This is the Daily Blast from the New Republic, produced and presented by the DSR Network.

I'm your host, Greg Sargent.

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. got absolutely massacred at a Senate hearing on Thursday.

He faced very harsh questioning, not just from Democrats, but also from Republicans,

who aggressively called out his anti-vax views and condemned his ongoing decapitation of the Centers for Disease Control, which is wrecking our public health system.

But Matt Goerts of Media Matters noticed something funny.

Fox News's coverage of the hearing bent way over backwards to try to portray RFK as pro-vaccine,

as someone who is working to make vaccines available to Americans and not trying to restrict them.

We think that's revealing of just how shaky a political position President Trump now finds himself

in amid RFK's wanton destruction of public health in this country. So we invited Matt on to talk about all of it.

Matt, good to see you as always. Good to be back. So just to give people a sense of how bad this

Senate hearing was for RFK, let's start with a

couple clips. First, here's Republican Senator John Barrasso excoriating RFK's tenure so far.

So over the last 50 years, vaccines are estimated to have saved 154 million lives worldwide. I support vaccines. I'm a doctor. Vaccines work.

Secretary Kennedy, in your confirmation hearings, you promise to uphold the highest standards for

vaccines. Since then, I've grown deeply concerned. The public has seen measles outbreaks,

leadership of the National Institute of Health questioning the use of

MRNA vaccines, the recently confirmed director of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

fired. Americans don't know who to rely on. If we're going to make America healthy again,

we can't allow public health to be undermined. Now here's Senator Bill Cassidy after RFK disparaged COVID vaccines.

Mr. Secretary, do you agree with me that the president, that the president deserves a Nobel

Prize for Operation Warpsky?

...