RFK Jr. tries (again) to distance himself from the anti-vaccine movement

On the day of his confirmation hearing to be secretary of health and human services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

On the day of his confirmation hearing to be secretary of health and human services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. sat before the Senate Finance Committee flanked by anti-vaccine activists and steadfast supporters who filled the room. 

Facing mounting criticism from public health officials, doctors’ groups and Democrats (along with some skepticism from some Republicans), Kennedy attempted a delicate balancing act: defending and denying his controversial past as a prominent anti-vaccine lawyer while pledging to be a responsible steward for an agency with 80,000 employees, a $1.8 trillion budget and the nation’s health at stake. 

“I want to make sure the committee is clear about a few things. News reports have claimed that I am anti-vaccine or anti-industry. Well, I am neither; I am pro-safety,” Kennedy said in his opening statement. “All of my kids are vaccinated, and I believe vaccines have a critical role in health care.”

Those statements, along with most of what Kennedy would say over the next four hours, bore little resemblance to the years of documented stances he took, such as advising all parents with babies not to vaccinate them. That dissonance did little to blunt the excitement in the anti-vaccine movement, some of which had descended on Washington for the hearing and subsequent celebrations.

Kennedy has eschewed the anti-vaccine label in the mainstream media for years, but in ideologically friendlier spaces, he has made his position on vaccines clear. In a 2020 podcast for his anti-vaccine nonprofit group, Children’s Health Defense, he said that vaccines had caused food allergies in his children and that he wishes he could go back and change his decision to vaccinate them. Kennedy went on leave from Children’s Health Defense in 2023 when he ran for president, and he resigned from the group last month.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/rfk-jr-tries-distance-anti-vaccine-movement-rcna189858

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