1. United States
2. Pa.
3. Letter

President Trump’s August 10, 2026 executive order on childhood vaccines is an outrageous abuse of presidential authority that puts ideology and scientifically unsupported claims ahead of the lives of American children. During its announcement, President Trump again connected vaccines to autism and suggested that separating and spacing vaccines could have a “huge impact on autism.” Decades of scientific research do not support the claim that vaccines cause autism. The President should not be permitted to turn an unsupported theory into federal public health policy. The consequences will not be borne only by families who choose whether to vaccinate. They will be borne by newborn babies. By children undergoing cancer treatment. By people who are immunocompromised. By medically fragile children and adults who may not develop adequate immunity even when vaccinated. These Americans depend upon high community vaccination rates to reduce the circulation of preventable diseases. Their lives cannot be treated as acceptable casualties of political ideology. The order directs sweeping changes to childhood vaccine policy, including reducing universal recommendations, separating and spacing vaccinations, and encouraging states to reconsider their vaccine requirements. These actions can leave children unprotected longer and create more opportunities for vaccinations to be delayed or missed. Congress must stop this. Use your oversight, legislative, and appropriations authority to prevent scientifically unsupported vaccine-policy changes from being imposed through executive action. Require HHS and CDC to produce credible scientific evidence for any change. Protect access to established vaccines, evidence-based vaccination standards, and the independence of federal public-health science. No President should be permitted to gamble with the lives of children and medically vulnerable Americans based on claims unsupported by science. Congress is a coequal branch of government. Act now and stop this dangerous abuse of executive authority before Americans pay for it with preventable illness and death.