Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President Donald Trump’s nominee for the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) secretary, was recently grilled by Senate Democrats during his confirmation hearing. At one point, Kennedy was point-blank asked if he was a “conspiracy theorist,” after which he listed numerous instances in which he was labeled as such and was eventually proven to be right.
Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) asked RFK Jr. before Congress, “Are you conspiracy theorist?” Kennedy immediately responded, noting that it was a term used against him to discredit him. “That is a pejorative Senator that’s applied to me, mainly to keep me from asking difficult questions of powerful interest,” RFK Jr. said, before demonstrating how he has been vindicated.
He continued, “I was told that I was a conspiracy theorist. That label was applied to me because I said that the vaccines, the COVID vaccine, didn’t prevent transmission and it wouldn’t prevent infection. When the government was telling people, Americans that it would, I was saying that because I was looking at the monkey studies in May of 2020.”
The nominee pointed out that he was right, despite being lambasted at the time. “I was called a conspiracy theorist and now everybody admits it,” he said. Kennedy provided another example where he was proven correct on a supposedly cancerous food dye. “I was called a conspiracy theorist because I said red dye caused cancer, and now FDA has acknowledged that and banned it,” he told the Senate.
“I was called a conspiracy theorist because I said fluoride lowered IQ. Last week, JAMA published a meta-review of 87 studies saying that there’s a direct inverse correlation between IQ laws…” RFK Jr. said before Tillis interjected. “All right, so I’m gonna assume…is there any one of them that you can say you got me, that really was a conspiracy theory?” Kennedy confidently responded, “Not yet.”
The American Tribune reported on another moment in RFK Jr.’s confirmation hearing involving Sen. Liz Warren, who pressed Kennedy to not continue his profession of suing companies during and after his time in the Trump administration. “So, Mr. Kennedy, will you also agree that you won’t take any compensation from any lawsuits against drug companies while you are secretary and for four years afterwards?” Warren asked Kennedy.
RFK Jr. responded, maintaining that he would not receive compensation from suing drug companies while serving as the acting HHS secretary. “Well, I’ll certainly commit to that while I’m secretary, but I do want to clarify something because you’re making me sound like a shill! I did a Science Day presentation to the judge on that case to get it into court…” he said.
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However, Warren cut him off, stating, ““Mr. Kennedy, it’s just a really simple question. You’ve taken in $2.5 million. I want to know if you will commit right now that not only will you not go to work for drug companies, you won’t go to work suing the drug companies and taking your rake out of that while you’re secretary and for four years after.” The conversation quickly devolved into a heated exchange. Watch the interaction below:
Note: The featured image is a screenshot from the embedded video.