Aaron Siri, an attorney who is helping Robert F. Kennedy Jr. select health officials for President-elect Donald Trump, has been fighting against vaccines for years, including a petition with the federal government to revoke its approval of the polio vaccine.
Most of Siri's work, which includes the petition against the polio vaccine filed in 2022, is on behalf of the nonprofit Informed Consent Action Network, reports The New York Times.
The network's founder is a close Kennedy ally, and Siri represented Kennedy while he was still running for president.
Siri has also filed petitions demanding a pause in distributing 13 other vaccines. He has also challenged COVID vaccine mandates, sued federal agencies to disclose records on vaccine approvals, and grilled vaccine scientists through depositions.
Kennedy, Trump's pick to run the Department of Health and Human Services, has said that he doesn't want to remove access to vaccines, but his partnership with Siri is raising concerns, including among public health leaders.
Siri joined Kennedy at Trump's transition headquarters to interview candidates for top government health positions, including asking the candidates about their opinions on vaccines, according to a source said to have observed the interactions.
Further, Kennedy has reportedly said he wants Siri to serve as the HHS general counsel, but Siri says he may have more sway on vaccines and health policy by staying out of a government role. He oversees 40 professionals at his law firm, Siri & Glimstad, who work on vaccine cases and policy.
Kennedy, though, said on a podcast hosted by ICAN founder Del Bigtree, that he loves Siri, saying "There's nobody who's been a greater asset to the medical freedom movement than him."
Despite his petitions, Siri has insisted he doesn't want to take vaccines away from Americans who want them.
"You want to get the vaccine — it's America, a free country," he told lawmakers in Arizona last year while not mentioning the petitions he's presented for ICAN to withdraw approvals.
Siri declined a request from The Times for an interview.
Katie Miller, a Kennedy spokeswoman, said Siri has advised Kennedy but has not discussed his petitions with him or other health nominees.
"Mr. Kennedy has long said that he wants transparency in vaccines and to give people choice," she said.
But if he is confirmed as HHS secretary, he potentially could intervene in the FDA review of the vaccine petitions.
Trump, meanwhile, told Time magazine in an interview that there will be "very serious testing" of vaccines, and some will be stopped, "if I think it's dangerous, if I think they are not beneficial."
He also told NBC's "Meet the Press" that he's willing to have a review on vaccines and autism, but he singled out the polio vaccine as an exception of vaccines to bring to an end.
"The polio vaccine is the greatest thing," he said. "If someone told me get rid of the polio vaccine, they're going to have to work really hard to convince me."
While polio has been largely eradicated in the United States, there are still cases circulating worldwide.
"It's an airplane ride away," said Dr. Kathryn Edwards, a Vanderbilt University vaccine scientist.
Dr. Stanley Plotkin, who invented the rubella vaccine in the 1960s, said having Siri in a position of influence "would be a disaster."
He was deposed for nine hours in a lawsuit brought by Siri, and said he finds him "laughable" but feels he is a "danger to public health."
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
© 2024 Newsmax. All rights reserved.