2025-11-22 23:07:08
In an interview published Friday, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told the New York Times that he’d personally directed the CDC to put a new page on the agency’s website, casting doubt on the fact that vaccines don’t cause autism.
“The whole thing about ‘vaccines have been tested and there’s been this determination made,’ is just a lie,” Kennedy told the Times, lying. He added, “The phrase ‘Vaccines do not cause autism’ is not supported by science.”
Kennedy employed confused logic in his conversation with the Times, telling journalist Sheryl Gay Stolberg that he doesn’t believe there’s adequate proof to claim that vaccines don’t cause autism. “He said he is not saying vaccines cause autism,” Stolberg wrote. “He is simply saying there is no proof that they don’t.”
Kennedy also claimed that he was merely offering a more accurate look at “the state of the science,” telling Stolberg, “I think the way to drive up vaccine utilization, ultimately, is to be honest with people,” he said, adding, “My job is not to gaslight Americans but to give them accurate information about the state of the science.”
It’s unclear what possible standard of evidence would satisfy Kennedy, who’s been a dedicated anti-vaccine activist since 2005. Dozens of studies both in the U.S. and internationally have made it clear that there’s no link between the aluminum adjuvants in vaccines and autism, including a landmark Danish study that followed 1.2 million children for 24 years. The study was published this summer in the Annals of Internal Medicine and also found no link between vaccines and a variety of other health conditions, including asthma, allergies, and autoimmune diseases. Kennedy has baselessly called for the study to be retracted, which he does not have the power to demand, and which the journal declined to do. According to Nature, the journal’s editor-in-chief Christine Laine wrote in a note on the study’s webpage that retraction “is warranted only when serious errors invalidate findings or there is documented scientific misconduct, neither of which occurred here.”
Kennedy’s directive has horrified CDC staffers, one of whom told my colleague Kiera Butler, “The best way I can put it is it feels like we’re on a hijacked airplane.” (As Butler wrote this week, the new “Vaccines and Autism” web page contradicts other information still available on the CDC website.) Public health experts told the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP) that CDC’s guidance can no longer be trusted, creating an unprecedented challenge for Americans looking for accurate health guidance from their government.
While Kennedy’s version of the CDC focuses on reviving false claims about vaccines, the United States is at risk of losing its measles elimination status. Measles cases are at their highest level in three decades, with 45 outbreaks so far this year nationwide. According to—for now—the CDC, in 92 percent of those cases, the patient’s vaccination status was listed as either “unvaccinated” or “unknown.”
2025-11-22 20:58:03
In a stunning announcement posted to Twitter/X on Friday night, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) said that she will resign her seat in the House on January 5, 2026. The announcement comes after Greene publicly skirmished with Donald Trump over the release of the Epstein files. Trump has responded by calling her a “traitor,” a “lunatic,” and “wacky,” saying he’ll refuse to take her phone calls, and that he’ll consider supporting a primary challenger against her.
In her announcement, Greene decried Trump’s attacks on her, writing, “Loyalty should be a two-way street.” Greene also said she’s being punished by Trump and the larger Republican Party for demanding a full release of files related to dead pedophile and one-time Trump friend Jeffrey Epstein: “Standing up for American women who were raped at 14, trafficked and used by rich powerful men, should not result in me being called a traitor and threatened by the President of the United States, whom I fought for.” Lurid to the last, Greene also said she refused to be, as she put it, “a ‘battered wife’ hoping it all goes away and gets better.”
“If I am cast aside by MAGA Inc and replaced by Neocons, Big Pharma, Big Tech, Military Industrial War Complex, foreign leaders, and the elite donor class that can’t even relate to real Americans, then many common Americans have been cast aside and replaced as well,” Greene wrote (caps hers).
