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More than 60 Health and Advocacy Groups Urge Trump to Fire Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Today, 61 organizations sent President Donald Trump a letter urging him to immediately fire Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., calling him the “source of chaos” at the U.S.’s top health agency.
In an effort led by Public Citizen and Protect Our Care, the groups call on Trump to replace Kennedy with someone who has a “demonstrated track record of experience and integrity.” The letter states Kennedy continues to undermine Americans’ health while sowing mistrust and limiting access to vaccines. The letter points to alarming moments under Kennedy’s watch including the mishandling of the 2025 measles outbreak, the firing of Center for Disease Control director Dr. Susan Monarez and cuts to billions of dollars in grant money and thousands of firings at the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
“Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is the most dangerous individual ever to hold the title of Secretary of Health and Human Services,” said Public Citizen Co-President Lisa Gilbert. “President Trump and Senate Republicans made a grievous error when entrusting Kennedy with our nation’s health, with results both horrible and entirely predictable. It is far past time that President Trump rectifies this error by firing Kennedy before more lives are unnecessarily put at risk by Kennedy’s anti-science views and gross mismanagement.”
Separately, in a letter released Wednesday, more than 1,000 HHS workers demanded Kennedy resign from the position, emphasizing that Kennedy is unfit to run the agency.
Read the letter sent by Public Citizen and other health groups here.
Public Citizen is a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization that champions the public interest in the halls of power. We defend democracy, resist corporate power and work to ensure that government works for the people - not for big corporations. Founded in 1971, we now have 500,000 members and supporters throughout the country.
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Platner Raises 3 Times as Much as Mills, Collins Combined in Small Donations in Final Quarter of 2025
"Remember back when the national media said our campaign was dead?" said the Democratic Senate candidate.
Feb 02, 2026
At a campaign event over the weekend, Democratic US Senate candidate Graham Platner repeated a message that's been central to his campaign since it launched last August: that his goal of serving in the Senate is about "movement politics" more than attaining a position of power for himself.
“If we win this race, with this kind of politics and building this kind of organizational capacity,” Platner told the crowd that had packed into the AmVets hall in Yarmouth, Maine on Saturday, “then we get to point to this and show them it works. We get to inspire others in other states. We get to show them that you can win Senate seats with a working-class movement.”
On Monday, new fundraising numbers released by the progressive candidate's campaign on social media showed that Maine voters are responding to Platner's call to help build people-powered movement.
In the fourth quarter of 2025, the veteran and oyster farmer's campaign brought in $3.2 million from people who donated less than $200—about three times the amount collected by Platner's top competitor in the Democratic primary, Gov. Janet Mills, and Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) combined.
Mills brought in $822,000 in the fourth quarter while the longtime Republican senator reported $230,000 in donations.
Teachers had the most common occupation among Platner's small-dollar donors, according to the campaign.
Platner released the fundraising data soon after announcing the "207 Tour"—a statewide tour currently scheduled to go until at least May with stops in the southern coastal town of York, Fort Kent on the Canadian border, and tiny inland towns like Liberty and Appleton.
Collins has not faced Mainers at a town hall in over two decades, Platner has noted.
"I don't know how we've reached a time when Mainers cannot count on politicians to show up in their communities and openly and honestly answer questions. Our campaign is doing things differently because I'd actually like to hear from you," said Platner last week. "Wherever you are, I'll see you there."
Beyond small-dollar fundraising, the Platner campaign is aiming to mobilize a grassroots army of volunteers across the state and that’s what the slate of town halls in dozens of communities is designed to help build.
The 207 Tour so far appears to offer more proof that Platner's campaign platform—which demands a Medicare for All system to replace for-profit health insurance, a repeal of Citizens United to "ban billionaires buying elections," and a billionaire minimum tax—is resonating with Maine voters.
He spoke to 500 people in Yarmouth, a town of 9,000 people. That same day, 100 people crowded into a venue in South Paris (population: 2,000), and 85 people joined him Sunday at a town hall in Isleboro, a town of fewer than 600 people which is accessible only by ferry.
In Liberty, Platner was greeted with a standing ovation on Sunday.
"Remember back when the national media said our campaign was dead?" he said on social media, referring to stories that broke just as Mills entered the Democratic primary race in October, pertaining to a tattoo that resembled a Nazi symbol—which had never before raised alarm and which Platner subsequently had covered up—and old Reddit posts he had written that he said no longer reflected his worldview.
