DeSantis: I’d Appoint Anti-Vaxxer RFK Jr. to Lead CDC or FDA

GOP presidential candidate Ron DeSantis, whose foundering campaign recently laid off a third of its staff, boasted on Wednesday that as president he’d “sic” anti-vaccine conspiracist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on the CDC or FDA by appointing him to lead the public health organizations. During an interview with right-wing pundit Clay Travis, the Florida governor said he wouldn’t be interested in making Kennedy—who is currently running a long-shot Democratic bid for the White House—vice president due to his “liberal” leanings. At the same time, DeSantis said on the “medical stuff,” he was “100 percent” aligned with Kennedy—who recently suggested COVID-19 is a genetically engineered bioweapon that ethnically targeted” to spare Jewish people. DeSantis’ plan to appoint one of America’s most notorious conspiracy theorists to lead the public health sector was even trashed by some of his supporters in the right-wing media, who called his plan “embarrassingly bad.” 2024 challenger Mike Pence, for his part, denounced the idea—but not because of RFK Jr.’s conspiratorial beliefs. “I will only consider Pro-Life Americans to lead the FDA, CDC or HHS,” he wrote in a statement.