RFK Jr. shared erroneous drug price math attributed to Trump

Claim:

U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said, "If you have a $600 drug and reduce it to $10, that's a 600% reduction."

Rating:

Correct Attribution (About this rating?)

Context:

Kennedy told Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., that U.S. President Donald Trump "has a different way of calculating" percentages. The next day at the White House, as he stood behind Trump, he defended this incorrect calculation using two other incorrect calculations.

In April 2026, a rumor spread that U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said that if the price of a drug dropped from $600 to $10, the change was a 600% reduction — an incorrect calculation. 

Social media users shared the claim, with one X post including a video of Kennedy speaking as he stood behind President Donald Trump with other members of Trump's administration (archived): 

The rumor further circulated on Facebook (the latter post showed a video in which Kennedy had an exchange with Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.) and Instagram. In addition, Snopes readers searched the website and emailed to check whether Kennedy had really said this. 

As we outline below, the quote was correctly attributed. Kennedy made this erroneous calculation as he answered Warren's questions during a Senate Finance Committee hearing on April 22, 2026. He said this was the way Trump calculated the reduction. 

Then, as he stood behind Trump in the Oval Office the next day, Kennedy defended this calculation by making two more incorrect calculations. 

We have reached out to the White House and HHS with accurate percentage increases and decreases, asking if Kennedy and Trump would seek to correct them publicly. We will update this report should they respond. 

Snopes readers can verify the percentage changes in Kennedy's statements using an online percentage calculator. The reduction of an amount cannot exceed 100% without the resulting number becoming negative, as 100% represents the entire original number. A 600% reduction from $600 would translate to negative $3,000 — meaning a drug manufacturer would have to pay the consumer $3,000 to use its drug.

The Senate Finance Committee hearing

During the April 22 Senate Finance Committee hearing, Warren asked Kennedy to explain how the TrumpRX program — a plan with the stated goal of making prescription drugs more affordable — reduced drug prices if generic drugs outside of the plan still cost less than brand-name drugs on TrumpRX. 

In response, Kennedy said Trump had a "different way of calculating" (at 1:03:57):

"There's two ways of calculating percentage," he said. "If you have a $600 drug and reduce it to $10, that's a 600% reduction." 

That calculation is incorrect. A drop from $600 to $10 is a 98.33% reduction. The change in price is expressed as a portion of the original price and cannot exceed 100% unless the new price is negative. The equation is as follows:  

(600 - 10) ÷ 600 x 100 = 98.333…%

Kennedy doubles down, gets it wrong again

The next day, as Kennedy took part in a "health care affordability event" with Trump at the White House, he sought to defend the calculation the day before, saying Warren was "ridiculing" Trump (at 11:59):

Kennedy said:

I was reminded, when the president was speaking, of a conversation that I had yesterday with one of the Democratic senators who was questioning me during a hearing and she was ridiculing President Trump for his math, and she was saying it's mathematically impossible to have a drug drop by 600% cost — which he had claimed. And I said, "Well if the drug was $100 and it raised the price to $600 that would be a 600% rise. If it drops from $600 to $100, that's a 600% savings expense."

And the president used that mathematical device to illustrate the magnitude of the theft that has been happening against our country and our people.

Both calculations Kennedy outlined were incorrect. 

If a price goes from $100 to $600, its increase is not of 600%. A 100% increase is a doubling of the initial amount. Multiplying an amount by six means increasing it by 500%. The equation is as follows:

(600 - 100) ÷ 100 x 100 = 500%

Lastly, a price going from $600 to $100 is an 83.33% decrease, not a 600% decrease. The equation is as follows:

(600 - 100) ÷ 600 x 100 = 83.333...%

Students in New York, for example, learn to calculate percentages in the sixth grade — the first year of middle school.

For further reading, Snopes verified the formula the Trump administration used to establish sweeping tariffs in April 2025.

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