Tensions boiled over Wednesday on Capitol Hill as Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., clashed during a confirmation hearing for U.S. Surgeon General nominee Casey Means.
The fiery exchange unfolded as Mullin took aim at Sanders, the ranking member of the Senate Health Committee, accusing him of resisting efforts by President Donald Trump and Health and Human Services Secretary Kennedy to overhaul what Republicans describe as a broken and unaffordable health care system.
“The ranking member wants to talk about all the death that is supposedly going to be happening because of President Trump and Secretary Kennedy, because how dare they look at a health care system that is broken and unaffordable and try to make changes,” Mullin began, launching into a lengthy rebuke of Sanders’ criticisms.
Mullin argued that continuing down the same policy path without reexamining underlying problems amounts to “the definition of insanity,” questioning why lawmakers should simply accept the current system without scrutiny. He specifically raised concerns about the rising rate of autism diagnoses and defended the idea of examining vaccines as a potential contributing factor.
“To just simply look to see if maybe vaccines may be a partial cause to autism when it’s rising at a rate faster than any country in the nation. How dare us look at science?” Mullin said. “My goodness, science is supposed to be perfect? I thought science was always supposed to be studied. I’m for looking into it. As a father of six kids, yeah, I wanna look into it, I wanna know what’s causing it, and I will turn over every stone.”
Mullin praised Dr. Means for expressing a willingness to thoroughly examine pressing public health issues. He emphasized that he was not claiming to be a medical expert but argued that questioning existing policies and investigating potential causes of health trends should not be off-limits.
The Oklahoma Republican also turned his attention to the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare, asserting that it has failed to deliver on promises of affordability. “It is absolutely not affordable. 100% not affordable, yet it was supposed to be affordable. That’s what we were sold by Obamacare,” Mullin said.
He called for bipartisan cooperation to scrap the ACA and work with President Trump on crafting a new approach to health care reform. But Mullin expressed skepticism that Democrats would be willing to admit mistakes or support such efforts.
“God forbid we change and go after and try to fix our broken system,” he said, before concluding, “Anyways, I ranted too long.”
“Yes, you did,” Sanders shot back.
Mullin quickly responded, “I’m sorry, I didn’t ask your opinion on that. And if I cared about your opinion, I would ask you, but I don’t care about your opinion.”
The exchange escalated further when Mullin accused Sanders of being “part of the system” and “part of the problem,” noting Sanders’ long tenure in Washington and suggesting he should have addressed health care issues long ago.
Sanders responded with a pointed remark: “I decided not to run for Surgeon General. You’re the nominee. I’ve decided not to accept that nominee.”
“That is definitely something we would never accept,” Mullin replied.
The clash marks the latest in a series of headline-grabbing moments between the two senators, who have frequently sparred during Senate Health Committee proceedings over the years.
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