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Almost seven months into Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s tenure, Lawrence O’Donnell has coined a new nickname for Donald Trump’s health secretary, dubbing him “the most dangerous nepo baby in American history.”
During his Thursday monologue, O’Donnell tore into Kennedy over his disastrous testimony on Capitol Hill. Earlier in the day, Kennedy appeared before the Senate Finance Committee, where he was grilled by Democrats and Republicans alike over his anti-vaccine policies.
The “Last Word” host highlighted a particular phrase used by the secretary during that testimony: “When my uncle was president.” O’Donnell argued that “no Kennedy has ever trafficked more blatantly and offensively in the dead Kennedys’ memories than Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has never been a serious student of or practitioner of anything.”
O’Donnell said Kennedy’s career is one built on family connections, not genuine ability. That includes his place in the Trump administration, which O’Donnell said he only secured “because of one word: Kennedy.”
“Donald Trump, a lifelong attention addict, grew up obviously dazzled by the Kennedy fame machine,” O’Donnell continued. “Fame is currency with Donald Trump.”
The MSNBC host said the “nepo baby” title is another quality that Kennedy shares with the president. “The most unqualified and incompetent health and human services secretary in history took his place in the Trump Cabinet, working for a man whose fortune and business career was handed to him by his father — Donald Trump, the most famous nepo baby in the New York real estate business,” O’Donnell said.
In the end, O’Donnell said it was the American people who would have to suffer for the president’s decision to appoint Kennedy: “Trump got the health and human services secretary that he deserves, but the country did not.”
You can watch O’Donnell’s full takedown of Kennedy in the clip at the top of the page.