MaddowBlog-'Too much liquid': Trump pretends he's qualified to give medical advice (he's not)

[LetMyPeopleVote]

Those who tuned in to the president’s event would’ve learned just as much about science if they’d spent an hour staring at a blank wall in the dark.

Mr. Let’s Inject Disinfectants Into People is apparently convinced that he’s qualified to dispense advice about medicine and vaccinations.

He is not. www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddo...

— Steve Benen (@stevebenen.com) 2025-09-23T14:06:27.425Z

https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/-much-liquid-trump-pretends-s-qualified-give-medical-advice-s-not-rcna233159

Those who tuned in to the White House announcement, however, quickly learned otherwise. As my MSNBC colleague Brandy Zadrozny explained:

In a wild and rambling speech from the White House on Monday that contradicted mainstream scientific consensus and medical guidance, President Donald Trump advised pregnant women not to take Tylenol, claiming it was linked to autism in children, and said expectant mothers should take it only if they ‘can’t tough it out’ during a high fever.

....Trump said, “Don’t take Tylenol” 11 times. He suggested medical organizations might be corrupt. He suggested physicians might be corrupt. As part of a weird anti-vaccine screed, he even declared, in reference to infant vaccinations, “It’s too much liquid.”

Trump: "It's too much liquid. Too many different things are going into that baby at too big a number. The size of this thing when you look at it. It's like 80 different vaccines and beyond vaccines."

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) 2025-09-22T21:29:42.466Z

Pretty much everything the president had to say was at odds with scientific evidence and the conclusions of those with actual qualifications — a point the Republican seemed to acknowledge over the course of the event. In fact, Trump said his conclusions were rooted in his “feelings” and his ignorance-based version of “common sense,” as opposed to those who base their findings on “studies.”

Paul Offit, a pediatrician and Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia vaccine researcher, told The Washington Post, “That was the most dangerously irresponsible press conference in the realm of public health in American history.” Arthur Caplan, the founding head of the division of medical ethics at N.Y.U. Grossman School of Medicine, told The New York Times, “The announcement on autism was the saddest display of a lack of evidence, rumors, recycling old myths, lousy advice, outright lies and dangerous advice I have ever witnessed by anyone in authority in the world claiming to know anything about science.”....

Trump is, in other words, arguably the last person anyone should ever turn to for medical advice, despite his eagerness to dispense it.

The president claimed at one point during his event that there are “a lot of stupid people in this country running things.” It was, oddly enough, the one thing he said over the course of the hour that I found compelling.

[LetMyPeopleVote]

1. MaddowBlog-'Violence against the truth': Obama takes aim at Trump's bogus Tylenol claims

After seeing his successor’s radical rhetoric about medicine and vaccines, the former Democratic president apparently felt the need to speak out.

Days before leaving office, @barackobama.bsky.social said he’d largely remain on the sidelines, except when “our core values” are at stake.

Nine years later, Obama is apparently seeing our core values in jeopardy with increasing frequency. Take this week, for example www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddo...

— Steve Benen (@stevebenen.com) 2025-09-25T16:26:15.157Z

https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/violence-truth-obama-takes-aim-trumps-bogus-tylenol-claims-rcna233690

Nearly nine years later, Obama is apparently seeing our core values in jeopardy with increasing frequency. Take this week, for example. Politico reported:

Barack Obama has accused President Donald Trump of ‘violence against the truth’ for linking autism to the use of Tylenol by pregnant women. The former president made a direct attack on his successor that was as rare for its forcefulness as for its setting — an arena stage on foreign soil in London on Wednesday — as he warned that the Trump administration’s claims undermine public health.

Speaking to a large crowd at London’s O2 Arena, the former president said, “We have the spectacle of my successor in the Oval Office, making broad claims around certain drugs and autism that have been continuously disproved.”

He added, “The degree to which that undermines public health, the degree to which that can do harm to women who are pregnant, the degree to which that creates anxiety for parents who do have children who are autistic — which, by the way, itself is subject to a spectrum, and a lot of what is being trumpeted as these massive increases actually have to do with a broadening of the criteria across that spectrum so that people can actually get services and help. All of that is violence against the truth.”.

And while it’s true that Obama was speaking at the time to a foreign audience, it’s also true that he wanted a domestic audience to be aware of his comments: The Democrat promoted excerpts from his appearance, including his Trump criticisms, via social media.

We have people in power making broad claims around certain drugs and autism that have been continuously disproven.

— Barack Obama (@barackobama.bsky.social) 2025-09-25T14:02:35.168Z

This was notable in its own right, especially given how dangerous Trump’s misguided claims about medicine, vaccines and public health have been. But circling back to our recent coverage, it’s also worth emphasizing the recent pattern involving the former president.,,,,,

In September, Obama slammed Trump for politicizing the Charlie Kirk shooting and not doing more to unite the country, before taking rhetorical aim at the right’s recent efforts to undermine the First Amendment.

A week later, the former president also shared a few thoughts about his successor’s anti-Tylenol rant.

When thinking about Trump’s most prominent and most vocal Democratic critics, Obama does not spring immediately to mind. That, however, is starting to change.