The controversies did not slow his momentum, with voters at his campaign events responding positively to Platner's candid comments about how his views have changed throughout his life.
Organizer and attorney Aaron Regunberg said Sunday that Democratic consultants and pundits who wrote off Platner last fall "shouldn’t be allowed to keep being so wrong all the time and still have jobs."
In overall fundraising in the last quarter of 2025, Platner outpaced both of his rivals, reporting $4.6 million in total donations. He has $3.7 million in cash on hand.
Mills reported $2.7 million for the period and has $1.3 million in available cash after the fourth quarter, and Collins raised $2.2 million and has $8 million in cash on hand.
A number of recent polls have also shown Platner favored to win in the primary and general election.
In recent weeks, Platner has taken Collins to task for supporting a funding bill for the Department of Homeland Security even as President Donald Trump's mass deportation campaign came to Maine and swept up numerous people who had not committed any crimes—and for taking credit when Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents were ending "enhanced" operations in the state.
In Yarmouth, Platner acknowledged he has built a reputation as a bit of a "bomb-throwing populist" with some of his campaign rhetoric—"and I am," he promised.
But he also said he does not want to go to Washington, DC just to "get in fights with people" with whom he disagrees—but to push for policies that his growing "movement" is demanding by working with anyone he can.
"When we're talking about policy that impacts people's lives and livelihoods," he said, "things don't happen just because you're holding grudge against somebody."
"The point is to go down there and pass things and build power," said Platner. "Sometimes it's not going to work, but that's also why we need to build that secondary power—the movement power—to impose [our power] at those times when relationships won't work."
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Five-Alarm Fire Warning After Trump Says 'Republicans Ought to Nationalize the Voting'
"His outbursts are real threats, but they come from weakness," said one critic of the president. "Tough shit, he's going down."
Feb 02, 2026
President Donald Trump on Monday declared that the Republican Party should "nationalize the voting" in the US and take away individual states' power to administer their elections.
While speaking with Dan Bongino, a former FBI deputy director and current podcaster, Trump rehashed the false allegations he's made in the past about Democrats only winning elections through the help of undocumented immigrants.
"These people were brought to our country to vote, and they vote illegally!" Trump falsely claimed. "Amazing that the Republicans aren't tougher on it. The Republicans should say... 'We should take over the voting in at least... 15 places.' The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting."
Trump: "These people were brought to our country to vote, and they vote illegally. The Republicans should say, we should take over the voting in at least 15 places. The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting. We have states that I won that show I didn't win. You're gonna see… pic.twitter.com/H5hT3OvtLE
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) February 2, 2026
Trump then continued to rehash his lies about winning the 2020 election that he lost to former President Joe Biden.
"We have states that are so crooked, and they're counting votes, we have states that I won that show I didn't win!" he said. "Now, you're going to see something in Georgia, where they were able to get with a court order the ballots, you're going to see some interesting things come out. But, you know, the 2020 election, I won that election by so much. And everybody knows it!"
In fact, Trump lost the 2020 election to Biden at both the national level and in the state of Georgia, which has a Republican governor, a Republican secretary of state, and a Republican-run Legislature.
Last week, the FBI executed a search warrant at Georgia's Fulton County election hub and hauled out boxes of ballots as part of an investigation related to the 2020 election.
Some Trump critics reacted to his latest outburst about "nationalizing" the vote by noting how incredibly unlikely the president would be to succeed in such an endeavor.
"Neither Trump nor the GOP in Congress have this power, and the only way they do this is if we decline to stand up for our rights," wrote Ezra Levin, co-executive director of Indivisible, in a social media post. "He's had a string of electoral defeats and rightfully fears the midterms. His outbursts are real threats, but they come from weakness. Tough shit, he's going down. No Kings."
MS NOW contributor Philip Bump also expressed skepticism about Trump's scheme, which conflicts with Article I of the US Constitution.
"Trump doesn't have the power to federalize elections, which obviously doesn't mean it's OK that he's saying things like this," he wrote. "The stuff about ginning up bullshit in Atlanta—we'll see."
Political strategist Murshed Zaheed likewise advised his social media followers to "take a deep breath" before panicking over Trump's plans.
"Trump cannot change election/voting rules with [executive orders]," he wrote. "Of course they are going to try crazy stuff—but this is desperate attempt to gin up fear."
Other critics, however, said that Trump's remarks needed to be taken as a direct threat to democratic governance.
