Here in Washington, we've been hearing about tensions between the White House and one of its most controversial (but, at least in some circles, most popular) figures: Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Polls among likely voters indicate that the Health and Human Services secretary can be an asset to Republicans when he talks about improving the nation's food supply or labeling ultra-processed foods. But when you're talking about eliminating recommendations for routine childhood vaccines, it can be detrimental.
So when I learned that Kennedy was taking his show on the road to my home state of Ohio, where populist figures tend to do well, I knew I had to be there.
How could a politician who built his reputation by sowing widespread doubt about routine childhood vaccines stay away from one of the central messages he has preached for years?
Well, it turns out that it starts by reading a book about a garbage truck to preschoolers.
The trip took us through northern Ohio, from a regenerative farm in Huron owned by two brothers who grow colorful vegetables, to the Cleveland Clinic, where a masked Kennedy entered the operating room of a heart surgery patient.
In the end, though, Kennedy couldn't escape the vaccine talk.
Speaking at the City Club of Cleveland, Kennedy raised questions about the safety of vaccines that, until last year, had been universally recommended to prevent hepatitis B, an incurable disease.
He asked that parents “have that choice” about administering the vaccine to newborns, a comment that led to cheers and applause from half the room.
The other half groaned and jeered.
When I sat down with the Health Secretary for a few minutes on an Ohio farm, Kennedy listed his accomplishments during his first year in office; Among them were redesigning federal nutrition guidelines and defining ultra-processed foods for the American public.
As her list grew longer, I thought about the mothers I'd spoken to over the past year who had become increasingly nervous about taking their babies out into crowded places amid a measles outbreak and the growing threat of other infectious diseases.
What was his message to those parents? I asked him.
“I would say that everyone should get vaccinated… against measles,” Kennedy told me. “But we must pay increasing attention to chronic diseases. All vaccine-preventable infectious diseases together probably kill 10,000 Americans a year.”
According to scientific researchers, the number of deaths is approaching 50,000.
He tested robotic hands on a heart surgery patient and munched on microgreens in Ohio, but Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. couldn't dodge questions about the Trump administration's most controversial policies.
