Trump Makes Big Tobacco Great Again: Public Health Project Newsletter

Doom scrolling this week may have led you to the New York Times story on how a wildly successful CDC anti-smoking campaign has been shelved for over year as millions of dollars in big tobacco money funneled into Donald Trump’s political orbit. Protect Our Care followed up that reporting with a report, ‘Up In Smoke’ on the how the administration’s nonsensical retreat from warning Americans about the extreme risks of smoking is part of a dangerous pattern of Trump and RFK Jr. selling out public health to big tobacco interests, not just to pad profits of a major Republican donor industry, but to bolster Trump’s personal stock portfolio.

Measles Cases Poised to Break Record By End of Summer: The Washington Post reports, in “roughly half the time”, the U.S. is “on the brink of surpassing last year’s total measles cases, putting the country on track to set a new record before summer’s end”. This is a prime example of what former CDC chief medical officer Dr. Debra Houry was talking about on Face The Nation when she declared Trump health secretary has “caused a lot of irreparable harm.” As Protect Our Care has documented, Kennedy has used every bureaucratic tool at his disposal to stoke anti-vax fear without proof, which further sabotaged vaccination rates and gave way for measles to roar back after decades of dormancy.

Little Attention Paid to U.S. Airman Killed By Trump Anti-Vax Agenda: Last week came the confirmation that the recent death of an Air Force recruit at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland was “caused by a flu virus that has swept the base” on the heels of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s asinine order to rescind the flu vaccine requirement in April. The blood of Keon Talik McDaniel is on the hands of not only Hegseth, but Trump health secretary RFK Jr. As Protect Our Care president Brad Woodhouse lamented: “Secretary Hegseth marched in line with RFK Jr.’s baseless anti-vax agenda and it got a U.S. soldier killed. Hegseth rolled the dice with the lives of American service members by removing a safe and proven shield against deadly disease — and predictably lost. Military readiness suffered and a young Airman paid the ultimate price for Hegseth’s incompetence and arrogance. If Hegseth and Health Secretary Kennedy have any honor, their resignations will be on the president’s desk today.”

Except that hasn’t happened; the Trump administration has taken no responsibility and pretends it never happened with the help of little media attention.

RFK Jr.-Founded Anti-Vax Group Stands By Accused Child Murderer They Used As Prop For Propaganda: In easily the most depressing news of the week via the NYT: “On May 1, 2025, a young mother in a small Idaho town said she found her 18-month-old twins dead in their bed, cold and lying on their bellies. Three days later, she sat for an interview with Children’s Health Defense, the anti-vaccine nonprofit co-founded by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., claiming that vaccines caused their deaths…The organization quickly embraced the woman, Andrea Renee Shaw, naming her the lead plaintiff in two legal actions against the nation’s top society of pediatricians claiming that the organization, the American Academy of Pediatrics, lied about the safety of childhood vaccines. Then, last week, after a nearly 14-month investigation by the Payette Police Department, a grand jury indicted Ms. Shaw, 23, on charges of murder, claiming that she suffocated the children in an act that was either premeditated or taken in the course of aggravated battery.”

And yet, Children’s Health Defense is not “backing down from [the] claim that vaccines killed both children.” What a sick, sad legacy of RFK Jr.’s.

A Match Made In Heaven: Popular Information dove into a cozy relationship we should have all seen coming, the Church of Scientology and RFK Jr.: “The Trump administration has engaged in a lengthy campaign to discourage the use of antidepressants. The effort has been led by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has spent years spreading misinformation about these types of medications. … Kennedy’s claims about antidepressants mirror those of the Church of Scientology, which has a long history of disdain for psychiatry and has targeted psychiatric medications for decades. Kennedy has an ongoing financial relationship with a law firm connected to Scientology that has pursued numerous lawsuits against antidepressant manufacturers.”

Of course, Kennedy has never shied away from conflicts of interest before, why stop now?

In The News

Infectious Disease Outbreaks and Public Health Threats

Measles

Other Public Health Threats