Neal-Kennedy Showdown? (still via House Ways & Means/YouTube) 

In his opening remarks at a hearing with US Health & Human Services Secretary Robert Kennedy, Jr., Springfield Congressman and Ways & Means Committee Ranking Member Richard Neal alluded to their shared, if indirect history. As a young man, Neal supported Kennedy’s father, the OG Bobby Kennedy. Twelve years later, Neal was a delegate for Senator Edward Kennedy. He even recalled President John Kennedy’s stop in Springfield on the eve of his election in 1960.

Nostalgia aside, Neal also alluded to what made this particular scion of one of the nation’s most prominent political families anathema to so many others.

“We watch daily as the threats to this health care system that we have constructed, whether it’s talking about measles and vaccinations. We remember what it was like before Dr. Salk’s polio vaccine,” he said.

“Let me say this, nothing has changed about the science of vaccines,” Neal continued. “We need people not to be prayed upon by demagoguery and there should not be a politicization of these very issues.”

Kennedy’s vaccine skepticism had long ago alienated him from much of his storied family. However, his embrace of Trump and gutting of the United States’s public health infrastructure have made him stand out, even in this administration.

The US Public Health system did not always cover itself in glory during the COVID pandemic. Yet, Kennedy has ravaged the Centers for Disease Control and upended billions in grants the National Institutes for Health awards. Most controversially, he has sought to undermine the vaccine approval process, even as cases of measles have reached levels not seen in years.  That’s aside from other weird stuff Kennedy has allegedly done.

Jump scare. (via Wikipedia)

The Secretary’s appearance before the full Ways & Means Committee Thursday was his first. Neal was only one of many Democrats on Ways & Means who were eager to question Kennedy. For example, Alabama Democratic Terri Sewell accused Kennedy of saying children on certain behavior medication should be “re-parented.” Kennedy questioned whether he said this, although The Washington Post reported that he had.

However, Neal had another specific mission. He sought to highlight the risks the Trump agenda presents to Massachusetts.

“Regardless of party, we built in Massachusetts a mecca of health care for the world. We’re proud of it. It’s the gold standard,” he said.

Neal noted Spanish investment in biotech and the recent bipartisan celebration of the state’s 2006 health care law. The Springfield Democrat also noted that the Low-Income Heating Assistance Program, whose office Kennedy oversees, began thanks to Silvio Conte, a Republican from the Berkshires. Kennedy’s HHS has overseen layoffs at the program, but Neal’s observation seemed to take aim at his Republican colleagues on the committee, too.

This posture was consistent with one Neal has long taken as the dean of Massachusetts’s delegation. At the same time, it generated some B-roll he could use this election cycle. Neal is not one of the biggest Democratic antagonists of Trump in Congress. (Although, he has already attracted the ire of Elon Musk.) The congressman faces educator Jeromie Whalen in the Democratic primary this year.

The GOP seemed to have its own agenda like a focus on anodyne health matters and playing down the more controversial elements of Kennedy’s reign at HHS. However, one Republican hobby horse was stalking the committee room.  Ways & Means’s chair, Republican Jason Smith of Missouri, ended his opening statement with a focus on fraud.

Neal may be here again soon if he reclaims the Ways & Means gavel. (still via Ways & Means/YouTube)

In response, Neal rejected the implication that anybody is in favor of fraud. He listed a couple of individuals that had defrauded federal health care programs and received pardons from Trump. Kennedy had no knowledge of them.

“If we’re going to pursue fraudsters, it’s not just the people who might make simple, honest mistakes that could be corrected,” Neal said. “It’s the people at the top that help to perpetuate this fraud. And the administration’s position seems to be that it’s only the recipients and not the providers that commit fraud.”

There were no flare-ups between the two. Neal even acknowledged Kennedy for his staff’s work correcting an issue with Head Start in the congressman’s district. However, he tempered that praise by noting that not only high-ranking Democrats should be able to secure such a fix.

That may not last. Should Democrats take the House in this year’s election, Neal will become Ways & Means chair once again. The panel has jurisdiction over a wide swath of health programs. Kennedy may become a guest, maybe a frequent one, of Ways & Means in short order.