The Secretary of Plague: RFK, Jr. Must Be Rejected

He's a fraud, an antivax profiteer, and a danger to American health.

I’m watching Robert F. Kennedy Jr. lie to the Senate Finance Committee, and it’s so breathtakingly dishonest that even my high-fury filter is struggling to keep up.

Over and over, Democratic Senators have hit him with verbatim quotes of his outrageous, unscientific, conspiratorial, and racist theories¹ about vaccines, and he’s denied saying them. Over and over, they’ve responded with transcripts proving that he did.

This is not just gaslighting—it’s gaslighting at scale, with the intensity of a man whose entire existence depends on a lie that has cost lives already, and will cost us more if he’s elevated to the Cabinet.

When anti-vaccine conspiracy profiteer Robert F. Kennedy Jr. says he’s “pro-safety” or “pro-health,” what he really means is he’s pro-polio, pro-measles, pro-typhus. He stated that we should “give infectious diseases a break.” Hard pass, Bobby. His testimony is so profoundly disingenuous that even Republicans on the committee must be feeling like they’ve finally found a bridge too far.

It didn’t help that Kennedy affirmed he’d review mifepristone — it was approved and has been in wide use for 25 years — at Trump’s behest as part of their war on women’s rights.

But I think the endless lying made the hearing unlike any other Trump appointment to date. He was proven not simply to be a liar but a dangerous one. The GOP avoided much of its usual theatrical scenery-chewing because even they admitted to themselves that RFK, Jr. was unqualified and lacked the knowledge and the character to do this job.

And make no mistake: he is the most dangerous nominee in Trump’s domestic policy orbit. Putting this grifting quack in charge of America’s healthcare system would be a travesty of historic proportions.

They know what we know.

He’d be leading protests against the vaccine if smallpox were still ravaging humanity. He’d recommend supplements against the bubonic plague. He’s lying at scale, fueled by a mix of malice, arrogance, and an unshakable belief that the rubes will never catch on. His misinformation campaign isn’t about science or freedom—it’s about lining his pockets.

Let’s talk about that profit motive.

With all the sincerity of a mob accountant filling out a tax form, Kennedy's letter to the HHS Ethics Officer conveniently notes that he’s keeping his investments in a massive lawsuit against Merck over the Gardasil HPV vaccine. Quelle surprise! He’s suspending his law firm relationships, but that horse has long since left the barn. His so-called legal work? Manufacturing anti-vaccine hysteria to drive lawsuits against vaccine makers and collecting a tidy slice of the vig.

He’s made millions from his for-profit fear machine, but the real payday is the potential multi-billion-dollar settlement against Merck. His role in whipping up these lawsuits has been financially lucrative, to say the least. Meanwhile, Gardasil has been scientifically proven to reduce cervical and other HPV-related cancers, with clinical trials, real-world data, and every major health organization on Earth confirming its safety.

But Bobby Kennedy doesn’t care about public health. He cares about cashflow.

His business model? Litigation, publishing anti-vax conspiracy books, and running a phony advocacy group that has suckered far too many parents into vaccine hesitancy.

It’s not just morally and medically repugnant—it’s an industry of deception. In an era where, as Tom Nichols put it, expertise is dead, RFK Jr. thrives on the Kennedy name while the entire legitimate medical and scientific community is screaming that he’s a quack, a grifter, and a profiteer of human suffering. The list of things he asserts that are absolutely, utterly, unquestionably wrong is longer than the matters on which he is even in the neighborhood of being right.

As we heard from a man who thinks “African” AIDS is different from “American” AIDS — and that HIV does not cause it — and that Lyme disease is a “military-engineered bioweapon,” I was shocked today that he didn’t talk about the importance of balancing the humours or the risks of miasmic vapors.

Perhaps HHS, under his leadership, will recommend bloodletting as a remedy to the coming bird flu or prescribe boiled badger dung for measles. It’s about as legitimate as recommending Ivermectin to treat COVID. Millions of MAGA followers believe in this man, which speaks both to their lack of scientific education and to their roaring credulity.

Even his own family wants nothing to do with him. He’s been roundly condemned by more Kennedys than I can count.

Caroline Kennedy, RFK Jr.’s cousin, issued a blistering rebuke of Trump’s pick for HHS, calling him what he is: a predator. She spells it out:

“Bobby preys on the desperation of parents of sick children—vaccinating his own kids while hypocritically discouraging others from doing the same.”

RFK Jr. isn’t just a danger to public health—he’s a walking, talking, lawsuit-filing contagion of disinformation. And if he gets anywhere near the levers of power, America’s health will pay the price. Children will die of diseases that haven’t been seen at scale in America in decades. Polio will return. Cancer and disease research will grind to a half.

The most important takeaway from Caroline Kennedy in her final paragraph:

"The American health care system, for all its flaws, is the envy of the world. Its doctors and nurses, researchers, scientists, and caregivers are the most dedicated people I know. Everyday, they give their lives to heal and save others. They deserve a knowledgeable leader who is committed to evidence and excellence. They deserve a Secretary committed to advancing cutting-edge medicine to save lives, not rejecting the advances we have already made. They deserve a stable, moral, and ethical person at the helm of this crucial agency. They deserve better than Bobby Kennedy- and so do the rest of us. I urge the Senate to reject his nomination.”

You can read the entire letter here.

The Senate must reject Robert F. Kennedy, Jr for this or any position in government.

1. Kennedy called COVID “…a genetically engineered bioweapon that targets Black and White people but spared Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese people.” How alt-right of him.