# RFK, Jr. Downplays VAERS After Years of Citing It

by Veronika Kyrylenko Posted on February 14, 2025
AP Images
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
Article audio sponsored by The John Birch Society

In his first interview as Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. delivered an astonishing reversal on one of the central pillars of his own past criticism of the Covid vaccines — the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS).

Fox News’ Laura Ingraham asked him, “Do you think the COVID vaccine was safe, and the boosters were safe? A lot of people talk about adverse effects.”

Kennedy, who has repeatedly criticized vaccines as unsafe, avoided giving a direct answer, stating, “We don’t have good data on it, and that is a crime. The fact that we don’t have a surveillance system that actually works.”

He then proceeded to cite VAERS, arguing that it captures only a fraction of all adverse events.

For years, Kennedy and Children’s Health Defense (CHD), a national nonprofit that he founded and chaired between 2015 and April 2023, insisted that VAERS data provided damning evidence of the dangers of Covid vaccines.

This abrupt about-face raises serious questions about Kennedy’s integrity and whether his previous public statements were ever rooted in genuine conviction — or simply a means to an end.

#### VAERS in Kennedy’s Book

VAERS, the national vaccine safety monitoring system, has long been Kennedy’s primary ammunition against mass Covid vaccination. While he told Fox News’ Laura Ingraham that system was supposed to “pick up injuries,” in reality, it serves as an early warning tool showing that a vaccine requires further investigation — a distinction Kennedy himself once understood.

In his book The Real Anthony Fauci, Kennedy cited VAERS extensively. He quoted the system’s “hockey stick” graph (p.87), which illustrated a massive spike in deaths following the Covid vaccine rollout. Kennedy did not just acknowledge VAERS — he used it as proof of what he called an unprecedented wave of vaccine-related fatalities.

He further emphasized VAERS’ significance, pointing to 800,000 recorded injuries within the first nine and a half months of vaccine distribution — 112,000 of them classified as “serious” (p.90).

Kennedy also referenced one of the earliest in-depth analyses proving the vaccine’s harms, referencing, besides VAERS, other databases (p. 88):

> A September 2021 analysis by a team of prominent scientists and mathematicians conveyed by Silicon Valley entrepreneur Steve Kirsch — of half a dozen population and surveillance database system databases, including VAERS — using eight different independent methods, attributes 150,000 deaths to COVID vaccines in the United States since January 2020.

Kennedy’s stance was clear: VAERS was a legitimate source of data, and its numbers painted a catastrophic picture.

#### VAERS in Kennedy’s Twitter Feed

Throughout the pandemic, Kennedy regularly cited VAERS on his social media to support his claims about vaccine dangers.

As early as January 2021, just weeks after the first Covid vaccine rollout, Kennedy urged “anyone who suffered a vaccine side effect” to report it to VAERS.

From that point forward, Kennedy frequently posted VAERS updates as proof of vaccine harm. Here are just a few of his posts:

Again, Kennedy evidently relied on VAERS to build his case against mass vaccination.

#### Kennedy’s Flip on VAERS: What Changed?

Now, as HHS secretary, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. claims VAERS is unreliable for determining the safety of Covid vaccines and boosters. His justification? A 2010 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) study showing VAERS captures less than one percent of vaccine injuries — a fact well known for more than a decade.

If VAERS is too flawed to trust, what was the foundation for Kennedy’s years-long insistence that Covid vaccines were deadly?

In March 2023, Kennedy told Sasha Latypova, a prominent CHD collaborator and former pharmaceutical executive, that the Covid vaccination campaign was “mass murder.”

Meanwhile, as of January 31, 2025 VAERS had recorded 1,660,411 reports of adverse reactions since the rollout. If the system truly does not account for 99 percent of actual cases, the real number could exceed 166 million injuries. Similarly, 38,398 reported cases of deaths translate into 3.84 million deaths — a scale of harm that completely upends the narrative on vaccine safety.

Interestingly, Steve Kirsch — previously quoted by Kennedy himself — estimated the VAERS underreporting factor could be as high as 41. If true, the real toll of these vaccines is beyond comprehension.

Yet now, rather than acting on this data, Kennedy claims we need to “fix” VAERS.

#### Flip on Operation Warp Speed

Kennedy’s transformation does not stop with VAERS. Largely overlooked — or excused as a slick tactic to get confirmed — was his reversal on Operation Warp Speed (OWS). In late January, during his Senate confirmation hearings, he hailed OWS as an “extraordinary accomplishment” — twice.

This is the same OWS that, in September 2023, Kennedy described as militarized and monetized totalitarian project run by the intelligence apparatus.

Back then, he warned that OWS was not led by public health agencies such HHS or its subsidiaries such the CDC, National Institutes of Health, or Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Kennedy claimed that the leading agency managing the project was the National Security Agency (NSA). And the second one was the Pentagon, he said, quoting OWS’s organizational chart. (It must be noted, however, that the unclassified chart that Kennedy likely referred to does not include the NSA as a prime manager of OWS.)

Kennedy then described the development and manufacturing of Covid vaccines within this framework as “a military operation from the start.” He even linked vaccine development to U.S. secret bioweapons programs.

Yet during his hearings, he avoided any mention of this, instead claiming that President Donald Trump considered numerous non-vaccine interventions to address the pandemic. That comes across as sleight of hand. The reality is that OWS funneled nearly all of its $18 billion into vaccines. Only a fraction — less than $1 billion — was allocated to therapeutics, relegating alternative treatments to the sidelines.

#### Kennedy’s Power Play: From Outsider to the System

As HHS secretary, Kennedy now holds significant influence over vaccine policy. While he cannot revoke FDA approvals, he can influence distribution by modifying federal contracts, limiting funding for vaccine campaigns, or launching new safety investigations.

All Covid vaccines remain shielded from liability under the Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness (PREP) Act until December 31, 2029. Kennedy has the authority to amend or revoke this protection.

While most Covid vaccines are fully approved, some booster doses and pediatric versions still rely on Emergency Use Authorizations (EUAs) — which Kennedy can revoke under Section 564 of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. Notably, Covid vaccines are a part of the CDC’s childhood vaccination schedule — a policy that Kennedy unequivocally endorsed during his confirmation hearings.

In other words, Kennedy has the power to disrupt the vaccine rollout. The real question is whether he’ll stand by his past convictions — or surrender to the system he once condemned.

#### Kennedy’s Test — Reformer or Bureaucrat?

Kennedy built his brand as a fearless critic of the government. Now, he is a part of the government. The man who once exposed regulatory failures now oversees the very agencies he exposed and sued. The outsider who warned of intelligence control over public health now navigates its inner workings.

So what will he do? His first moves suggest not revolution, but recalibration — distancing himself from past rhetoric while embracing the realities of power. His supporters may still hope for bold action, but Washington has a way of tempering idealists. If Kennedy truly believes the system is broken, he now has the authority to fix it. The question is: Will he? Or will he, like so many before him, find that governance looks very different from the inside?

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#### Veronika Kyrylenko

Veronika is a writer with a passion for holding the powerful accountable, no matter their political affiliation. With a Ph.D. in Political Science from Odessa National University (Ukraine), she brings a sharp analytical eye to domestic and foreign policy, international relations, the economy, and healthcare.

Veronika’s work is driven by a belief that freedom is worth defending, and she is dedicated to keeping the public informed in an era where power often operates without scrutiny.

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