No. of Recommendations: 2
How hard do they NEED to fight the RFK appointment? IOW, how popular is he among Republican Senators? While the MAGA crowd is growing in Congress, it’s a bit slower in the Senate. Are there 3 GOP Senators who will oppose him based on his anti vax or other fringe positions?
He's probably not especially popular - or unpopular - among Republican Senators. I'm sure many of them don't really care all that much - unlike the Defense Department or the national security and intelligence apparatus, HHS isn't a government agency that is as high on the caucus' priority list as others.
However, part of how "unpopular" a pick will be can be affected by how hard the Democrats are planning to go after them and whether there are any issues that might cause the Senator some political heartburn. It ups the political cost they pay for confirming the nominee. So, for example, Democrats went all-in in marshalling opposition to Betsy De Vos for Education in 2017, but mostly didn't press much against Ben Carson for HUD - and that probably swayed some votes.
Secondly, is he really pro-choice? Or simply not a rabid anti-abortionist who might not care that much one way or the other?
I think he's really pro-choice, though I don't think it matters. Trump doesn't seem to care about abortion, which means that if his HHS Secretary doesn't care about abortion one way or another, there won't be a strong effort to restrict abortion coming out of HHS. Which is probably the best-case scenario for Democrats in a Republican Administration, at least for that agency.
