WASHINGTON, DC – Today, U.S. Representative Kelly Morrison (MN-03) joined almost 90 of her colleagues in demanding President Trump rescind his dangerous executive order that urges schools to reduce the number of required vaccines for children. These childhood vaccinations have kept millions of children safe and healthy for decades.

 

A doctor for more than 20 years, Representative Morrison is deeply concerned about the effect that this executive order will have on our children’s health. She joined her colleagues in a letter urging that President Trump rescind this executive order and follow the evidence-backed vaccination recommendations that are used across the country to prevent dangerous diseases like measles — which recently hit a 35-year high in the United States.

 

This anti-science executive order creates chaos and confusion just as millions of families across the country are preparing for the school year and are relying on science-based vaccine recommendations to protect their children and communities from preventable diseases.

 

“As a doctor for more than 20 years, I’ve seen firsthand how vaccines save lives. We should be doing everything we can to make our kids safe and healthy — not putting them at risk of previously eliminated preventable diseases like this order does. This new dangerous order defies science, facts, and evidence. The level of chaos and confusion it will sow is cruel. This dangerous decision will make all of our kids less safe. It will increase costs, increase disease, and increase school disruptions. For the safety and well-being of our children, I urge the President to rescind this order, ” said Congresswoman Kelly Morrison.

 

In the letter, the lawmakers wrote: “At a moment when the United States is experiencing the highest surge in measles cases in thirty-five years and an increasing number of states forced to declare public health emergencies – your administration is placing more children in harm’s way rather than protecting them. This Executive Order overrides decades of scientific evidence and sows fear, chaos, and confusion. The result will not be safer or healthier children; it will be a continued decline in vaccination rates, recurring disease outbreaks, higher healthcare costs, and school disruptions that cause learning loss.”

 

Trump’s latest directive pushes to break up combination vaccines into single-disease doses, ignoring the medical community’s long-standing, evidence-backed agreement that combination vaccines are safe, effective, and specifically timed to protect children when they need it most. The executive order forces families to schedule multiple doctors’ appointments with multiple co-pays, which adds unnecessary chaos, confusion, and financial strain. The largest cut to healthcare in American history in Trump’s One Big, Beautiful Big Act that drastically cut access to care and increased cost burdens for low-income families further compounds the damage this administration is doing to the American people.

 

Notably, single-disease shots for routine childhood vaccines, like measles, mumps, and rubella, simply do not exist in the U.S. market. Demanding parents and pediatricians switch to non-existent vaccines creates mass confusion, stalls routine care right as children head back to school, and forces drug manufacturers into a years-long regulatory pipeline.

 

Additionally, this executive order directs the Department of Justice to push back on longstanding state school immunization requirements, ignoring 81 percent of parents who agree that public schools should require essential immunizations like measles and polio vaccines.

 

This letter was signed by more than 20 Senators and almost 70 members of the House of Representatives.

 

Read the full letter here.

 

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