As Vaccine Panel Meets for Last Time This Year, American Oversight Warns HHS Is Violating Federal Law, Jeopardizing Childhood Health

On Thursday, we sent a letter to Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., warning that his firing of respected medical experts and replacing them with figures with extreme anti-vaccine views on the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) violates the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA). We are calling for immediate corrective action to prevent an improperly constituted committee from issuing recommendations that could endanger the public’s health — including children, immunocompromised people, and people with disabilities — and undermine public trust in immunization policy.

“Parents should be able to trust that decisions about their children’s health are being made by independent, qualified experts — not by an advisory committee engineered to produce predetermined outcomes or to amplify fringe voices untethered to established science,” said our Executive Director Chioma Chukwu. “Federal law requires advisory bodies like ACIP to reflect a fair balance of viewpoints. Instead, Secretary Kennedy has demonstrated his contempt for scientific expertise by sidelining leading medical organizations, installing members who promote vaccine misinformation, and steering the nation toward dangerous, unsupported changes to immunization practices at a time when lapses in vaccination rates are already fueling a surge of preventable, and sometimes deadly, diseases. This is not just an unlawful procedural failure — it is a threat to the integrity of our public health system. Our children and most vulnerable populations deserve better.”

In our letter, we detailed how Secretary Kennedy’s mass firing of ACIP members, appointment of individuals who lack appropriate scientific balance, and removal of 30 non-voting liaison organizations — including the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Medical Association — have left the committee out of compliance with the statute, its charter, and its membership balance plan. Each of these authorities underscore the core requirement that federal advisory bodies reflect a fair cross-section of relevant expertise. These departures from long-standing norms are occurring just as ACIP prepares to vote on controversial changes to the childhood vaccine schedule.

American Oversight also notes that recent actions by the reconstituted ACIP — including attempts to scale back access to essential vaccines and to limit input from subject-matter experts — highlight why balanced membership is not merely a legal requirement but a public health imperative. We are calling on HHS to immediately restore expert representation and reinstate the liaison organizations critical to maintaining ACIP’s scientific rigor, transparency, and credibility.