Cassidy denounces Trump and Kennedy after backing health chief

Bill Cassidy, the Louisiana Republican who helped push Robert F. Kennedy Jr. into the nation’s top health job, is now denouncing both Kennedy and President Donald Trump as he heads toward the end of his Senate career. The break has sharpened into a public clash over vaccines, public health and the cost of going along with a president who still dominates the Republican Party.

Cassidy was the decisive Republican vote on the Senate Finance Committee when Kennedy’s nomination advanced on a 14-13 vote on Feb. 4, 2025. He then voted to confirm Kennedy as health and human services secretary on Feb. 13, 2025, after saying Kennedy had given him commitments on vaccines and public health. Cassidy’s support proved pivotal because the committee vote would have stalled without him.

That backing has become a political liability for Cassidy, who now says Kennedy broke those promises. He has accused Kennedy of running the nation’s public health system on a “foundation of lies,” a charge that lands with unusual force because Cassidy is the chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee and has long portrayed himself as a guardian of medical credibility and vaccine policy.

The rupture with Trump widened last week in the White House, where Cassidy had a reported shouting match with the president in a private meeting on June 25, 2026. Cassidy said the administration had not been honest with the American people about the conflict being discussed, underscoring how far the relationship had deteriorated between a senator who once helped Trump’s health nominee and a White House now facing one of its own GOP critics.

The timing matters. Cassidy lost his Louisiana Republican Senate primary on May 16, 2026, ending his bid for a third term. His current Senate term runs through Jan. 3, 2027, giving him less than seven months left in office as he turns from party ally to internal critic.

His reversal arrives amid broader turmoil around Kennedy and the Department of Health and Human Services, where lawmakers and health workers have criticized vaccine policy and cuts to mRNA research funding. Cassidy’s break now carries added weight because it comes not from a Democratic opponent, but from a Republican who helped clear the path for Kennedy in the first place.