When Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced his bid for the White House last year, Kennedy took positions on a wide variety of issues tied to the economy, war and the environment that had the potential capacity to appeal to disenchanted citizens across the political spectrum. And it looked like there was a chance he might run as a populist not entirely defined by his fringe conspiratorial views about vaccines. But Kennedy’s messaging and the people he’s hired show that he’s leaned fully into anti-vaxxer and false conspiracy theories. And that laser focus is evident in the two names for his potential running mates confirmed by NBC News: New York Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers and former pro wrestler and Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura.
Any hope that Kennedy would run a serious campaign is gone. Rodgers, a four-time NFL MVP, has never held public office. He hasn’t run a major organization. He’s not a policy wonk or a community organizer. But he has at least two qualities that might appeal to Kennedy.
First, because he’s a talented pro athlete, a lot of people know Rodgers’ name; his joining Kennedy would cause a bunch of celebrity buzz and garner attention from folks who might otherwise not pay attention to Kennedy — or politics at all.
Kennedy’s interest in Rodgers and Ventura signals a willingness to leverage celebrity to promote conspiratorial thinking about public health.
Second, outside of football, Rodgers is mainly known for one thing: his fringe views on vaccines and conspiracy theories. When asked in 2021 at a news conference if he had been vaccinated, Rodgers deliberately misled reporters by saying he had “immunized” himself to Covid-19. He was, in fact, not vaccinated and had attempted to use an unproven homeopathic remedy as a substitute. He has raged against the “pharmaceutical-industrial complex” while describing Anthony Fauci as “one of the biggest spreaders of misinformation.” As Gordon Pennycook, an associate professor of…
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