Trump’s former surgeon general balks at allowing RFK Jr. to “madness” in terms of health policy

Donald Trump has spent a lot of time in recent weeks boasting about his plans to award Robert F. Kennedy Jr. influential position in a possible second term. The former president did not provide specific details, but suggested that Kennedy – a lawyer with no professional experience in medicine, science or public health – would work on health policy in some capacity.

At one rally last week, Trump said he was committed to making America healthy again addition“Come on, Bobby. Bobby will do it. Constable. Let’s go, Bobby. Will you make us healthy, Bobby?

On Sunday, during a highly controversial rally at Madison Square Garden, the Republican Party nominee assured his audience that he would let Kennedy “be crazy about your health“

Oddly enough, Trump’s former surgeon general seems to have some misgivings about the idea. Mother Jones reported: :

Sheryl Gay Stolberg of The New York Times reported on the conference and quoted a warning from Trump’s former surgeon, who warned conference participants about the adverse influence Kennedy could have.

“If (Kennedy) has a significant impact on the next administration, it could further reduce people’s willingness to learn about recommended vaccines, and I worry about the impact that could have on our nation’s health, our nation’s economy, our global security.” Adams said.

A former surgeon general who served on Trump’s team for nearly four years after working with then-Gov. Mike Pence in Indiana, he continued“I would advise Republicans to tread very carefully in a world where vaccine confidence is allowed to continue to erode so that we go backwards on one of the most important public health achievements achieved in this country in the last 50 to 75 years.”

Public comments like these will likely do lasting damage to Adams’ influence within the Trumpified GOP, but the former surgeon general offered some sound advice.

Like us recently discussedthe idea that Kennedy should be able to “be crazy about your health” in a Republican administration is more than a little weird.

As my MSNBC colleague Zeeshan Aleem recently clarifiedRFK Jr. “is best known for its fringes vaccine conspiracy theories and other medical interventions such as the belief that antidepressants cause school shootings“

NPR had related report last year, noting: “Wi-Fi causes cancer and ‘leaky brains'” – Kennedy he told podcaster Joe Rogan. … Antidepressants are to blame for school shootings, he he mused during the performance with Twitter CEO Elon Musk. Chemicals in water supplies could turn children transgender, he said said right-wing Canadian psychologist and podcaster Jordan Petersonrepeating A false claim made by a serial fabulist Alex Jones. AIDS cannot be caused by the HIV virus – that is what happened suggested many times“

Of course, this only scratches the surface.

I don’t want to go into too much detail, but if his name was Robert F. Smith Jr., there is obviously no way he would be considered for a leadership position in the federal government. He would be dismissed by the American mainstream as a fringe figure and it would be better for serious people to ignore him.

But in 2024, the Republican Party’s candidate for the highest office in the land is nevertheless letting the public know – in fact, bragging to voters – that this marginal figure with absurd ideas is “I will be a part” of his team for a second term, even though the former president’s surgeon general makes it clear how unwise that would be.

This post updates ours related prior coverage.