Republicans have embraced Robert F. Kennedy JR., whose alliance with President-elect Trump could make the prominent environmentalist and vaccine skeptic the nation’s top health official next year.
They hold an overwhelmingly positive view of Kennedy, with most approving of Trump’s decision to put him in his administration, according to recent polling from the AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research and AP VoteCast.
But Americans overall are less positive about Kennedy, and there isn’t broad support for some of his most controversial views, which include closer scrutiny of vaccines.
If confirmed by the Senate, Kennedy will be charged with leading the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, a $1.7 trillion agency that researches cancer, approves prescription drugs and provides health insurance for roughly half the country.
About 6 in 10 Republicans approve of Kennedy’s appointment to Trump’s Cabinet and only about 1 in 10 disapprove, according to an AP-NORC poll conducted in December, while the rest aren’t familiar with him or didn’t have an opinion.
Kennedy doesn’t fare as well among Americans overall, with about 4 in 10 U.S. adults disapproving and about 3 in 10 approving of his appointment.
And although he hails from one of the most powerful Democratic dynasties in the country, most Democrats said they don’t like that he’s been named to Trump’s Cabinet. About 6 in 10 Democrats “strongly disapprove” of his nomination, the December poll found. That’s a higher share of disapproval than other high-profile picks, like defense secretary nominee Pete Hegseth or secretary of state nominee Marco Rubio.
Kennedy started his career as an environmental lawyer, eventually winning big lawsuits against companies over the chemicals used in weed killers and heavy metal smelters.
But in recent years, he’s attracted a sizable and loyal following over his claims that vaccines, recommended and championed by the nation’s public health agencies, are dangerous.
“There’s no vaccine that is safe and effective,” Kennedy said on a podcast in July 2023. During a Fox News interview the same year, he said he still believes a repeatedly discredited idea that vaccines can cause autism. In recent days, Trump has increasingly suggested that the link between autism and vaccines should be studied.
About half of voters want the government to be more involved in ensuring children are vaccinated for childhood diseases, according to AP VoteCast, a survey of more than 120,000 voters in the 2024 presidential election.
About one-quarter said the government’s current involvement on this is “about right,” and only about 2 in 10 wanted the government to be less involved. But parents of school-age children were somewhat more likely to support a smaller government role: Roughly 3 in 10 parents of children under 18 years old wanted the government less involved, compared to about 2 in 10 voters without children under 18.
Among Trump’s voters, about one-third wanted the government less involved in ensuring children are vaccinated for childhood diseases.
A similar share wanted the government more involved, and about 3 in 10 said its involvement was about right. Roughly 4 in 10 Trump voters who are parents of children under 18 said they want the government less involved in ensuring children are vaccinated, while about one-third said they wanted it more involved.
Allies of Kennedy and Trump have promised not to take away vaccines, instead saying they oppose government mandates and want to conduct more research on the vaccines.
The AP-NORC poll of 1,251 adults was conducted Dec. 5-9, 2024, using a sample drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for adults overall is plus or minus 3.7 percentage points.
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