RFK Jr. wins Senate committee vote as Tulsi Gabbard faces test

RFK Jr. won the backing of a Senate committee to beryllium President Trump’s wellness caput with party-line enactment from Republicans portion Tulsi Gabbard faces a akin trial aboriginal Tuesday.

The arguable vaccine skeptic won a 14-13 vote successful the committee, including the backing of Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-Louisiana), a aesculapian doc who sharply questioned the nominee’s views connected immunizations and was considered a imaginable nary vote.

Kennedy’s information present heads to the afloat Senate, wherever helium has decent likelihood of winning confirmation contempt heavy concerns from Democrats astir the years of enactment he’s done sowing unfounded doubts astir vaccines.

He would request the enactment of all but 3 Republicans if Democrats ballot successful lockstep to reason him arsenic expected.

Republican Sens. Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky are each seen arsenic imaginable nary votes.

Tulsi Gabbard, President Donald Trump’s nominee to beryllium Director of National Intelligence, arrives to attest during her confirmation proceeding earlier the Senate Intelligence Committee successful the Dirksen Senate Office Building connected January 30, 2025 successful Washington, DC. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

In a CBS “60 Minutes” interrogation that aired Sunday, McConnell, a puerility polio survivor, declined to accidental however helium would ballot connected RFK Jr. but reiterated “vaccines are critically important.”

Meanwhile, Gabbard picked up the endorsement of Collins up of a ballot successful the quality committee to go manager of nationalist intelligence.

The arguable erstwhile Democratic congresswoman from Hawaii angered immoderate Republicans astatine her committee proceeding by refusing to disavow her past enactment of Edward Snowden. She has besides raised hackles with her pro-Russia views and her cozy ties to ousted Syrian dictator Bashir al-Assad.

Still, astir Senate vote-counters judge astir each GOP lawmakers volition shelve their concerns astir Gabbard to debar crossing Trump.