RFK Jr under fire for ‘bullying’ letter to scientific journal

Robert F Kennedy Jr, the US health secretary, is demanding answers from a medical journal that recently removed a paper suggesting a link between vaccines and infant death, saying their decision was “of great interest to me”.

Public health advocates immediately criticized the move, and said Kennedy appeared to be trying to intimidate and influence the journal’s editorial process. The journal Toxicology Reports had removed the paper this spring after editors determined it was so seriously flawed it could harm patients and pose a risk to public health.

The letter, which Kennedy on Monday posted on X, asked the journal editor to answer several questions about how it arrived at its decision about the paper, which suggested a link between vaccines and sudden infant death syndrome, or Sids, by 25 June.

“If he is trying to use his position to bully a journal, he is stepping close to violating their first amendment rights,” Dorit Reiss, an expert in vaccine law at UC Law San Francisco, wrote in reply to his post on X.

Dr David Gorski, a surgical oncologist who has written extensively about the antivaccine movement, pointed out in a post that Kennedy has portrayed himself as pro-free speech, but that he was “apparently using the power of his position” to put pressure on an editorial decision by a private publisher.

“To antivaxxers, it’s free speech for me, but not for thee,” Gorski wrote on X.

Kennedy’s letter was dated one week after the Guardian published a story about the journal’s decision to take the rare step of removing the paper, which it said it did after an investigation had identified “serious methodological flaws”. It explained the decision in a five-paragraph notice it posted in place of the paper. It was one of three papers the Guardian highlighted that have been used by Kennedy and his allies to justify controversial changes to federal vaccine policy.

Spokespeople for Kennedy did not return messages seeking a response to criticism that he was overstepping his authority in writing to the journal.

The journal’s editor, Lawrence Lash, and its publisher, Elsevier, did not immediately return emails seeking comment. Elsevier previously told the Guardian the decision followed “careful review and consultation with relevant experts”. It said it removed the paper because “the recommendations and conclusions presented in the paper may pose potential risks to public health and could potentially be applied in clinical practice resulting in harm to patients”.