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President Donald Trump is pushing U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to do more to investigate a possible link between vaccines and autism, according to a Wall Street Journal (WSJ) report published late Monday.
According to the report, based largely on information provided by anonymous sources “familiar with the matter,” Trump asked Kennedy at a May lunch at the president’s golf course in northern Virginia why the secretary wasn’t doing more to probe the vaccine-autism connection.
Trump told Kennedy he “had the yips,” an anonymous source told WSJ.
Kennedy was reportedly taken aback, given that White House advisers had asked him to tone down his work around vaccine safety in advance of the midterm elections, the WSJ said.
Trump also reportedly told Kennedy he wanted him to do more to reduce the number of childhood vaccine recommendations, and that he wants to see autism rates go down, the WSJ said.
According to the anonymous sources, the president thinks he has given Kennedy enough time to work on these issues and is disappointed that the secretary hasn’t accomplished more in the last year and a half.
Some sources said Kennedy will fail if he does not make more progress.
The WSJ said that the issue of vaccines has been a point of contention between Trump and Kennedy.
However, when asked to comment on the WSJ report, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Press Secretary Emily Hilliard told The Defender:
“Secretary Kennedy and President Trump are aligned in their commitment to confronting the chronic disease epidemic affecting America’s children through rigorous, gold-standard science.
“HHS will continue to pursue evidence-based research to identify the root causes of autism and other chronic diseases, advance prevention strategies, and improve the health of the American people.”
Kennedy has done a great deal on vaccines, Reuters reports
Although the WSJ report suggests that Trump thinks Kennedy should have already accomplished more on vaccines, Kennedy has done more during his brief tenure as HHS secretary on vaccine-related issues than most of his predecessors, according to a Reuters special report published July 14.
The Reuters report, written as a hit piece on Kennedy, revealed how hard Kennedy has worked on the issue.
According to Reuters, key highlights of Kennedy’s vaccine policies include “winding down mRNA vaccine development, withdrawing funding for an international vaccine alliance and tightening access to COVID shots.”
In August 2025, Kennedy canceled $500 million in federal contracts and grants earmarked for the development of mRNA vaccines. However, in its story last month, Reuters didn’t report that advisers to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration have since recommended the agency approve Moderna’s mRNA flu vaccine.
In June 2025, Kennedy announced that the federal government would stop funding Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, a public-private partnership that promotes childhood vaccination globally.
The Gates Foundation is the largest private donor to Gavi. The foundation, which also funded Gavi’s launch in 1999, holds a permanent seat on Gavi’s board. The Gates Foundation and Gavi are also two of the largest donors to the World Health Organization (WHO).
The Trump administration formally withdrew the U.S. from the WHO earlier this year, making good on a pledge it made soon after Trump took office in 2025.
In October 2025, the U.S. adopted new COVID-19 vaccine guidance after a vote by the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) to recommend “individual-based decision-making” for COVID-19 vaccination for people ages 6 months to 64 years. ACIP advises the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on vaccine policy.
In May 2025, the CDC stopped recommending the COVID-19 shot for healthy children and healthy pregnant women. That change, and subsequent changes, prompted the American Academy of Pediatrics and other medical groups to sue Kennedy and HHS.
In March 2026, a federal court stayed the changes to COVID-19 vaccine policy, along with other vaccine policy changes the agency had approved. In May, HHS appealed the federal court’s ruling. The appeal is pending.
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Government committed to finding answers to parents’ questions about autism
According to the WSJ’s report, White House spokesman Kush Desai said that the countless U.S. parents who have questions and concerns about “America’s skyrocketing autism rates have long been ignored if not mocked.”
Desai said the Trump administration is “committed to leaving no stone unturned to finally address these concerns with Gold Standard Science.”
In January, Kennedy launched the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC) to advise him and the federal government on issues related to autism.
IACC member John Gilmore told The Defender in an earlier interview that the committee’s “first order of business” was to “answer the many unanswered questions about autism.”
Earlier this month, the IACC released a draft strategic plan that could lead to a new direction in federal autism policy, Dr. Elizabeth Mumper told The Defender in an earlier interview.
Mumper, a pediatrician and founder and CEO of the Rimland Center for Integrative Medicine, is a member of IACC.
She said IACC’s plan calls for “a shift … from the ‘autism is genetic and predetermined mindset’ to recognizing the phenomenon of neurodevelopmental regression and complex medical problems that coexist with autism and are eminently treatable.”
The White House did not immediately respond to The Defender’s request for comment.
Related articles in The Defender
- Reuters Ran a Hit Piece on RFK Jr. — and Revealed How Hard He’s Worked to Reform Vaccine Policy
- Trump Signs Executive Order Backing HHS on Childhood Vaccine Reform — Will It Matter?
- RFK Jr. Leading ‘Intense,’ Multi-Agency Study on Childhood Vaccine Safety, New York Times Reports
- RFK Jr. to Create COVID Vaccine Injury Table — Will More People Finally Be Compensated for Injuries?
- Federal Government Appeals Ruling in AAP Lawsuit that Struck Down RFK Jr.’s Vaccine Policies
- ‘Uncompromising and Relentless’: HHS to Study All Possible Causes of Autism, Including Vaccines
