Chris Pratt Says RFK Jr. Is ‘Great’ and Hating Trump Shouldn’t Detract From ‘Any Success From His Administration’: RFK Is ‘Getting Toxic Stuff Out of Kids’ Food’ and ‘That’s a Great Thing’

Chris Pratt joined Bill Maher on the latest episode of the “Club Random” podcast and got asked about Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is serving as President Trump’s secretary of health and human services. RFK Jr. also happens to be cousins with Pratt’s wife, Katherine Schwarzenegger. In conversation with Maher, the “Guardians of the Galaxy” actor spoke favorably of Kennedy, noting they often avoid politics at family dinners.

via: The Independent

“I’ve spent a number of occasions hanging with him [in a] strictly family dinner kind of vibe,” Pratt said. “I really got along with him well and think he’s great. He’s funny, he’s wonderful. I love him.”

When it comes to the negative media attention Kennedy attracts, the Jurassic World star, 46, noted that “in politics, you inherit enemies.”

“And when you jump on the bandwagon with the most divisive president ever, it makes sense that you’re going to be made to look terrible,” he explained. “So I don’t know what to believe [about his reported policies]. It’s not like I say to Bobby, ‘Let’s talk about this’ while we’re playing cards or having fun or having dinner. I’m not going to pick his brain to find out exactly which of those things are true. I just assume that none of them are? For the most part, I wish him well.

“There are certain things [that RFK Jr.] oversees that seem to be supported in a bipartisan way,” Pratt continued, identifying some of the policies he agrees with, “like getting terrible toxic stuff out of our kids’ food.”

“I think that’s a great thing. If you just do that, that’s amazing,” he said. Much of Kennedy’s “Make America Healthy” initiative has targeted ultra-processed foods and petroleum-based synthetic food dyes, which he’s labeled as “toxic” and “dangerous to our children’s health and development.” He’s also an outspoken vaccine critic, previously promoting conspiracies that childhood vaccines cause autism.

“I’d hate to be so mired in hatred for the president that any success from his administration is something I’d be having an allergic reaction to,” Pratt said. “To be like, ‘Oh, well, if they do it, I don’t want it to happen. I’ll put Clorox in my children’s cereal myself!’ Be reasonable here. There’s certain things that would be a good thing to have. I want them all to be successful.”

Pratt’s wife, Schwarzenegger, is the daughter of Maria Shriver, whose mother, Eunice Kennedy Shriver, was a sister of Kennedy’s lawyer father, former U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy.

While Pratt framed his remarks as an appeal for bipartisanship and reason, critics online quickly accused him of excusing policies that harm vulnerable communities.

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This is a clear example of why some actors should be seen and not heard. This is also why he's been touted as the least favorite Chris out of Hemsworth, Pine, and Evans. I'm also not taking advice from someone who allegedly cheated on his ex-wife Ana Faris, and allegedly abandoned his first born special needs child to start a new family with Arnold Schwarzenegger and Maria Shriver's daughter.

The reason people have a problem with RFK Jr, and why he is the black sheep of the Kennedy family is because of the medical misinformation he has spread throughout his political career.

During his confirmation hearings, senators revisited his past comments on anti-vaccine rhetoric, unscientific remarks about Black people’s immune systems, and other false medical claims.

In recent years, RFK Jr.’s focus has been on promoting conspiracy theories, and his claims have earned him a reputation as one of the leading spreaders of COVID-19 vaccine misinformation.

There is a long political, social, and economic history of misinformation shaping the public narrative about Black people, and Senators Alsobrooks and Warnock brought needed attention to this history. Racist discourse, which deemed Africans and their descendants inferior, supported the enslavement of Black people and reinforced white supremacy. This denigration led to racist and dehumanizing medical practices with lasting consequences for Black people. Public health research, led by Ayah Nuriddin and others, shows that racism is a fundamental determinant of health outcomes and disparities, and that racist policies and practices have also been integral to the formation of medical science in the United States.

Nuriddin and colleagues at Johns Hopkins University and Johns Hopkins School of Medicine detail the long history of racial injustice and inequality in health care, including medical segregation, the exclusion of Black Americans from medical training and educational opportunities, and the exploitation of enslaved people’s bodies in medical experimentation—leading to the development of entire medical fields, like gynecology. These racist attitudes toward Black women persisted into the 20th century through eugenics laws and compulsory sterilization practices in several states and Puerto Rico. These practices led to thousands of Black, Latina, and Native American women being subject to involuntary surgeries.

Another example of medical racism is the violation of medical ethics and human rights by the U.S. Public Health Service in the Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male. The 40-year study, conducted from 1932 to 1972, involved hundreds of Black men who were treated for so-called “bad blood” without their informed consent. Yet, even after penicillin became a known treatment for syphilis in 1945, treatment was withheld from the men.

The egregious nature of the Tuskegee Study led to the development of medical ethics, regulations, and review boards—designed to protect human participants in medical, social, economic, and other research. Another notable violation of medical ethics due to racism is reflected in the story of Henrietta Lacks, a Black woman with cervical cancer whose cells were taken without her permission while receiving segregated care at Johns Hopkins Hospital in 1951. Her cancerous cells, known as HeLa cells, contributed to medical advancements worldwide, but the use of her cells generated financial profits for scientists and institutions without compensation to her or her family until 2023.

Given the health care system’s long history of reinforcing racial stereotypes, Kennedy’s confirmation could lead to greater mistrust from the African American community.

If they were so concerned with wanting Americans to eat healthy, then they should make it affordable for the American people to buy healthy products. Also cutting SNAP programs for people struggling to take care of their families, cutting food safety inspections and school lunch programs for poor kids doesn't help matters either.

Don't get it twisted, Trump didn't pick RFK because he has a real concern for wanting to take all the toxic stuff out of kids food. Trump only surrounds himself with loyalists to his cause, and Trump only cares about doing the bidding of billionaires and corporations who make millions off of keeping people sick and addicted. And if there's someone who knows firsthand about addiction, it would be RFK Jr.