Former President Trump said Thursday he would have Robert F. Kennedy Jr. work on “health and women’s health” and look at the nation’s food supply, the latest indication that the former independent presidential candidate could be given a wide portfolio in a potential Trump administration.
“Robert F. Kennedy Jr. we have. And he’s going to work on health and women’s health and all of the different reasons, because we’re not really a wealthy or a healthy country,” Trump said at a campaign rally in Nevada.
“I told Bobby, ‘I want you to take care of health, I want you to look at the food and the food supply and what we put on the food and all sorts of — you can look at, but let me handle the oil and gas, Bobby,'” Trump added.
Kennedy, who has led an initiative for the Trump campaign dubbed “Make America Healthy Again,” has long drawn criticism for his anti-vaccine comments. He has spoken about the proliferation of processed foods and additives, and he has worked as an environmental lawyer.
Medical experts have raised concerns about Kennedy’s potential influence in a future Trump administration.
Kennedy said Monday that Trump had promised him “control” of public health agencies, including the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Department of Agriculture (USDA), should he win a second term.
Howard Lutnick, a co-chair of Trump’s transition team, said in a CNN interview on Wednesday that Kennedy would not have a role leading those agencies, but instead would be given federal data on vaccines so he could prove they are “not safe.”
Kennedy has denied being against vaccines outright but has long peddled debunked conspiracy theories about them. At a congressional hearing last year, he denied telling people to avoid getting vaccinated, but two years earlier he said on a podcast that he regularly tells strangers not to vaccinate their babies. And on CNN in December, he denied saying no vaccines are “safe and effective,” despite having said exactly that in an interview last July.