Towards the end of Robert F Kennedy jnr’s appearance before the Ways and Means Committee on Capitol Hill on Thursday, the New York Democratic senator Tom Suozzi broke the tension to take a trip down memory lane.
He reminisced about the years when RFK, the health secretary’s father, had lived in Glen Cove, the affluent Gold Coast community that Suozzi now represents. Suozzi’s father had campaigned for RFK. In fact, when the younger Suozzi was mayor of Glen Cove, in 2007, he had Kennedy jnr come to give a talk “because you had founded the Riverkeeper [environmental organisation] about the environmental quality of Long Island Sound”.
Kennedy, clad in his customary Oxford button down and skinny tie, offered a patrician nod of recollection.
“And I applaud some of the things you are doing,” Suozzi continued.
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“I like the idea of going after the food guys. I like the idea of going after micro plastics, of doing prevention instead of just treatment for chronic disease,” he said.
The moment was a reminder of the aching resonance the Kennedy name still commands on Capitol Hill – and of the varied lives of the 71-year-old whose policies as health secretary will be under the microscope over several days of testimony.
Kennedy’s late uncle, Ted Kennedy, had, by the end of his gargantuan run of 47 years on Capitol Hill, become one of the most effective and progressive lawmakers in its history, earning him the sobriquet the Lion of the Senate.
Of course, if his nephew got wind of a lion, or any class of majestic animal at loose in the Senate, the fear would be that he’d wish to wrestle it, or strap it to his car or do something that wouldn’t end well, given jnr’s arresting history with exotic animals.
Kennedy’s appearance this week coincided with the latest book on his life, Isabel Vincent’s RFK Jr: The Fall and Rise, which rifles through the pages of Kennedy’s private diaries that the author was given, in confidence. Of course, the hateful media ignored many of the anguished entries to thrill readers with the nugget that Kennedy jnr had confessed (to himself) to cutting off the genitals of a road-killed raccoon in upstate New York in 2001.
Bizarre, undoubtedly, but there is always context: as Vincent explained of her subject’s animal fixation in a television interview with CNN on Thursday night, Kennedy had, as a boy, dreamed of becoming a veterinarian. He was obsessed with animals – keeping a pet seal who flopped around the family pool at the august family home Hickory Hill, in McLean, Virginia, and retaining his fascination with the study of animals throughout his life.
The Ways and Means hearing marked an uncomfortable three hours for Kennedy, whose appointment as health secretary by Donald Trump, after a decade spent as one of the most strident vaccine sceptics in the United States, continues to alarm the medical community. During the entirety of the Biden administration, 514 measles cases were reported in the US. Some 2,300 cases were recorded in the first year of the Trump administration.
“Mr Secretary, kids have died because measles is running rampant under your watch, in large part because President Trump allowed your conspiracy theories to run our public health,” California Democrat Mike Thompson told him.
“HHS [US department of health and human services] should be led by professionals who respect science and data and put patients first.”
Over the morning, Kennedy himself did not volubly push back against the Democratic criticisms of his vaccine beliefs, in keeping with recent reports that he has been ordered by the White House to tone down his message after polling found it to be unpopular.
Jay Bhattacharya, the director of the National Institute of Health (NIH), recently clarified it is “absolutely vital” that US children are vaccinated against measles. The White House’s 2027 provisional budget bill has built in a 13 per cent cut to the NIH and a 30 per cent cut to the budget for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Kennedy has argued that part of his brief is to address the “laxity of vigilance” of the Biden administration and to root out Medicaid-related fraud. In addition, he has launched an arguably revolutionary war on the domination of processed food on US shelves and larders, pushing vegetables, fruits and dairy at the top of an inverted food pyramid.
The most heated moment of the hearing occurred when Kennedy was confronted by Rep Terri Sewell over remarks made in a 2024 podcast when – she quoted – he said that “every black kid is now just standard put on Adderall, SSRIs [antidepressants], benzos, which are known to induce violence. And those kids are going to have to go somewhere to get reparented.”
“There is a lot to unpack in that comment,” said Sewell.
Kennedy expressed doubt that he ever said it.
“Well, I’d like to hear the recording,” he responded.
“Because it didn’t make any sense – I don’t even know what it means.”
The spat undermined the startling trajectory of Kennedy’s influence and prominence since he launched his avant-garde presidential election campaign in 2024, abandoning the Democratic umbrella for an Independent run that generated eye-catching polling numbers in the early part of the election year.
Throughout his campaign, he largely steered clear of the hostile traditional media outlets that had habitually mythologised his late father and uncle, turning up on alternative podcasts where he spoke unguardedly. He suspended his campaign that summer and, to the vocal mortification of several prominent Kennedy family members, endorsed Trump.
Now, he cuts an unusual figure in the Trump cabinet; the physical link to the mythos of the Camelot administration, and one of the many next-generation of family members whose lives have been shaped by the harrowing fact and aftermath of the assassinations of both men.
Kennedy’s life story is a messy confection of privilege and addictions and weighted by a series of family tragedies. His personal eccentricities and vanities have made for ceaseless tabloid fodder since he rose to public prominence. His political profile within the Trump administration is an odd mix of regal silence and wacky self-promotion designed to demonstrate the virtues of healthy living as part of the Maha (Make America Healthy Again) programme.
“You are making terrible decisions that impact real lives,” congresswoman Linda Sanchez told him.
“One thing I find incredible is that you suspended this pro-vaccine campaign but somehow you are spending taxpayer dollars to drink milk shirtless in a hot tub with Kid Rock and somehow you think that’s a better public health message than informing the public about the importance of vaccines?”
She was referring to the most recent Make America Healthy Again promotion when the health secretary displayed his hard-body upper torso as he embarked on a peculiar workout regime with Rock in his favoured rig-out of no top and dark denim jeans. They cycled stationary bikes and did press ups in a sauna and played pickleball. The day may come when RFK shows up at a cabinet meeting in just the jeans, with Trump making approving comments while the other less buffed males on his cabinet shift uncomfortably in their sad suits.
As the administration strips the overall health budget by $10 billion, the immediate interpretation on RFK jnr is that the administration wants to keep its prestige former Democrat in check as it prepares for a bruising midterm election season. But Kennedy is unlikely to stop being himself.
“He sees himself as he has always seen himself: as on a crusade,” said Isabel Vincent.
“He really sees what he is doing as good for humanity. And he has been told his whole life that he is the heir to Camelot; he’s his father’s namesake and after his father’s assassination there was a lot of pressure on him to go into public service. He has reached part of the pinnacle of his dream – he is part of the president’s cabinet. And he believes what he is doing is truly right and he believes he is helping people.”
His grandnephew and Democratic congressional candidate Jack Schlossberg, one of RFK jnr’s most vociferous critics, predicted this week that Kennedy will make a second run for the Oval Office in 2028. “He’s going to run. He’s got a real following. Those Maha guys and women are cultish about him. It doesn’t make sense what he says. I mean, I’ll give him credit for being a brilliant mythologiser.”
As Kennedy exited the hearing on Thursday, he posed for photographs with staffers who were clearly star-struck. He carried a takeaway coffee and looked at home in the corridors the older generation of Kennedy men had also walked. A reporter asked him about the raccoon. Bobby just laughed his pale-eyed laugh and didn’t reply.
