{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://harris.house.gov/media/press-releases/rep-harris-five-years-after-adirim-mandatory-vaccine-memo-put-her-under-oath", "REP. HARRIS: FIVE YEARS AFTER THE ADIRIM MANDATORY VACCINE MEMO, PUT HER UNDER OATH", "2026-09-14", "2026", "2026-09", "Republican", "House", "MD", "Andy Harris", "H001052", "harris.house.gov", "harris", "https://harris.house.gov/media/press-releases", "scraper", "WASHINGTON, D.C. \u2014 Today, Congressman Andy Harris, M.D., physician and former Naval Reserve medical officer, calls on Chairman James Comer, Chairman Rand Paul, and Chairman Ron Johnson to bring Dr. Terry Adirim in to testify under oath. Five years ago today, September 14, 2021, Dr. Terry Adirim, then acting Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs, signed the memorandum that told DoD providers they \u201cwill\u201d use EUA-labeled product interchangeably with fully approved vaccines to vaccinate the force.\u00b9\n\nThree weeks earlier, on August 24, 2021, Secretary Austin had limited the mandate to vaccines with full FDA licensure, \u201cin accordance with FDA-approved labeling and guidance.\u201d\u00b2 But because of the subsequent Adirim memorandum, our troops now call September 14 \u201cReign of Terry\u201d day. Rep. Andy Harris, M.D. (R-Md) said Congress should treat the anniversary the way the force already does: as the anniversary of the day that two-page order left her desk, with serious and dire results.\n\nHarris is a Johns Hopkins-trained anesthesiologist and former Naval Reserve medical officer. In March 2021 he administered COVID shots at clinics in his district. That spring the GOP Doctors Caucus agreed that you should talk to your physician and decide. He said then what he said in April 2023 and is saying again: freedom to choose to be COVID vaccinated, not mandates\u2014and the more than 8,400 troops fired for refusing should have been reinstated.\n\n\u201cI know the difference between a clinical recommendation and an order with a discharge packet attached,\u201d Harris said. \u201cI would never tell a healthy infantryman his career depended on an EUA vial. The record since does not let us pretend it was just \u2018following the science.\u2019\u201d\n\nThe regulator (the FDA) said should. Her memo said will.\u00b9 It cited no statute, no presidential waiver, no legal analysis\u2014only a footnote to an FDA web page. Under 10 U.S.C. \u00a7 1107a, a warrior given an EUA product must be told he can refuse. Only the President can waive that right, in writing, for national security.\u00b3 DoD Instruction 6200.02: **only the Secretary of Defense may even ask.**\u2074 They never asked. They mandated it anyway.\n\nIn July 2021 DoD told Justice it could not require an EUA product without that waiver.\u2075 No waiver issued. In November 2021 DoD conceded in open court that the President had not executed one. A federal judge called DoD\u2019s reading of \u00a7 1107a \u201cunconvincing\u201d and wrote that without a waiver \u201cthe DOD cannot mandate vaccines that only have an EUA.\u201d\u2076 FDA\u2019s Peter Marks swore the licensed and EUA products remained legally distinct.\u2077 At Holloman AFB, a service member was told the Adirim memo was why an EUA lot could be forced on him.\u2078\n\nOn April 23, 2025, Secretary Hegseth said the last administration \u201cissued unlawful orders on mandatory vaccines on an experimental vaccine, COVID-19,\u201d\u2079 and signed a remedies memo the same day.\u00b9\u2070 On May 7, 2025, USD(P&R) wrote that the mandate \u201cwas unlawful as implemented.\u201d\u00b9\u00b9 Hegseth later called it \u201cwrongfully forced\u201d and \u201cunjust.\u201d\u00b9\u00b2 Two weeks ago, Politico and the Times reported an Army physician, in a deposition in the Adirim case, said she is reviewing thousands of unverified service-member death reports for HHS and the Pentagon.\u00b9\u00b3 That is not a completed finding. It is why this file cannot close.\n\nAbout 8,600 service members were ejected. Tens of thousands left early. Another 20,000 retired early. Nearly a million ordered to take it. Anthony Fauci got an autopen scribble pardon. Dr. Adirim has no pardon.\n\n\u201cI changed what I was willing to say about the vaccines as the facts changed. That is what a physician does,\u201d Harris said. \u201cOur Warriors deserve the truth. Put her under oath. Let her look those service members whose careers were ruined and family-members of the deceased that were decimated by her memo in the eye.\u201d\n\nHe called on Chairman James Comer (Oversight), Chairman Rand Paul (HSGAC), and Chairman Ron Johnson (PSI) to put Adirim on the record about that destructive and unlawful memo and its human cost.\n\nFootnotes\n\n1. Acting ASD(HA) Terry Adirim memorandum, Sept. 14, 2021, Coker v. Austin, ECF 65-13 (DOD 000001); FOIA 22-F-1262, Enc. 2 p. 28\n\n2. Secretary of Defense memorandum, Aug. 24, 2021, Coker v. Austin, ECF 31-2.\n\n3. 10 U.S.C. \u00a7 1107a.\n\n4. DoDI 6200.02 (Feb. 27, 2008), Enc. 3 \u00a7 E3.4\n\n5. 45 Op. O.L.C. __ (July 6, 2021), at 17.\n\n6. Doe #1\u2013#14 v. Austin, 572 F. Supp. 3d 1224 (N.D. Fla. Nov. 12, 2021), ECF 47 at 12, 14; Tr. ECF 45 at 52:8\u20139. PI denied on proof; no merits holding the mandate was unlawful.\n\n7. Decl. of Peter Marks, M.D., Ph.D., Coker, ECF 65-14 \u00b6 11.\n\n8. Holloman AFB declaration, Coker, ECF 68-1 (lot 30155BA).\n\n9. Hegseth, X, April 23, 2025\n\n10. SecDef memorandum, April 23, 2025\n\n11. USD(P&R), May 7, 2025, \u201cunlawful as implemented\u201d\n\n12. Hegseth, X, May 8, 2026\n\n13. Politico, Sept. 3, 2026\n\nRep. Andy Harris, M.D., represents Maryland\u2019s 1st District. Johns Hopkins-trained anesthesiologist, former Naval Reserve medical officer, Chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, Chairman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Agriculture, Rural Development, FDA, and Related Agencies.", 1, "2026-09-15T09:50:21Z", "2026-09-15T09:52:05Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://harris.house.gov/media/press-releases/rep-harris-five-years-after-adirim-mandatory-vaccine-memo-put-her-under-oath"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.2078708969056606, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}