Donald Trump's disconcerting nomination of tinfoil-hatted and wildly unqualified Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to lead the Department of Health and Human Services crystallizes an alarming vision for American healthcare, one that places pseudoscience and insane conspiracy theories at the helm of the nation's premier health institutions.
The announcement on Nov. 14 hands control of an 80,000-employee department, spanning 13 operating divisions and more than 100 critical health programs, to a figure whose medical positions routinely contradict established science. Dr. Richard E. Besser, former acting CDC director, delivered a stark assessment: the appointment "would pose incredible risks to the health of the nation."
Kennedy's documented history of promoting wild (and fully debunked) health theories raises giant red flags about the future of American public health. He has persistently spread false information linking vaccines to autism -- a thoroughly discredited claim. He's publicly contradicted CDC recommendations on water fluoridation, promoted raw milk consumption despite FDA warnings about its dangers, and championed hydroxychloroquine -- a prescription drug expressly for treatment of malaria -- after its emergency authorization as a COVID-19 treatment was revoked due to ineffectiveness.
Senator Patty Murray crystallized these well-warranted concerns, labeling Trump's selection "catastrophic" and warning it "could not be more dangerous." Such alarm from a former Senate Health Committee chair underscores the gravity of placing someone with Kennedy's unhinged medical "views" in charge of an antibacterial soap dispenser, much less the FDA, CDC, and crucial medical research programs.
The appointment reveals a deeper, more systemic threat -- particularly to women's health. In fact, upon even cursory inspection, Trump's cabinet selections, including Matt Gaetz (accused of involvement of underage girls) for Attorney General and Pete Hegseth (a possible white nationalist who isn't particularly fond of women) for Defense Secretary, demonstrate a clear pattern. These nominees share troubling histories regarding women's rights and healthcare access, suggesting a coordinated effort to roll back decades of progress in women's health protections like a Walmart sale.
Trump's own statements -- which were enough for The Week to create an entire rundown -- about women's healthcare decisions reflect this regressive agenda. His first administration supported policies restricting women's reproductive rights -- which included the eventual striking down of Roe v. Wade by his ideologically aligned Supreme Court. Kennedy's nomination signals further intensification of these efforts. The HHS nominee would oversee crucial programs affecting women's health services, Medicare, Medicaid, and research funding -- all while promoting views that contradict actual science.
The irony lies in Trump's campaign promise to "restore the nation's health agencies to the traditions of Gold Standard Scientific Research." Kennedy's appointment achieves the opposite, potentially dismantling evidence-based healthcare protocols in favor of a violent pseudoscience that will be normalized and will damage women, especially women and children of color. Because what are facts and information anyway, right? More troubling still is Trump's casual admission about letting Kennedy "go wild on the medicines," a statement that inadvertently reveals the reckless approach to public health policy that Trump voters have asked for. This cavalier attitude toward pharmaceutical oversight could endanger millions who depend on FDA-regulated medications and treatments.
For women voters who supported Trump, this appointment presents a particular paradox. The very administration they helped elect is now positioning people openly hostile to women's (and therefore children's) healthcare needs in positions of immense power.
Kennedy's nomination signals a fundamental shift away from science-based health policy toward an approach guided by conspiracy theories, as they have a growing cottage industry of truth creation for a base that doesn't care about protections for anyone outside of themselves, whatever the context. The likely consequences of such a drastically criminally unhinged shift will reverberate throughout American healthcare -- from vaccine programs to drug safety protocols, harming everyone in the course.