As first noted by journalist Will Sommer, Greene’s announcement also declared “There is no ‘plan to save the world,’” which is the title of a viral 2018 video by a well-known QAnon promoter. Greene repeatedly promoted QAnon conspiracy theories both before and after becoming a member of Congress, but has intermittently disavowed those beliefs of late years, most recently during an early November appearance on ‘The View.’
“There is no ‘plan to save the world’ or insane 4D chess game being played,” Greene wrote in her announcement, referring to QAnon believers’ claims that Trump is enacting a complex, hidden plan to bring a powerful pedophilic cabal to justice.
Greene first took office in January of 2021, quickly establishing herself as part of the most radical and conspiracy theory-addled wing of the Republican party. Before her first candidacy, Greene spent a lot of time on Facebook posting hateful, racist, Islamophobic, antisemitic, and otherwise toxic viewpoints, which included suggesting the Parkland and Sandy Hook shootings were hoaxes, and appeared to support committing political violence. Things did not improve after she began serving as an elected official: she promoted stolen election conspiracy theories and appeared as a surprise speaker at a 2022 conference organized by white nationalist and antisemite Nick Fuentes, then pretended she had simply no idea how she’d found her way there or about Fuentes’ background and beliefs.
Since Trump was reelected and took office for the second time, Greene has tempered her Trump sycophancy and even offered public criticisms of him. She’s also espoused what are seen as more progressive views, including calling the war in Gaza a “genocide” this summer. Greene has also been vocal in her calls to release files related to Jeffrey Epstein in full; days ago, she appeared at a press conference with several Epstein survivors and called Trump’s handling of the scandal “destructive” to MAGA.
“Watching this actually turn into a fight has ripped MAGA apart, and the only thing that will speak to the powerful, courageous women behind me is when action is actually taken to release these files, and the American people won’t tolerate any other bullshit,” Green said.
In her retirement announcement, Greene was clear that her plans to retire are directly linked to Trump’s attacks, writing, “I have too much self-respect and dignity, love my family way too much, and do not want my sweet district to have to endure a hurtful and hateful primary against me by the President we all fought for, only to fight and win my election while Republicans will likely lose the midterms.”
In a recent Instagram Live video talking to her constituents, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) offered a different explanation for Green’s rebellion against Trump, saying that because Greene wanted to run for Senate “and Trump said no.” AOC dubbed Greene’s recent behavior a “revenge tour;” Greene responded by calling AOC “really jealous” of her.
Trump responded to Greene’s announcement early Saturday morning on TruthSocial, dubbing her “Majorie ‘Traitor’ Brown,” for some reason, and adding: “Her relationship with the WORST Republican Congressman in decades, Tom Massie of Kentucky, also known as Rand Paul Jr. because he votes against the Republican Party (and really good legislation!), did not help her. For some reason, primarily that I refused to return her never ending barrage of phone calls, Marjorie went BAD. Nevertheless, I will always appreciate Marjorie, and thank her for her service to our Country!”
Greene didn’t give any indication in her announcement of what she plans to do with her sudden abundance of free time. Under federal law, by retiring after five years in office, Greene will be leaving precisely when she’s eligible to collect retirement benefits.
2025-11-22 20:30:00
This story was originally published by Vox and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.
Tehran is running out of water.
Rationing has begun in Iran’s capital city, with some of the approximately 10 million residents experiencing “nightly pressure cuts” between midnight and 5 am. The entire country is in an unprecedented drought, facing its driest—and hottest—autumn in nearly 60 years. Tehran has received no rain at all since the start of September, and no rainfall is expected for the foreseeable future.
The city depends on five major reservoirs for its water supply. One has dried up completely, with another below 8 percent capacity. The managing director of the Tehran Regional Water Authority told state media last week that the Karaj Dam has only two weeks of drinking water left. The drought extends beyond the city, too. The water reserves of Mashhad, the second largest city in the country, have dropped below 3 percent capacity, putting 4 million people at imminent risk.
