A Republican senator got Health and Human Services Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr. to agree that the president should receive a Nobel Prize for expediting the approval of COVID-19 mRNA vaccines, despite Kennedy’s opposition to the vaccines.

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA) said at a Senate Finance hearing today that he believes that the president deserves a Nobel Prize for Operation Warp Speed, a program that accelerated vaccine testing during the pandemic.

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“If he had been President [Barack] Obama, he woulda gotten it,” Cassidy claimed.

He then asked Kennedy if he agreed: “Mr. Secretary, do you agree with me… that the president deserves a Nobel prize for Operation Warp Speed?”

“Yeah, absolutely, Senator,” Kennedy replied. His response was probably not expected, considering his opposition to vaccines in general and the COVID-19 vaccines in particular.

“Let me ask you, but you just told Senator [Michael] Bennet that the COVID-19 vaccine killed more people than COVID,” Cassidy pointed out.

“I did not say that,” Kennedy replied. “Senator, I just want to make clear, I did not say that.”

It’s not clear exactly what Cassidy, who voted to confirm Kennedy to his current position back in February, was referring to. Kennedy made comments when he was questioned by Sen. Michael Bennet (D-CO) about how he believed that the COVID-19 vaccines killed people, but he didn’t say anything about the number of people he believes they killed.

Kennedy got into a more heated exchange with Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA), where he said he didn’t even know how many people died from COVID-19 in the U.S.

“I don’t think anybody knows that,” Kennedy said, blaming “data chaos” at the CDC.”You don’t know the answer of how many Americans died from COVID!” Warner said. “This is the secretary of health and human services! Do you think the vaccine did anything to prevent additional deaths?”

“Again, I would like to see the data and talk about the data,” Kennedy responded.

“You have had this job for eight months and you don’t know the data about whether the vaccine saved lives?” Warner said incredulously. “The Secretary of Health and Human Services doesn’t know how many Americans died from COVID, doesn’t know if the vaccine helped prevent any deaths, and you are sitting as Secretary of Health and Human Services? How can you be that ignorant?”

Over 1.2 million people have died of COVID, according to CDC data.

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