00:00You have no medical degree, and you have no formal medical training.
00:04You have never parented a black child.
00:07As of 24 of the 26 HHS secretaries have not had medical degrees.
00:12Secretary, this is my time.
00:14And I say to the chairman, I want to reclaim my time.
00:18So, you are not a doctor, have no formal medical training, and you've never parented a black child,
00:24and yet you are suggesting that the federal government should take black children away from their families
00:29and re-parent them, and send them off to some wellness farm instead of providing them with evidence-based medical...
00:35You're just making stuff up.
00:36I am absolutely not making this up.
00:38Mr. Secretary, in your opinion, what factors should the federal government consider when re-parenting a black child
00:45who has been on ADHD or ADD?
00:49I don't even know what you're talking about, Congressman.
00:53I don't know what you're talking about.
00:55I don't know what re-parenting either means.
00:57I don't either, but you said that.
00:59Even today, black children are removed from their homes at higher rates than white children.
01:04Not because of their greater harm, but because of long-standing bias and built-in institutional.
01:10I never suggested that.
01:12Your words matter.
01:13When those words are careless, communities pay the price.
01:17You choose your words with sincereness and with seriousness.
01:22The seriousness that your position demands.
01:24Mr. Secretary, you've made a number of outlandish and, frankly, disturbing comments
01:31both before and during your tenure as Secretary of Health and Human Services.
01:35I want to draw your attention to one of those times.
01:38In a 2024 podcast interview, you suggested that black children on ADHD medication should be re-parented.
01:49You said every black kid is now just standardly put on Adderall, SSRI, benzos, which are known to induce violence,
02:00and that those children are going to have to go somewhere to get re-parented.
02:06There is a lot to unpack in that comment.
02:10I know that you've already answered several of the questions I was going to ask, and so I'm just going
02:14to rephrase them.
02:16Mr. Secretary, you've already admitted that you are not board-certified physician,
02:20and you've already admitted that you did not go to medical school.
02:25Have you ever re-parented, or parented, I should say, a black child?
02:29I don't even know what that phrase means, and I doubt that I said it.
02:33A yes or no answer.
02:35I doubt that I said that phrase?
02:36No.
02:36I'm not going to answer something that I didn't say.
02:39You absolutely said it.
02:41Oh, I'd like to hear the recording.
02:43So, to be clear.
02:44Because it doesn't make any sense.
02:45I don't even know what it means.
02:47I'm going to replay my time.
02:48I don't either.
02:48That's why I'm asking.
02:49By the way.
02:50So, to be clear, you're not a doctor, you have no medical degree, and you have no formal medical
02:56training, and you have never parented a black child, and yet you are suggesting that government
03:03Secretary, this is my time.
03:07And I say to the chairman, I want to reclaim my time.
03:11So you are not a doctor, have no formal medical training, and you've never parented a black
03:16child, and yet you are suggesting that the federal government should take black children
03:20away from their families and re-parent them, and send them off to some wellness farm instead
03:25of providing them with evidence-based medical...
03:27You're just making stuff up.
03:29I am absolutely not making this up.
03:31Mr. Secretary, in your opinion, what factors should the federal government consider when
03:36re-parenting a black child who has been on ADHD or ADD?
03:42That's rhetorical...
03:42I don't even know what you're talking about, Congressman.
03:45Attentive...
03:46I don't know what you're talking about.
03:48Attention deficit...
03:48I don't know what re-parenting either means.
03:50I don't either.
03:51But you said that.
03:52I did not say that.
03:53Mr. Secretary, for black families of the United States, the United States, the United States,
03:55the issue of family separation is not new.
03:59Our nation has a long and painful history of separating black children from their families.
04:04During slavery, black children were taken from their parents and sold with no regard
04:08for their humanity.
04:09And after slavery, black families continued to face forced separations through Jim Crow
04:14laws, discriminatory policing, and child welfare systems that too often assumed that black
04:20parents were unfit.
04:22Even today, black children are removed from their homes at higher rates than white children,
04:27not because of their greater harm, but because of longstanding bias and built-in institutionalism.
04:34For you to suggest that black families are not capable of raising their own children is deeply
04:39offensive.
04:40Sir, you are the Secretary of Health and Human Services for the world's most powerful country,
04:47and your words matter.
04:50When you suggest that re-parenting black children, when you so doubt about the safety of vaccines,
04:56and when you promote unproven statements that have no basis in science, you endanger the
05:02lives of everyone across this nation.
05:06Those children have parents.
05:12And to suggest that they have to be re-parented is offensive.
05:16I never suggested that.
05:18Your words matter.
05:19When those words are careless, communities pay the price.
05:23When your words are imprecise, they create confusion.
05:27And when your words are dismissive, they cause real harm.
05:31So, you do, you don't have the pleasure, because of your position, to speak first and think
05:38later.
05:39Not in this job and not because of your responsibility.
05:43What is something I supposedly said in 2014?
05:44I expect, and the American people expect, that you choose your words with sincereness and
05:50with seriousness.
05:51The seriousness that your position demands.
05:55American lives are at stake, and it's time that you start acting like it, sir.
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