How RFK Jr.’s tumultuous past has shaped his convictions
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
This is In Conversation from Apple News. I'm Shamita Basu. Today, how RFK Jr.
How did RFK Jr. become a powerful figure in public health?
became the most powerful man in public health.
Earlier this year, journalist Michael Shearer set out to profile health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and Kennedy agreed to sit down with him.
And almost literally the first thing he said to me when I walked in the room was, my staff doesn't want me to talk to you. They think this is a mistake. No one in your position ever treats me fairly. And that was sort of the launching point.
Michael first wrote about Kennedy back in 2023 when he was at The Washington Post. Kennedy had taken issue with some parts of that coverage, but the two stayed in touch. And for this new story for The Atlantic, Kennedy granted Michael a remarkable level of access.
We met, I think, in total for something like seven hours. There are dozens of text messages on my phone going back and forth about particular studies. I traveled with him to Chicago. I mean, it ended up becoming a rather elaborate reporting process.
Michael's piece is out now. It explores how Kennedy's background — the privilege, the trauma, the years of addiction and recovery — shaped the worldview he brings to his role at HHS and what that means for federal public health policy, including rollbacks to the CDC's longstanding guidance on childhood immunization and generally shifting American attitudes toward vaccines. Michael told me that to understand the choices Kennedy is making today, you have to start with the story of how he became who he is.
I think he's a very peculiar person, even among politicians who tend to be incredibly driven, incredibly self-focused people. He has a ferocity to him that is unusual. And I've been doing this a lot of years now in Washington, profiling people like this. And my idea is that you cannot understand what he's doing now at HHS. without understanding him as a person, where he came from, and that extraordinary journey, the extraordinary trauma he went through of losing his father and uncle at a very young age, of getting deeply into drugs starting at the age of 15, of spending 14 years as a heroin addict, of spending most of his life since then on a daily basis focused on overcoming his many addictions—
And on reclaiming the birthright he was born with. I mean he was born as much a prince as America has ever had in that the Kennedy family in the 1960s was as much political royalty as the United States has ever had. And he lost all of that. His life course went way off track in his teen years and his 20s. And it is a remarkable journey to go from that to someone who's running a hopeless campaign for president to literally the most powerful scientific policymaker probably in the world right now.
Well, let's get into some of that background. I mean, you write about this just a bit in the piece. As you said, it feels like incomplete to tell the story without touching on some of that. But how old was he exactly when his uncle was shot first?
So he was nine years old when his uncle, President Kennedy, was shot. And then 14 years old when his father, Kennedy's brother, Bobby Kennedy, was shot in California. And that was, I mean, obviously a trauma for any family. But compounding it... was the fact that, you know, his mother was left with 11 children at that point to raise on her own. And he was left, you know, basically shipped off to boarding school. I mean, he was left without many people raising him. And he tells the story of... The summer after his father is killed, 1969, someone offers him LSD. He was into a comic book at the time that was about Native Americans who lived among dinosaurs. So he said to this boy who's offering him acid, you think I'll see dinosaurs?
It just shows, I'm a 15-year-old kid.
Yeah, he was 15. Yeah.
Yeah, 15. And that's just the beginning of his night. I mean, he crashes pretty hard later on, and another group of kids offer him crystal meth. And it was the crystal meth—I mean, I think psychedelics have continued to play a role in his life, but it was a crystal meth that led to the heroin.
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Chapters
6 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:03–0:10
2
How did RFK Jr. become a powerful figure in public health?
0:10–5:55
3
What experiences shaped RFK Jr.'s worldview and beliefs?
5:55–9:24
4
What traumatic events impacted RFK Jr.'s early life?
9:24–23:12
5
What was the turning point for RFK Jr. in overcoming addiction?
23:12–29:02
6
How does RFK Jr. view his recovery journey today?
29:02–31:16
Speakers
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