But if nothing changes, Tehran may soon face Day Zero—or when a municipality can no longer supply drinking water to its residents and taps run dry. In October, President Masoud Pezeshkian claimed that Tehran could no longer serve as the country’s capital, citing the water crisis as a major factor.
”If it doesn’t rain in Tehran by late November, we’ll have to [formally] ration water,” Pezeshkian told Iranian state media on Thursday. “And if it still doesn’t rain, we’ll have to evacuate Tehran.”
(Update: On Thursday, Pezeshkian president again said the capital will need be moved.)
While it’s unlikely evacuation will happen any time soon, Tehran’s water crisis is not made equal. When the taps run dry, more affluent Tehranis purchase mineral water or rely on water tankers, a prohibitively expensive option for many. The rest must rely on charity, or they will die of thirst.
Water use in Tehran is quite high, even for cities. But Iran’s water problems go deeper than this record-breaking drought.
The country is uniquely isolated and subject to numerous sanctions, crippling the economy and making it very difficult for Iran to obtain state-of-the-art water technologies. It’s an enemy state to many of its neighbors, as well as regional leaders in desalination technology—Israel, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. But desalination is largely irrelevant in an Iranian context, often coming at a high environmental cost.
According to water issues analyst Nik Kowser, Iranians are under the thumb of a “water mafia”—a shadowy and well-connected network driving these megaprojects for their own gain. “Iran faces water bankruptcy, with demand far outstripping supply,” Kowsar wrote in Time. “The collapse of water security in Iran has been decades in the making and is rooted in a mania for megaprojects—dam building, deep wells, and water transfer schemes—that ignored the fundamentals of hydrology and ecological balance.”
Trying to relocate 10 million people would be an incredible logistical challenge.
Iran is also particularly vulnerable to the effects of climate change: Over 82 percent of the country is arid or semi-arid, and Iran is sixth on the list of countries most prone to natural disasters. The country grows thirsty crops, and its quest for food security and self-sufficiency is a tremendous driver of its water bankruptcy. The agricultural sector comprises up to 90 percent of the country’s total water withdrawals.
But Iran’s environmental crisis does strain existing geopolitical tensions both inside and outside of the country. Water is sometimes transported from one region of the country to supply another, driving fears that certain ethnic populations are intentionally being deprived at the expense of others.
Yale University historian and Iran expert Arash Azizi, who is also a contributing writer for The Atlantic, told me that despite the tremendous humanitarian cost of continued sanctions, they are very unlikely to be removed in response to the water crisis.
Tehran joins many, many other cities that have approached Day Zero, and it certainly will not be the last. São Paulo in Brazil and Cape Town, South Africa, had similar crises that ended with rainfall. Tehran might not be so lucky in terms of its weather forecast, though.
So, let’s loop back to the idea of evacuating Tehran.
It is, of course, incredibly unpopular. Iranians balked at the idea when the president mentioned the possibility. Former Tehran Mayor Gholamhossein Karbaschi said this was “a joke…Evacuating Tehran makes no sense at all.”
Azizi thinks it’s unlikely that Iran will end up moving its capital anytime soon. The majority of jobs are in Tehran. And evacuating a city of upward of 10 million people would be an incredible logistical challenge.
More importantly, relocation won’t fix the immediate issue of water access. But the current strategy of trucking in supplies, rationing water, and praying for rain is woefully inadequate to meet the moment. And water rationing is a stopgap measure.
“Actually cutting off the supply to households or to individual neighborhoods de facto reduces their consumption,” said David Michel, senior fellow for water security at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “But the underlying demand is still there.”
However, there are other kinds of strategies cities like Tehran could employ. Michel argued that cities have to prioritize business models that provide the resources and revenues needed for water systems to operate, maintain, and expand to serve new customers.
“That challenge has put many city water systems around the world into this very challenging spiral where lots of municipal water systems’ revenues don’t cover the costs of operations and maintenance, much less expanding supply,” Michel said.
