In his first two years on the job, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has become a polarizing figure on Capitol Hill, largely because of his vaccine skepticism and distrust of the status quo.
But one of his quieter pushes — ending animal testing in medical research — has earned him accolades among some Democrats and Republicans alike.
It could be considered an odd position for Kennedy, who admitted in 2024 to leaving a bear carcass in Central Park a decade earlier. But administration policies are consistently moving against such testing: Both the National Institutes of Health and Food and Drug Administration have recently rolled out policies to reduce the number of research projects that rely on animal testing.
But it is consistent. In a 2025 interview with Lara Trump, Kennedy said his agency is “deeply committed to ending animal experimentation.” He also called for an end to the importation of monkeys for scientific studies.
Lawmakers have introduced several bills to do the same.
