By Bo Erickson and Leah Douglas
WASHINGTON, April 1 (Reuters) – Supporters of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. are pressing for a fight for the U.S. vaccine overhaul their “Make America Healthy Again” movement helped create.
But two weeks after a court ruling halted key aspects of the vaccine revamp, the Trump administration has not taken any steps to appeal, a delay longer than for other cases where President Donald Trump has aggressively fought federal rulings challenging his agenda.
Meanwhile, Republicans are busy strategizing how best to defend slim majorities in the U.S. House and Senate in November’s midterm elections, complicating the vaccine fight.
The Trump administration is still weighing whether to appeal, according to four senior administration officials, as it works through which health issues are most voter friendly.
The administration must balance the support of millions of Kennedy’s MAHA backers, who were already upset by Trump’s order to boost pesticide production, against low general public support for his vaccine agenda. MAHA is seen as an important constituency whose votes were key to Trump’s win in the 2024 election.
“The White House has a very delicate needle to thread here because it wants to preserve all of its coalition heading into the midterms,” said Jeff Grappone, a Republican political strategist.
Kennedy co-founded the anti-vaccine group Children’s Health Defense, and has tied vaccines to autism, a theory long debunked by science. A Reuters poll in February found bipartisan support for childhood vaccinations.
Asked if they intended to appeal the case, the White House did not respond. “Unless officially announced by us, any assertions about what we are doing next is baseless speculation,” said Health and Human Services spokesperson Andrew Nixon.
LACK OF ACTION
On March 16, a federal judge ruled that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention acted unlawfully in January, when it sharply cut the number of broadly recommended childhood vaccinations.
The judge also said Kennedy’s removal and replacement of all members of a vaccine advisory committee to the CDC with appointees ideologically aligned with his anti-vaccine view was unlawful.
To move quickly on an appeal, the Justice Department could have preemptively asked Boston-based U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy, an appointee of Democratic President Joe Biden, to put the ruling on hold, a tactic it has used in other cases.
It could also have asked Murphy to reconsider his order or move to appeal the decision to the Boston-based 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, a precursor to pursuing any further appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. It can still appeal under a 60-day window.
George Washington University law professor Sara Rosenbaum, a former vaccine committee member who filed a friend-of-the-court brief in support of the plaintiffs, said the lack of action was noteworthy.
In other cases, the administration has been “kapow, turning around and filing your appeal before the ink was dry,” she said.
On Tuesday, the administration took just hours to appeal a judge’s ruling that blocked construction of Trump’s planned $400 million White House ballroom.
NEXT STEPS UNCLEAR
The four administration officials told Reuters the lack of action is because the path forward is still up in the air.
One official said it was considering an appeal focused on the removal of the committee members.
Another said a final decision had not been made on whether to appeal that part of the ruling, or to accept the ruling and remake the committee in line with the judge’s requirements. That official said Kennedy was still weighing his options.
The Health Department’s January vaccine announcement was seen as this year’s main action on vaccines, given how controversial the overhaul had been, two of the sources said.
Accepting the ruling could allow the White House and MAHA to pivot from the least popular part of the movement’s agenda to more favorable issues like children’s diets and technology use, said policy consultant Abby McCloskey, who has worked for Republicans.
“They should take the block and move on,” she said.
The White House in recent weeks urged its health policy focus away from vaccines to topics like healthy eating, two sources told Reuters.
Noel Brewer, a University of North Carolina public health professor who was on the original expert vaccines panel, said it was unclear if or how the previous members could be reinstated, and that any changes would not be quick. Brewer said the vetting process for new members typically takes a year, and his own took a year and a half.
One committee member, Dr. Robert Malone, said he has left the committee after speaking with Kennedy.
MAHA GROUPS WANT APPEAL
Key MAHA groups have an expectation that the court ruling will be appealed and overturned.
Tony Lyons, a longtime Kennedy ally and publisher of his books who is now president of MAHA Action, said on a March 18 webinar that Trump and Kennedy have demonstrated commitment to MAHA issues.
“While this is a short-term setback, the mission and the direction are clear,” he said.
Children’s Health Defense has tried to insert itself into the case despite opposition from the judge and the Justice Department. Last week, it appealed the judge’s decision excluding it and said it would appeal the vaccine committee ruling, though it would need to be a party to the case to do so.
“We will not allow this to stand,” said the group’s CEO, Mary Holland.
(Reporting by Leah Douglas and Bo Erickson in Washington; Additional reporting by Mike Erman in New York, Julie Steenhuysen in Chicago and Nate Raymond in Boston; Editing by Caroline Humer and Bill Berkrot)
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