Economic incentives like volumetric tariffs, where the cost of water is proportional to the amount consumed, could be beneficial. The more you use, the higher price you pay, essentially, with the hope of reducing pressure on the poorest consumers.
Relief can’t come to Tehran soon enough. American cities in California and the southwest, with similarly arid climates and dwindling water supplies, should take heed. And everyone should pay attention when the president of Iran says the residents of its capital city may have to evacuate in a few months’ time.
“You can imagine the psychological effect,” Azizi said. And that could be “the future of everywhere in the world.”
This story was updated to reflect the Iranian president’s latest announcement.
2025-11-22 16:00:00
When a typhoon hit Alaska, public radio station KYUK was on the air, broadcasting critical information about conditions, evacuations, and search and rescue operations. An estimated 1,600 people were displaced, and many were saved in the biggest airlift operation in state history.
“The work that we do in terms of public safety communication literally does save lives,” said Sage Smiley, KYUK’s news director.
KYUK is small, scrappy, and bilingual. It broadcasts in English and Yugtun, the language of an Indigenous population that lives in villages along two massive rivers. The station airs NPR content, but also high school basketball games, local call-in talk shows, and even a show hosted by the volunteer search and rescue team, answering listeners’ questions about ice conditions and safety. The station is a lifeline for this unique region.
Subscribe to Mother Jones podcasts on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast app.KYUK covers an area the size of the state of Oregon, but after Congress passed the Rescissions Act over the summer, it lost 70 percent of its operating budget. Republicans have targeted public media since its inception in the late 1960s. But this is the first time they have successfully ended the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, wiping out more than $1 billion in funding for public media.
This week on Reveal, we take listeners inside KYUK as it grapples with this new reality. Host Al Letson sits down with Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski to discuss how the cuts are affecting her state. And we take a trip to WQED in Pittsburgh for a look back at how Fred Rogers, the host of Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood, defended public television throughout its decadeslong struggle to survive Washington politics.
2025-11-22 02:01:38
You should be paying attention to Tennessee.
The congressional race in the state’s seventh congressional district, which includes Nashville, is where cracks in Donald Trump’s base are starting to show. Democrat Aftyn Behn is facing off against Matt Van Epps, a Republican West Point grad who had been strongly favored to win.
Both parties have bombarded the state ahead of the special election on December 2. Trump held a telephone rally for Van Epps, and super PACS from both sides have flooded the race with money, including $1 million from one allied with Trump, according to the New York Times.
“This is a predominately Republican district,” Behn told me. “It was drawn that way.” Indeed, Republicans never intended for it to become a battleground, but the special election has given Democratic voters in the state who are fed up with Trump’s agenda an opening.
Despite Tennessee being one of the lowest turnout states in the country, Democratic lawmakers—sensing an opportunity during a special election that’s activated voters facing an affordability crisis—have shown up big. Former Vice President Kamala Harris recently campaigned for Behn, along with Democratic National Committee chair Ken Martin and Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas).
“We have a state government that has inhibited the city of Nashville from addressing the rise of the cost of living,” Behn said. “We have a federal government that is in chaos and cannot address the cost of living.”
The special election is on December 2. Stay tuned.
2025-11-22 01:33:11
Earlier this week, a new page titled “Vaccines and Autism” appeared on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website. Contrary to previous CDC guidance, the page alleged, “The claim ‘vaccines do not cause autism’ is not an evidence-based claim because studies have not ruled out the possibility that infant vaccines cause autism,” adding that “studies supporting a link have been ignored by health authorities.” Those claims aren’t supported by evidence, but they do reflect talking points regularly promoted by anti-vaccine activists—of which Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is a leader.
