Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said earlier this week that former President Donald Trump has “promised” him “control of the public health agencies” should Trump win back the White House in November.
Kennedy, who suspended his independent presidential campaign in August and endorsed Trump, made the remarks on a Zoom call with supporters on Monday night. The agencies Kennedy would reportedly oversee in that case include the federal Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Agriculture.
“The key, which President Trump has promised me, is control of the public health agencies, which is HHS and its sub-agencies, CDC, FDA, NIH and a few others. And also the USDA, which is, you know, key to making America healthy, because we’ve got to get off of seed oils and we’ve got to get off of pesticides … and we need to make that transition to regenerative agriculture,” Kennedy said.
Kennedy has been anti-vaccine activist and founded the Children’s Health Defense, a prominent anti-vaccine nonprofit that has campaigned against immunizations and other public health measures like water fluoridation. Medical experts expressed concerns about a rise in medical misinformation through Kennedy’s candidacy.
Harris slammed the promise that Kennedy would oversee the agencies late Wednesday night.
“Putting an anti-abortion conspiracy theorist in charge of our public health agencies says everything you need to know about how Donald Trump would govern,” Harris wrote on X.