Colorado Governor Jared Polis lauded Kennedy for working to “defeat vaccine mandates” in his state.
Democratic Colorado Governor Jared Polis remains wary but is “excited” by President-elect Donald Trump’s decision to nominate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as the director of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
Kennedy, an anti-vaccine activist who was included on a 2021 list of the 12 people spreading the bulk of misinformation about vaccines online, was named as Trump’s choice lead the country’s top health agency on Thursday.
While a number of health experts were alarmed by Trump’s pick and many Democrats appeared less than thrilled with the prospect of Kennedy as HHS secretary, Polis said that he was “excited” by the news.
In a post to X, formerly Twitter, the Democratic governor recalled how Kennedy helped him “defeat vaccine mandates in Colorado in 2019″—referring to vaccine requirements in schools for diseases like polio, which killed or paralyzed millions of adults and children before vaccination was widely available.
“I’m excited by the news that the President-Elect will appoint @RobertKennedyJr to @HHSGov”, Polis wrote. “He helped us defeat vaccine mandates in Colorado in 2019 and will help make America healthy again by shaking up HHS and FDA [the Food and Drug Administration].”
“I hope he leans into personal choice on vaccines rather than bans (which I think are terrible, just like mandates) but what I’m most optimistic about is taking on big pharma and the corporate [agricultural] oligopoly to improve our health”, he added.
