Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.’s recent disclosures have revealed several potential conflicts of interest, including investments in two biopharma companies.
The U.S. Senate Finance Committee will convene on Wednesday, Jan. 29, to discuss the nomination of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. as the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. Kennedy will serve as a witness in the hearing. More than 80 advocacy organizations plan to oppose his confirmation, Reuters reported, including consumer group Public Citizen, the Union of Concerned Scientists, the NAACP and the National Organization for Women.
President Donald Trump named Kennedy as his pick for HHS head in November 2024, saying in a Truth Social post that the former presidential candidate would help keep in line the “industrial food complex and drug companies who have engaged in deception, misinformation, and disinformation when it comes to Public Health.”
Trump also expects Kennedy to lead the charge “to end the Chronic Disease epidemic” in the U.S., according to his November announcement.
Kennedy is a controversial appointee—and could pose crucial challenges to the biopharma industry—particularly as he is a well-known anti-vaccine campaigner. The nephew of former president John F. Kennedy and son of assassinated presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Sr., RFK, Jr. is a founder of the Children’s Health Defense, a nonprofit that works to eliminate “toxic exposure” in children to end childhood health epidemics.
The Children’s Health Defense on its website continues to attribute side effects such as autism and developmental delays to vaccination, despite the repeated debunking of these supposed effects by the scientific literature. The organization rose to prominence during the COVID-19 pandemic, when it propagated misinformation against vaccines. Kennedy has previously asserted that he is not anti-vaccine.
Prior to his nomination, Kennedy had also taken aim at the National Institutes of Health and the FDA with claims of corruption and threats of removing hundreds of employees.
The controversies have only ramped up in the days following Trump’s inauguration. Disclosures made in the past week show that in the last two years, RFK Jr. earned $11.6 million from legal work he’s done with different firms, according to reporting by Bloomberg. Of note, Kennedy also reported more than $850,000 in referral fees for cases that he passed to Wisner Baum, a law firm that has made vaccine-related injury claims against the HHS.
According to his ethics statement, Kennedy promised that if appointed, he will no longer take the agreed-upon 10% contingency fees from Wisner Baum for the cases he’s referred to the firm.
Kennedy’s disclosures also reveal that he has investments in CRISPR Therapeutics and Dragonfly Therapeutics, biotech companies that work with HHS agencies and that, if confirmed, could present conflicts of interest for Kennedy. He has promised to divest interests in both companies within 90 days of confirmation.
