R.F.K. JR. GOES NUTS
Fired C.D.C. director Susan Monarez revealed in a Senate hearing on Wednesday that R.F.K. Jr. spoke with Trump “every day” about changing the vaccine recommendations for children, including the polio vaccine (which R.F.K. Jr. once falsely claimed killed “many, many, many, many, many more people than polio ever did”) and the hepatitis-B vaccine (which has brought the number of infected newborns each year from 9,000 to almost none). One White House insider reports that Trump has started running out of excuses to dodge R.F.K. Jr.’s daily calls. (Saying he had a doctor’s appointment resulted in 50 missed calls and 112 texts like: “Whatever you do, do NOT go to the doctor. My shaman Neal has an organic medicinal caviar that works wonders. It’s called taenia solium.”)
the VACCINE DEBATE GETS TESTY
In his opening remarks at the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices meeting this week—in which members rock-paper-scissored over whether to reintroduce polio or smallpox to the American school system courtesy of their freshly gutted vaccine policy—committee chair Martin Kulldorff challenged nine former C.D.C. directors who had previously described the committee’s hastily appointed members as “unqualified” and “dangerous” in a New York Times op-ed to an “open public debate.” Kulldorff, who was fired from Harvard Medical School in 2024 for refusing to receive the coronavirus vaccine, followed up on his thrown gauntlet with an observant query: “A key question is, Who can you trust?” At this point, we’d trust Typhoid Mary over R.F.K. Jr.’s Island of Misfit M.D.’s.
THE SURGEON GENERAL GOES MAHA
Casey Means is putting her money where her mouth is. Actually, divesting her money from where her mouth is. The wellness influencer-cum-entrepreneur-cum-author has been nominated for surgeon general, and she’s vowing to clean up her finances by slaughtering her cash cows—including a partnership with an “algae supplement” company that earned her $27,000, another $79,000 in newsletter and social-media promotions—and unloading her family’s tobacco portfolio. No, thank you for smoking! The sugar on top of the MAHA militants’ latest appointment is the lack thereof: Means doesn’t do sugar. She prefers “unsweetened protein powder.”
THE C.D.C. GOES FOR THE JUGULAR
As if watching the C.D.C.’s downfall weren’t painful enough, MAHA is ending remote work for disabled employees, forcing them back to the office to witness the circus in person. The decision, which stems from the Trump administration’s directive earlier this year to end remote work for all federal staff, affects workers with disabilities ranging from multiple sclerosis to high-risk pregnancies—with some of them given less than 24 hours’ notice to return. Lawyers note the move may violate the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. But then again, skirting the law is this administration’s superpower.
Carolina de Armas and Paulina Prosnitz are Junior Editors at Air Mail