I spoke with five CDC staffers on Thursday and Friday to find out their reactions to the announcement. While they declined to be identified for fear of retaliation, they all said that they and their colleagues were shocked and dismayed by the misinformation put forth on the new page. “It’s horrifying, it’s embarrassing, it’s scary, it’s heartbreaking—it’s all of those things,” said a staffer at the CDC’s Injury Center. “To see our agency being used to spread lies and misinformation is a gut punch,” a CDC communicator with the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Disease wrote in a message. “People will be harmed by this—parents will decide not to vaccinate their kids because of false information, and kids will get sick and die as a result.”
Another longtime CDC employee who works in communications said, “The best way I can put it is it feels like we’re on a hijacked airplane.”
Several employees noted that there had been no warning about the new page before it was posted—in fact, said the NCIRD staffer, even department leadership had “only learned about it today when somebody saw it the same way everybody else did.”
Others doubted the new page had gone through the agency’s rigorous protocol for vetting public-facing information, which the longtime communications staffer said, “can be clunky and take a long time. It is the bane of many people’s existence who work at CDC because it is so laborious and it requires so many different stages of review.” The new page, on the other hand, “popped up without going through CDC clearance processes.”
“I don’t even know who is updating these web pages, or if anyone at CDC has anything to do with any of that,” said another staffer who works on immunizations. Department supervisors told employees that “their understanding is that these updates to the website are not coming from CDC. Somebody at the HHS level is going in and changing these pages.”
HHS did not respond to a request for comment from Mother Jones.
“I think people are starting to see that we can’t fulfill our mission here, like I think it’s that is becoming more and more clear and loud and unavoidable with each day.”
The concerns about the Autism and Vaccines page are only the latest blow to morale at the CDC. First came the appointment of Kennedy, who formerly ran an anti-vaccine activist group. Then there were the waves of layoffs, and after that, a record-breaking government shutdown. Several of the people with whom I spoke, some who had been with the CDC for years, said that morale at the agency was so low that they and most of their colleagues were currently looking for new jobs. “I changed my mind 20 times over the course of one meeting about whether I’m going to quiet quit and look for something else while still collecting a paycheck as long as I can, versus lean in and fight and try to protect the possibility of doing good work in the future,” said the Injury Center staffer. “I think people are starting to see that we can’t fulfill our mission here, like it’s becoming more and more clear and loud and unavoidable with each day.”
On the other hand, the longtime communications staff member said, “We’re still getting really important health information out, and if I leave, that will stop, and I don’t want to leave CDC when so many experienced people have left—or been forced out.”
In an internal memo from earlier this week shared with Mother Jones, HHS leadership outlined 16 “strategic initiatives” for the agency, including “Evaluating funding support for jurisdictions,” “invigorating the CDC workforce,” and “enhancing scientific rigor at CDC.” In the comments section, employees expressed skepticism about the initiatives. “Additional clarification on initiative #4 (enhancing scientific rigor) would be appreciated, given recent updates to the public-facing webpages that did not follow the agency’s clearance guidelines,” one comment read. In response to the goal of invigorating the workforce, another commenter wrote, “This leaves me very confused and with many questions since the cadre of our colleagues new in their careers and in probationary status were summarily dismissed earlier this year.”
Everyone with whom I spoke emphasized that the new page does not reflect the work or viewpoints of the vast majority of CDC employees. “The bulk of staff who work here still believe the same science and want to do the same good public health,” said someone with the CDC’s National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion. They emphasized that their actual day-to-day work had not been compromised, though some worried that it soon could be.
When asked if the CDC was still a reliable source of public-health information, the employees said that most of the public-facing information remained unchanged. A critical problem was that there didn’t appear to be a good way for the public to discern the difference between accurate and politicized messaging. “I don’t know how they would distinguish that,” the Chronic Center staffer said. “There’s not a disclaimer saying posts were approved by political appointees and not by career scientists, so I don’t know.”
“It’s really easy from inside the agency to know what is real information and what has just been added there for political reasons,” added the longtime communications staffer. “But I can see that it would be really hard if you’re outside the agency to know the difference.”
