Despite RFK Jr. claiming his 2019 Samoa trip wasn’t related to vaccines, a letter he wrote to the nation’s prime minister mentioned “vaccines” or “vaccinations” eight times
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NEED TO KNOW
- Documents reveal Robert F. Kennedy Jr. mentioned vaccines multiple times in a letter before his 2019 Samoa trip
- Kennedy’s visit occurred months before a deadly measles outbreak on the island killed 83 people
- During a 2025 hearing, Kennedy denied his trip was vaccine-related despite evidence to the contrary
After Robert F. Kennedy Jr. insisted multiple times during his 2025 confirmation hearing that his 2019 trip to Samoa had nothing to do with vaccines, new documents have countered that claim.
The documents, obtained by the Associated Press and the U.K. outlet The Guardian, revealed that Kennedy’s comments were inaccurate.
In a letter Kennedy wrote to Samoan Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi ahead of his trip in 2019, he said he intended to study the measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine in Samoa. In the letter, Kennedy used the words “vaccine” or “vaccination” eight times.
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At the time, Kennedy served as chair and chief legal counsel of Children’s Health Defense (CHD), an anti-vaccine group.
In the letter, Kennedy expressed interest in studying the MMR vaccine’s effects in relation to the deaths of two children who received an improperly mixed vaccine.
“I would propose my team conduct detailed health informatics assessment in Samoa of what happened with your MMR vaccines,” he wrote.
By the time of Kennedy and his wife Cheryl Hines’ trip, vaccinations had resumed, and Samoa’s Director General of Health Leausa Take Naseri had announced that human error was responsible for the child deaths. Kennedy’s 2019 visit to Samoa came just months before a measles outbreak hit the island, killing 83 people.
Despite what these new documents show, during his hearing last year to become the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, Kennedy denied that his trip had anything to do with vaccines.
“I never gave any public statement about vaccines. You cannot find a single Samoan who will say I didn’t get a vaccine because of Bobby Kennedy,” he said during the hearings.
When questioned by Democratic Senator Ron Wyden, Kennedy said of the trip, “I went there, nothing to do with vaccines. I went there to introduce a medical informatics system that would digitalize records in Samoa and make health delivery much more efficient.”
A spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) said in a statement to The Guardian, “Secretary Kennedy’s visit to Samoa in 2019 was unrelated to vaccines. Any claim or insinuation based on these letters that Secretary Kennedy lied under oath or to Congress is not only false but outright defamatory.”
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Kennedy was not under oath during these hearings, The Guardian reports.
PEOPLE has reached out to Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for comment.
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