Kerry Kennedy, sister of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., said this week that her brother is not the right person to lead the agency, expressing concern over his controversial public health views and conduct in office.
Her remarks came during an interview on CNN, where she appeared from El Salvador and was asked about the growing calls for Kennedy’s removal.
“I think he is not an appropriate HHS secretary,” she said, when asked directly if she agreed with comedian John Oliver’s recent call for her brother to be impeached.
Kerry Kennedy’s comments marked a rare moment of public family disapproval amid Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s contentious tenure leading the health department. While she noted her personal affection for him, she was clear that his views and actions had crossed the line.
“I love Bobby and I find him incredibly charismatic,” she said. “But I have said—and my other family members have been super clear about this—that we disagree again and again and again on the things that he’s said.”
The criticism followed an explosive segment on Oliver’s late-night program, in which he spent more than 30 minutes laying out what he described as a dangerous pattern of misinformation, staff purges, and scientific negligence under Kennedy’s leadership.
At one point in the show, Oliver said Kennedy was “in way over his worm-riddled head” and called for impeachment, adding, “Too much damage has already been done.”
Kennedy, who was appointed to the cabinet post by President Donald Trump earlier this year, has faced intense backlash from the scientific community and health professionals.
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Since taking office, he has dismissed or forced out many of the nation’s top public health experts, slashed funding for key research programs, and promoted fringe medical theories that contradict established science.
During a recent press conference, Kennedy described autism as an “epidemic” worse than COVID-19 and claimed that many autistic individuals will “never pay taxes, never hold a job, never play baseball, never write a poem, never go out on a date, and many of them will never use a toilet unassisted.”
His remarks drew immediate condemnation from autism advocacy groups and public health leaders who pointed out that autism is a spectrum and that many individuals live full, independent lives.
After facing backlash, Kennedy attempted to clarify his comments, saying he had been referring specifically to individuals with profound autism. Critics said the damage had already been done.
In another blow to his credibility, Kennedy’s long-standing skepticism of vaccines has been blamed for a sharp rise in vaccine hesitancy. That hesitancy, public health officials say, is fueling a widespread measles outbreak—the most severe the country has seen in years.
Kennedy has suggested that catching measles is preferable to receiving the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) vaccine, despite the risk of serious health complications or death from the disease.
Meanwhile, within HHS, turmoil has been the norm. More than 10,000 employees have been terminated, many of them top scientists, researchers, and public health coordinators.
While some were rehired after administrative confusion stemming from Elon Musk’s government restructuring initiative under DOGE, most of the firings were permanent.
The upheaval has also impacted other agencies. At the Food and Drug Administration and the National Institutes of Health, senior officials have resigned in protest, citing interference, political pressure, and misinformation.
A number of grants were suspended or canceled outright, halting ongoing research and leaving many in the scientific community uncertain about future funding.
Among the high-profile departures was Dr. Peter Marks, the FDA’s top vaccine expert, who resigned with a scathing public statement accusing Kennedy of spreading “dangerous lies” and undermining years of progress in public health.
Kennedy’s swearing-in earlier this year was one of the more controversial moments of Trump’s second term. Once a third-party presidential candidate, Kennedy dropped out of the race and endorsed Trump in exchange for a promised cabinet position. The move was widely criticized as a political maneuver that placed loyalty above qualification.
At the time, Trump defended the choice, calling Kennedy a “truth-teller” and a “fighter” who would challenge the so-called deep state. But critics warned that Kennedy’s long record of promoting conspiracy theories made him an unfit choice for a department responsible for the health of over 300 million Americans.
Since then, Kennedy’s critics have only grown louder. Advocacy organizations, public health coalitions, and Democratic lawmakers have all called for his removal. Kerry Kennedy’s public statement adds a personal dimension to the outcry.
In her CNN interview, she listed off a series of false claims her brother has promoted over the years, including his assertion that vaccines cause autism, that HIV does not cause AIDS, that pollution is turning people transgender, and that people with autism are a “burden” on society.
“This is insanity,” she said. “Just look at the science. This goes on and on and on. I love my brother. [But] I think he’s dead wrong.”
She also spoke from El Salvador, where she has been working on a separate human rights case involving 10 Venezuelan men detained and deported by the Trump administration without due process.
Her trip, unrelated to the HHS controversy, nevertheless provided a stark contrast to her brother’s role in a government accused of neglecting the very human rights she seeks to defend.
Kerry Kennedy has been active in humanitarian advocacy for decades, and her legal work often centers on issues of government accountability, health equity, and the treatment of vulnerable populations.
That background has made her especially sensitive to the current political climate, where public health, science, and human rights frequently intersect.
The calls for Kennedy’s resignation or impeachment may not yet have reached a critical mass, but the momentum is building. Kerry Kennedy’s disavowal, combined with the widespread professional condemnation, has intensified the pressure on the administration to reconsider his place in government.
The Trump administration has not issued an official response to Kerry Kennedy’s comments or to Oliver’s segment, though insiders have suggested that the White House is aware of the backlash.
Whether the president will remain loyal to Kennedy or seek to make a change remains uncertain. For now, Kennedy continues to hold his post, but the chorus of voices urging his removal continues to grow—louder now that one of them is family.
