Judge won't let RFK Jr. out of lawsuit over vaccine directives and alleged advisory panel biases
Source: Law & Crime
Jan 8th, 2026, 1:20 pm
Updated Jan 8th, 2026, 4:08 pm
A lawsuit challenging Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s recommendations on the COVID-19 vaccine can move forward, a federal judge has ruled.
U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy wrote in his 22-page order that the individual people and professional medical associations — led by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) — that filed suit were well within their right to do so, denying a challenge from Kennedy to have the complaint thrown out.
The case can be traced back to May 2025, when Kennedy announced an order for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) "to remove from the routine CDC Schedules the recommendation that pregnant women and 'healthy' children receive the COVID vaccine." The agency subsequently changed the routine recommendation to a "Shared Clinical Decision Making" (SCDM) designation, which the AAP says is "typically reserved for vaccines where the risk/benefit analysis is less clear or complex."
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) continued making changes. On June 9, 2025, Kennedy fired all 17 existing members of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), a federal advisory committee established under the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA) to create "evidence-based recommendations for the use of vaccines." He then appointed new members, whom the AAP alleges are unqualified and were only chosen "based on the candidates' alignment with Secretary Kennedy's 'anti-vaccine agenda.'"
Read more: https://lawandcrime.com/high-profile/no-basis-judge-wont-let-rfk-jr-duck-lawsuit-over-change-in-vaccine-recommendations/
Full headline: 'Does not follow that the membership is fairly balanced': Judge won't let RFK Jr. out of lawsuit over vaccine directives and alleged advisory panel biases
Link to ORDER (PDF viewer) - https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/26462244-murphy-rfk/
Link to ORDER (PDF) - https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/26462244/murphy-rfk.pdf
REFERENCES
https://www.democraticunderground.com/10143492496
https://www.democraticunderground.com/10143515192
https://www.democraticunderground.com/10143583982
https://www.democraticunderground.com/10143587887
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