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WASHINGTON (CN) — Vaccine skeptic and one-time presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. is President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to run the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the incoming administration announced Thursday.
Kennedy, 70, was widely expected to snag a position in Trump’s cabinet after he dropped his third-party bid for the presidency over the summer and endorsed the president-elect. Trump himself had suggested that he would consider Robert F. Kennedy’s son for a role overseeing public health policy.
In a statement announcing his appointment, Trump said that the Health and Human Services Department under Kennedy would “play a big role” in keeping Americans safe from harmful chemicals, pollutants, pharmaceutical products and food additives.
“For too long, Americans have been crushed by the industrial food complex and drug companies who have engaged in deception, misinformation and disinformation when it comes to Public Health,” Trump wrote on X, formerly Twitter. “Mr. Kennedy will restore these Agencies to the traditions of Gold Standard Scientific Research, and beacons of Transparency, to end the Chronic Disease epidemic, and to Make American Great and Healthy Again!”
Kennedy’s nomination to lead the government’s foremost public health authority is a controversial one. The former environmental attorney is the founder of a children’s health advocacy group which has spread anti-vaccine disinformation, and he has suggested that the government should take another look at products it considers hazardous, such as raw milk.
Kennedy has more recently said that the Trump administration should take steps to encourage local governments to remove fluoride from drinking water supplies, based on his belief that the compound causes adverse health effects. Some U.S. communities fluoridate their water in an effort to protect Americans’ dental health, but there is no federal law requiring the compound to be present in drinking water.
The former presidential candidate’s positions on these issues are almost certain to come up during his Senate confirmation process.
His nomination is just the latest in a series of Trump loyalists who have scored coveted cabinet positions for the president-elect’s second administration. Trump this week tapped Florida Representative Matt Gaetz for attorney general, a move that even riled some congressional Republicans.
The incoming president has also nominated former Democratic Representative Tulsi Gabbard as his director of national intelligence, and selected Fox News host Pete Hegseth as defense secretary.
Though many of Trump’s appointees will need to be confirmed by the Senate, the president-elect has suggested an end-run around the traditional process that would allow him to unilaterally select his cabinet without congressional input. Known as recess appointments, the move would require the consent of leadership in both the House and Senate — and would trample on the upper chamber’s traditional “advice and consent” role in checking the Whtie House.
Top Republicans in the Senate have not said whether they would support recess appointments but have left the option on the table.
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