Senate Democrats open dual inquiry into Kennedy's Samoa testimony and gifts from donor

Two Senate Democrats this week opened formal inquiries into Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., demanding documents by Dec. 4 that could determine whether he gave false testimony to Congress about a 2019 trip to Samoa and whether he violated federal ethics rules by accepting tens of thousands of dollars in travel and lodging from a longtime donor.

Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, and Sen. Angela Alsobrooks of Maryland, a member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, sent a letter to Children's Health Defense, the anti-vaccine group Kennedy once led, seeking records tied to his 2019 Samoa travel, his 2024 presidential campaign and his Senate confirmation process, along with all communications between the group and federal health officials since January 2025. In a separate letter dated Nov. 11, the same two senators pressed Kennedy and the donor, security consultant Gavin de Becker, over roughly $250,000 in flights to Fiji and Greece and the use of de Becker's Washington property.

A Letter That Undercuts Sworn Testimony

At his January 2025 confirmation hearing before the Senate Finance Committee, Kennedy told lawmakers his trip to Samoa four years earlier "had nothing to do with vaccines," describing it instead as an effort to help introduce a medical informatics system to digitize the country's health records, according to the official transcript of that hearing.

Reporting published in August by the Associated Press and the Guardian undercut that account. The outlets obtained a letter dated Jan. 20, 2019, written on Children's Health Defense letterhead and addressed to then-Samoan Prime Minister Tuila'epa Sa'ilele Malielegaoi, in which Kennedy proposed that his organization conduct an independent assessment of the MMR vaccine used in the country. The letter used the words "vaccine" or "vaccination" eight times. Kennedy was not under oath at his confirmation hearing, but knowingly making a materially false statement to Congress is a federal crime even when a witness is unsworn, though prosecutions under that statute are rare.

The stakes of the dispute are set by what happened in Samoa after Kennedy's visit. A measles outbreak that swept the islands months later killed 83 people, the overwhelming majority of them children under five, after vaccination rates had collapsed in the wake of two infant deaths that were wrongly attributed to the MMR shot in 2018. Samoan health officials have since disputed Kennedy's public characterizations of the episode; the country's health ministry called some of his later remarks about the deaths false. Kennedy has maintained his trip did not contribute to vaccine hesitancy there.

A Second Line of Inquiry: Gifts From a Donor

The Nov. 11 letter on gifts, posted on the Senate Finance Committee's website, says Kennedy accepted flights and the use of residential property from de Becker, a security consultant and longtime associate, without clarity on how those benefits were disclosed or valued under federal ethics rules. Wyden and Alsobrooks asked Kennedy to provide the dates of every flight de Becker paid for and every stay at his property, and asked de Becker separately whether he reported the costs as gifts or business expenses on his tax returns.

"We intend to hold Secretary Kennedy accountable for the grave harm he has caused to vulnerable children," Wyden and Alsobrooks wrote in their letter to Children's Health Defense.

Who Is Affected, and the Response So Far

The inquiries land squarely on Kennedy and the department he runs, but they also touch Children's Health Defense, which Kennedy chaired and served as chief legal counsel for before resigning to join the Trump administration, and de Becker, who has provided protective services to Kennedy and his family. Neither Children's Health Defense nor de Becker had responded publicly to the new letters as of Thursday.

HHS has pushed back forcefully on the underlying allegation since the August reporting first surfaced, telling the AP that the Samoa visit was "unrelated to vaccines" and that any claim he lied under oath or to Congress "is not only false but outright defamatory." A Kennedy spokesperson has separately said he has consulted with the department's ethics officials regarding gifts from de Becker and believes he is in full compliance with disclosure requirements. The watchdog group American Oversight had already asked the Justice Department in August to open a criminal investigation into Kennedy's confirmation testimony; there is no public indication the department has acted on that request.

What Comes Next

For now, Wyden and Alsobrooks sit in the minority and cannot compel documents or testimony on their own; both letters are requests, not subpoenas, and both set a Dec. 4 deadline for a response. That could change quickly. Wyden is positioned to become chairman of the Finance Committee, which holds jurisdiction over HHS and subpoena power, when the new Congress convenes in January, after Democrats won back control of the Senate in last week's midterm elections. A chairmanship would give him the authority to compel records and testimony that he currently lacks, raising the prospect that an inquiry now built on letters could escalate into compelled depositions or a referral to the Justice Department if the December deadline passes without a satisfactory response. Kennedy, for his part, remains in his post with the backing of the White House, and HHS has given no indication it intends to produce additional records beyond what it has already disclosed.