Robert F. Kennedy Jr. appeared on the latest episode of Tucker Carlson’s podcast on Monday and it’s filled with the ramblings of a man completely detached from reality. Kennedy falsely suggested vaccines cause autism, more or less endorsed the idea that Anthony Fauci should go to prison, and says that AI will allow the FDA to approve new drugs very quickly. It’s quite a mess.
These absolutely unhinged ideas wouldn’t be such a problem if this were any other fringe lunatic appearing on the podcast of a racist former Fox News host. But Kennedy happens to be the Secretary of Health and Human Services, a man who’s been given enormous power over America’s entire healthcare system thanks to President Donald Trump.
One of the most troubling moments in the new interview comes when Kennedy discusses the role that artificial intelligence is going to play in replacing or altering the VAERS system, which stands for Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System. VAERS allows doctors to report incidents when they believe a patient has been harmed by vaccines, but Kennedy isn’t happy with it. The secretary insists it was “designed to fail,” suggesting it’s not registering enough people who in his mind have been harmed by vaccines over the years.
“We’re going to absolutely change VAERS and we’re going to make it, we’re going to create either within VAERS or supplementary to VAERS, a system that actually works,” Kennedy said. “And, you know, right now, even that system is antiquated because we have access to AI.”
Kennedy told Carlson he was creating an “AI revolution” at the Department of Health and Human Services and was attracting the top people from Silicon Valley who “walked away from billion dollar businesses.” But Kennedy says these people don’t want prestige or power, they just want to make the healthcare system better.
“We are at the cutting edge of AI,” Kennedy said. “We’re implementing it in all of our departments. At FDA, we’re accelerating drug approvals so that you don’t need to use primates or even animal models. You can do the drug approvals very, very quickly with AI.”
Kennedy has previously talked about using AI to increase efficiency at FDA but hasn’t provided details about what AI tools will be used and how they would be used to approve new drugs. But given generative AI’s instability and propensity for failing at some of the most basic tasks, the idea of putting drug approvals in the hands of robots is pretty terrifying.
Kennedy, who was the founder of an anti-vaccine group called the Children’s Defense Fund, says repeatedly during the interview that vaccines have never been properly studied, which is just a flat-out lie. But he now has the power to demand investigations into vaccines that will get him the results he wants, no matter how much he insists his own opinion doesn’t matter.
“We need to stop trusting the experts, right?” Kennedy told Carlson. “We were told at the beginning of COVID, don’t look at any data yourself, don’t do any investigation yourself, just trust the experts. And trusting the experts is not a feature of science, it’s not a feature of democracy, it’s a feature of religion, and it’s a feature of totalitarianism.”
Kennedy went on to insist that it was important for everyone to “do your own research,” a common refrain among those in the so-called Make America Healthy Again movement. But Kennedy is intentionally misrepresenting the role of experts in an informed society. Listening to experts isn’t about abandoning all critical thinking. It’s about recognizing that there are areas where you may not have expertise and taking the opinions of medical professionals more seriously than random people on shows like Joe Rogan and Tucker Carlson who are just self-proclaimed experts.
Kennedy was asked several leading questions from Carlson, including whether the covid-19 vaccine has killed more people than it saved. And Kennedy is skilled enough as a communicator (his father was Attorney General during his uncle’s presidency, as he frequently mentions) that he can avoid directly answering in the affirmative while subtly telling you that he believes it’s the case.
Notice, for instance, how Kennedy initially responds to Carlson’s question while eventually working his way to sowing doubt about trust in vaccines.
Carlson: Do you think overall the COVID vaccine killed more than it saved?
Kennedy: My opinion about that is irrelevant. What we’re going to try to do is make that science available so the public can look at the science.
Carlson: Yep.
Kennedy: And I would not say one way or the other. And the truth is, I don’t know. And the reason I don’t know is because the studies that were done by my agency were substandard. And they were not designed to answer that question. And there’s been a lot of obfuscation about covering up, as you know, about suppressing any kind of discussion of vaccine injuries.
Kennedy is often effective at manipulating an audience, but also says things that don’t make any sense, even if you agree with his worldview. At one point during his interview with Carlson he said that when Pfizer’s covid-19 vaccine was studied there were two people who died in the control group and one person who died in the vaccine group.
“You remember they were saying the vaccine is 100% effective? Well, that’s why they were saying it because there was… there was… two is 100% of one,” Kennedy said.
That’s not how anyone is measuring the efficacy of vaccines. Yes, some of the early studies were admittedly too rosy in their projections, especially those in early 2021 as the vaccines were first released. But nobody was claiming that two people dying in a control group and one person dying in the vaccine group showed the vaccine was 100% effective. That math isn’t anything that was actually presented in any study Gizmodo is aware of.
Kennedy was also asked about whether Anthony Fauci, the nation’s most visible public health expert during the covid-19 pandemic, would be prosecuted for some unspecified crimes. Again, the secretary danced around a bit with his language but then heavily suggested Fauci should be tried for criminal acts. Kennedy said there should be some kind of “truth commission” for covid-19 vaccines like the truth and reconciliation commissions in South Africa and Central America in the 20th century under repressive governments.
“Anybody who comes and volunteers to testify truthfully is then given immunity from prosecution. And, but, so that at least the public knows who did what,” Kennedy said. “And people who are called and don’t take that deal and purge themselves, they then can be, they can be prosecuted criminally.”
Kennedy believes that Fauci was involved in some kind of weaponization of covid-19 and in cahoots with the Chinese government. “I think he had a lot of liability on creating coronavirus,” Kennedy said. “You know, he was funding precisely that research at the Wuhan lab. And he was giving them the technology.”
When Kennedy notes that Fauci no longer has protection from the Secret Service since President Trump withdrew it, Carlson responds “good.” Fauci received countless death threats from lunatics over the years.
Kennedy didn’t really get into the spiritual side of his MAHA movement during his latest interview, something that’s previously been top of mind. In fact, Kennedy was very focused on the role of a higher power when he last appeared on Carlson’s show back in August 2024, shortly after abandoning his own bid for president. “God talks to us through the fishes, the birds, the leaves, they’re all words from our creator,” Kennedy said.
Casey Means, Kennedy’s pick to be Surgeon General, has also appeared on podcasts like Joe Rogan to spout many of the same crazy talking points and emphasize how important spirituality is for health. But it remains to be seen whether Means will be confirmed by the U.S. Senate. Kennedy recently said he’s going to push for all Americans to get a wearable device to monitor their health, and as luck would have it, Means sells a wearable for monitoring glucose. The device is targeted at consumers who aren’t even diabetic, the people who do actually need glucose monitoring.
The entire episode of Tucker Carlson is available on YouTube but it’s a frustrating thing to sit through for any halfway intelligent person. At one point, Kennedy insists Trump is a smart guy, calling him “immensely knowledgeable” and “encyclopedic in certain areas.” Kennedy even referred to Trump as “one of the most empathetic people that I’ve ever met.” The only point where Kennedy seems to disagree with Trump is on tariffs, with the secretary saying that “businesses are hurting because of the tariffs.” But it’s the kind of quick dissent that will likely go unnoticed given how Kennedy praises the fascist president incessantly throughout.
You’ve been warned. Listen at the risk of your own sanity.
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