RFK Jr. Called Out for Saying Black People Should Have Different Vaccine Protocol than White People: 'So Dangerous'

Mar. 15, 2025

Angela Alsobrooks, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.Photo:Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun/Tribune News Service via Getty; Nathan Posner/Anadolu via Getty

Amy Davis/Baltimore Sun/Tribune News Service via Getty; Nathan Posner/Anadolu via Getty

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.was confronted over what a lawmaker described as “dangerous” past remarks about how Black Americans should be on a “different vaccine schedule” than White Americans.

Alsobrooks, elected in November as one of only two Black women in the Senate, asked Kennedy to explain his previous assertion that Black people should not be given “the same vaccine schedule that’s given to Whites because their immune system is better than ours.”

Kennedy said that a “series of studies” in Poland showed that Black people have “a much stronger reaction” to “particular antigens.”

“Let me just ask you then,” Alsobrooks responded. “What different vaccine schedule would you say I should have received?”

“Mr. Kennedy, with all due respect, that is so dangerous,” she said.

“Your voice would be a voice that parents listen to, that is so dangerous,” she reiterated. “I will be voting against your nomination because your views are dangerous to our state and to our country.”

Sen. Angela Alsobrooks arrives at the Capitol on Jan. 28 2025.Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty

Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty

But the study’s author told NPR that the data Kennedy cited does not support a vaccine schedule change based on race.

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Robert F. Kennedy Jr. attends a Senate confirmation hearing on Jan. 29, 2025.Anna Moneymaker/Getty

Anna Moneymaker/Getty

The confirmation hearing exchange between Alsobrooks and Kennedy marked one of the first major moments involving the senator, who is still in her first month on the job.

Alsobrooks, who previously served as Prince George’s County Executive, was elected at the same time as Delaware Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester, marking the first time in Congress' 200-plus years that two Black women have served in the Senate simultaneously.

They became only the fourth and fifth Black women to ever serve in the Senate upon their swearing-in on Jan. 3.

Kennedy faced a number of other questions about his prior vaccination claims during his confirmation hearings this week.

Kennedy, who spent much of the week trying to distance himself from his longtime opposition to vaccines, argued that he currently has “no power over that organization."

His confirmation hearings also followed ascathing letterthat his cousinCaroline Kennedysent to senators earlier this week, in which she called him a “predator” and “unqualified” for the position.

His siblings have alsopreviously blasted Kennedy’s proximity to Trump, writing in a letter that his endorsement of the now-president was “a betrayal of the values that our father and our family hold most dear.”

source: people.com