Caroline Kennedy wrote a scathing letter to key senators on Tuesday, calling her cousin, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a “predator” addicted to attention from airing dangerous views on vaccinations and who is unfit to be the nation’s health secretary.
She urged lawmakers, who will be questioning Mr. Kennedy at his confirmation hearings Wednesday and Thursday, to reject his nomination. She cited his lack of experience, misinformed views on vaccines and personal attributes. In the letter, she described how he led other family members “down the path of drug addiction.”
“His basement, his garage, and his dorm room were the centers of the action where drugs were available, and he enjoyed showing off how he put baby chickens and mice in the blender to feed his hawks,” Ms. Kennedy wrote. “It was often a perverse scene of despair and violence.”
Her letter was first reported in The Washington Post.
Ms. Kennedy expressed particular outrage over the new disclosures in his ethics agreement filed with the Senate, which she described as outlining how his “crusade against vaccination has benefited him in other ways.”
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She cited Mr. Kennedy’s decision to keep a financial stake in litigation against Merck, which makes a key vaccine against the human papillomavirus (HPV) that is administered to protect against cervical cancer.
“In other words, he is willing to enrich himself by denying access to a vaccine that can prevent almost all forms of cervical cancer and which has been safely administered to millions of boys and girls,” Ms. Kennedy wrote.
As President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s ambassador to Australia, Ms. Kennedy was actively involved in promoting the HPV vaccine, which has put Australia on a path to eliminate cervical cancer. She was instrumental in persuading Mr. Biden to expand his “cancer moonshot” initiative to the Indo-Pacific region.
In her role as ambassador, Ms. Kennedy said, she was reluctant to make public comments against Mr. Kennedy, who launched his presidential campaign in 2023 as a primary challenger to Mr. Biden before running as an independent candidate. When Mr. Kennedy dropped his presidential bid, he endorsed Mr. Trump, who, after winning the election, named Mr. Kennedy as his choice for health secretary.
After that, she broke with her cousin, saying his views about vaccination were dangerous.
Her letter painted Mr. Kennedy as a charismatic figure, “willing to take risks and break the rules,” and able to attract others through the strength of his magnetic personality. Then she traced a tragic history of Mr. Kennedy’s influence over other family members.
“But siblings and cousins who Bobby encouraged down the path of substance abuse suffered addiction, illness and death,” she wrote, “while Bobby has gone on to misrepresent, lie and cheat his way through life.”
Mr. Kennedy’s younger brother, David died in Palm Beach County in May of 1984 of “multiple ingestion” of three drugs found in his body fluids, authorities said at the time
Other relatives have also spoken out against Mr. Kennedy, including his brother Joseph Kennedy II and his sister Kerry Kennedy, who described his comments on race and vaccines as “deplorable and untruthful.”
On Tuesday, Jack Schlossberg, Ms. Kennedy’s son, who has also been critical of Mr. Kennedy, posted a video on social media of his mother reading the letter she had written.
She urged lawmakers, who will be questioning Mr. Kennedy at his confirmation hearings Wednesday and Thursday, to reject his nomination. She cited his lack of experience, misinformed views on vaccines and personal attributes. In the letter, she described how he led other family members “down the path of drug addiction.”
“His basement, his garage, and his dorm room were the centers of the action where drugs were available, and he enjoyed showing off how he put baby chickens and mice in the blender to feed his hawks,” Ms. Kennedy wrote. “It was often a perverse scene of despair and violence.”
Her letter was first reported in The Washington Post.
Ms. Kennedy expressed particular outrage over the new disclosures in his ethics agreement filed with the Senate, which she described as outlining how his “crusade against vaccination has benefited him in other ways.”
Advertisement
SKIP ADVERTISEMENT
She cited Mr. Kennedy’s decision to keep a financial stake in litigation against Merck, which makes a key vaccine against the human papillomavirus (HPV) that is administered to protect against cervical cancer.
“In other words, he is willing to enrich himself by denying access to a vaccine that can prevent almost all forms of cervical cancer and which has been safely administered to millions of boys and girls,” Ms. Kennedy wrote.
As President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s ambassador to Australia, Ms. Kennedy was actively involved in promoting the HPV vaccine, which has put Australia on a path to eliminate cervical cancer. She was instrumental in persuading Mr. Biden to expand his “cancer moonshot” initiative to the Indo-Pacific region.
In her role as ambassador, Ms. Kennedy said, she was reluctant to make public comments against Mr. Kennedy, who launched his presidential campaign in 2023 as a primary challenger to Mr. Biden before running as an independent candidate. When Mr. Kennedy dropped his presidential bid, he endorsed Mr. Trump, who, after winning the election, named Mr. Kennedy as his choice for health secretary.
After that, she broke with her cousin, saying his views about vaccination were dangerous.
Her letter painted Mr. Kennedy as a charismatic figure, “willing to take risks and break the rules,” and able to attract others through the strength of his magnetic personality. Then she traced a tragic history of Mr. Kennedy’s influence over other family members.
“But siblings and cousins who Bobby encouraged down the path of substance abuse suffered addiction, illness and death,” she wrote, “while Bobby has gone on to misrepresent, lie and cheat his way through life.”
Mr. Kennedy’s younger brother, David died in Palm Beach County in May of 1984 of “multiple ingestion” of three drugs found in his body fluids, authorities said at the time
Other relatives have also spoken out against Mr. Kennedy, including his brother Joseph Kennedy II and his sister Kerry Kennedy, who described his comments on race and vaccines as “deplorable and untruthful.”
On Tuesday, Jack Schlossberg, Ms. Kennedy’s son, who has also been critical of Mr. Kennedy, posted a video on social media of his mother reading the letter she had written.
