Little over a week after his resounding election victory, president-elect Donald Trump has made several controversial choices for government roles. It seems as though Elon Musk will, after all, head up his vaunted Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE. Tulsi Gabbard will be put forward as Director of National Intelligence, despite having posted in support of Kremlin conspiracy theories. And Trump has nominated the firebrand Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz, to be attorney general. All announcements that have provoked wailing and gnashing of teeth.
None caused as much consternation, however, as the possibility of Robert F. Kennedy Jr – RFK Jr, as he is known – being thrust into the White House. And on Thursday Trump said he was “thrilled” to announce that Kennedy would serve as his Health and Human Services Secretary, to “make America great and healthy again”.
The announcement followed Trump’s pledge during the campaign that Kennedy would be in “control of the health agencies.” In the US these include the department for Health and Human Services (HHS), the Center for Disease Control (CDC), the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and the US Department of Agriculture.
What are RFK Jr’s priorities?
On Thursday Trump added: “For too long, Americans have been crushed by the industrial food complex and drug companies who have engaged in deception, misinformation, and disinformation when it comes to public health.” Kennedy, he said, “will play a big role in helping ensure that everybody will be protected from harmful chemicals, pollutants, pesticides, pharmaceutical products, and food additives that have contributed to the overwhelming health crisis in this country.”
“Robert F Kennedy cares more about human beings and health and the environment than anybody,” Trump told the crowd during his rally at Madison Square Garden in New York in October. “I’m going to let him go wild on health. I’m going to let him go wild on the food, I’m going to let him go wild on medicines.”
Posting in the past week, Kennedy said the “FDA’s war on public health is about to end,” add he would stop the “aggressive suppression of psychedelics, peptides, stem cells, raw milk, hyperbaric therapies l, chelating compounds, invermectin, hydroxychloroquine, vitamins, clean foods, sunshine, exercise nutraceuticals and anything else that advances human health and can’t be patented by Pharma.”
These initial statements sounded the alarm in health agencies across America and the wider world. Few health ministers are urged to “go wild”, let alone one with a track record of peddling anti-scientific and conspiracy theories.
Why is RFK Jr controversial?
Kennedy, 70, has variously said he believes JFK’s death was part of a CIA conspiracy, that Republicans stole the 2004 election, and that 5G phone networks are being used for mass surveillance.
After the election, he announced on social media that one of his first acts would be to stop the practice of adding fluoride to drinking water to reduce tooth decay. Above all, he is arguably the most prominent vaccine sceptic in America.
“RFK Jr, in my view, is the world’s most well funded and influential anti-vaxxer and science sceptic,” says Lawrence Gostin, a professor of public health at Georgetown University. “If he had CDC Director or secretary for health and human services, which is what he covets, or even in the White House, it would be very destructive for public health.
“He’s an environmental and public health campaigner who has no fidelity to science, and somebody who rails against public health and science itself.”