"He’s saying the quiet part out loud," said Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.). "Trump and MAGA Republicans can’t win with their unpopular policies at the ballot box, so they want to steal the 2026 election."
Dartmouth political scientist Brendan Nyhan expressed even greater alarm.
"The last time he started talking like this, his allies minimized the risks and we ended up with January 6," he warned, referring to the deadly riots carried out by Trump supporters on the US Capitol that sent lawmakers running for their lives. "This time we must take him literally and seriously. These comments are a five-alarm fire for democracy. In a functioning republic, he would be impeached and removed from office today."
Trump's comments come as Republicans in Congress push a bill that would enable massive voter purges, impose photo ID requirements, and ban ranked-choice voting, universal mail-in ballots, and the acceptance of mailed ballots that arrive after Election Day.
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Trump Admin Condemned for Pushing Big Oil Leases in Arctic Refuge
The Bureau of Land Management is seeking nominations for which parts of ANWR's Coastal Plane should be offered up to fossil fuel companies for potential drilling.
Feb 02, 2026
The Trump administration on Monday took the first step toward holding controversial oil and gas lease sales in the Coastal Plane of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
The Bureau of Land Management announced on Monday that it was seeking nominations for which parts of ANWR's Coastal Plane should be offered up to fossil fuel companies for potential drilling, fulfilling a mandate passed by the US Senate in late 2025. However, the move goes against the wishes of Indigenous people who consider the plane sacred as well as conservationists, scientists, and many members of the American public who value US public lands for their beauty and wildlife.
“People have worked together for decades to defend the Arctic Refuge, because this unique landscape is too special to be sacrificed to the oil industry for profit," Earthjustice managing attorney Erik Grafe said in a statement. "Tripling down on oil development in the Arctic takes us in exactly the wrong direction in our existential fight to curb climate change and protect these critically important public lands."
The sales would continue US President Donald Trump's push to increase oil and gas production, including in Alaska, ramping up an agenda that has dominated both of his terms. The Senate's action in 2025 followed an October decision by the Department of the Interior (DOI) to open the Coastal Plane to drilling, overriding Biden-era protections. The DOI, led by pro-fossil fuel Doug Burgum, also reversed Biden administration protections for Alaska's Western Arctic.
"The Arctic Refuge is no place for drilling."
"The Trump administration spent 2025 waging an all-out assault on public lands in Alaska’s Arctic, while ignoring the voices of Indigenous communities that hold these lands sacred and jeopardizing the survival of Arctic wildlife," Grafe said. "We’ve already taken steps to challenge Interior’s overall leasing plan for the Arctic Refuge in court, and we’re prepared to continue the fight as this lease sale process grinds on.”
The Trump administration's plan for the Arctic faces wide opposition—public comments on nominations for portions of the Western Arctic to lease featured tens of thousands of calls for protection rather than exploitation.
However, opponents of the plan also noted it may not be as popular with the industry as Trump hopes. Lease sales in ANWR in 2021 and 2024 received little interest from oil and gas companies, with the latter not receiving a single bid.
“The Trump administration is hung up on oil and gas leasing in the Arctic Refuge because they cannot admit that the original Trump leasing plan—established following the 2017 Tax Act—was a complete and utter failure,” said Kristen Moreland, executive director of the Gwich’in Steering Committee, in a statement.
The Alaska Wilderness League appealed to the industry itself, noting that the area has some of the highest production costs on the continent while being an increasingly difficult place to work due to extreme weather and other changes caused by the climate crisis, an uncertain regulatory environment, competition from cheaper forms of renewable energy, and the fact that many Americans do not support drilling in the Arctic.
“Serious companies don’t gamble their future on the most remote, expensive, and controversial oil on Earth from one of the most unparalleled ecosystems left on this planet,” said league executive director Kristen Miller. “If companies are still looking to drill the Arctic Refuge in 2026, it’s a sign that they can’t read the writing on the wall: Smart money has already walked away.”
But whatever the decision of the oil and gas industry, Indigenous communities and their allies are determined to fight for the land that is home to polar bears, millions of birds, and the Porcupine caribou herd.
“We condemn these actions, and encourage officials in the Trump administration—and our representatives in the Alaska delegation—to acknowledge and accept what we as Gwich’in know, and what the majority of the American people agree on: The Arctic Refuge is no place for drilling," Moreland continued. "It deserves to be protected and preserved for the wildlife that depend on it, and for all our futures.”
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