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Robert Francis Kennedy Jr. (born January 17, 1954), also known by his initials RFK Jr., is an American politician, environmental lawyer, anti-vaccine activist, and conspiracy theorist. He is the chairman and founder of Children's Health Defense, an anti-vaccine advocacy group that is a leading proponent of COVID-19 vaccine misinformation, and an independent candidate in the 2024 presidential election. A member of the Kennedy family, he is a son of U.S. attorney general and senator Robert F. Kennedy, and nephew of U.S. president John F. Kennedy and senator Ted Kennedy. Kennedy began his career as an assistant district attorney in New York City. In 1984 and 1986, he joined two nonprofits focused on environmental protection: Riverkeeper and the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC). His work at Riverkeeper set long-term environmental legal standards. At both organizations, he won legal battles against large corporate polluters. He became an adjunct professor of environmental law at Pace University School of Law in 1986. In 1987, he founded Pace's Environmental Litigation Clinic, where he held the post of supervising attorney and co-director until 2017. He founded the nonprofit environmental group Waterkeeper Alliance in 1999, serving as the president of its board. Since 2005, Kennedy has promoted anti-vaccine misinformation and public health conspiracy theories, including the scientifically disproven claim of a causal link between vaccines and autism. Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, he has emerged as a leading proponent of COVID-19 vaccine misinformation in the United States. Many of his often disproved public health claims have targeted such prominent figures as Anthony Fauci, Bill Gates, and Joe Biden. He has written books including The Real Anthony Fauci (2021) and A Letter to Liberals (2022). Early life and education Kennedy was born at Georgetown University Hospital in Washington, D.C., on January 17, 1954. He is the third of eleven children of senator and U.S. attorney general Robert F. Kennedy and Ethel Skakel. He is a nephew of President John F. Kennedy and Senator Ted Kennedy. Kennedy was raised at the Kennedy Compound in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, and at Hickory Hill, the family estate in McLean, Virginia. He was nine years old when his uncle, President John F. Kennedy, was assassinated in 1963, and 14 when his father was assassinated while running for president in 1968. Kennedy learned of his father's shooting while at Georgetown Preparatory School, a Jesuit boarding school in North Bethesda, Maryland. A few hours later, he flew to Los Angeles on Vice President Hubert Humphrey's plane, along with his older siblings, Kathleen and Joe. He was with his father when he died. Kennedy was a pallbearer at his father's funeral, where he spoke and read excerpts from his father's speeches at the mass commemorating his death at Arlington National Cemetery. After his father's death, Kennedy was expelled from two boarding schools—Millbrook in upstate New York and Pomfret in Connecticut—for using drugs. In August 1970, Kennedy and his cousin Bobby Shriver were arrested in Barnstable, Massachusetts, for marijuana possession and placed on 13 months' probation. In June 1972, he graduated from the Palfrey Street School, a day school in Watertown, Massachusetts. While attending Palfrey, Kennedy lived with a surrogate family at a farmhouse in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Kennedy continued his education at Harvard University, graduating in 1976 with a Bachelor of Arts in American history and literature. He then studied at the London School of Economics before earning a Juris Doctor degree from the University of Virginia School of Law in 1982, and a Master of Laws from Pace University in 1987. Career Conviction for heroin possession In 1982, Kennedy was sworn in as an assistant district attorney for Manhattan. After failing his bar exam, he resigned in July 1983. That September, he was charged with heroin possession in Rapid City, South Dakota. He pleaded guilty to a single felony charge of possession of heroin in February 1984, whereupon he was sentenced to two years' probation and community service. He originally faced a potential sentence of two years in prison. After his arrest, he entered a drug treatment center. To satisfy one of the conditions of his probation, Kennedy worked as a volunteer for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and was required to attend regular drug-rehabilitation sessions. His probation ended a year early. Riverkeeper In 1984, Kennedy began volunteering at The Hudson River Fisherman's Association, renamed Riverkeeper in 1986 after a patrol boat it had built with settlement money from legal victories preceding Kennedy's arrival. The association's office was in a farmhouse near the Natural Resources Defense Council, where Kennedy was doing the community service mandated by his sentence for heroin possession. After he was admitted to the New York bar in 1985, Riverkeeper hired him as senior attorney. Kennedy litigated and supervised environmental enforcement lawsuits on the east coast estuaries on behalf of Hudson Riverkeeper and the Long Island Soundkeeper, where he was also a board member. Long Island Soundkeeper sued cities and industries along the Connecticut and New York coastlines. On the Hudson, Kennedy sued municipalities and industries, including General Electric, to stop discharging pollution and clean up legacy contamination. His work at Riverkeeper set long-term environmental legal standards. In 1995, Kennedy advocated for repeal of legislation during the 104th Congress that he considered unfriendly to the environment. In 1997, he worked with John Cronin to write The Riverkeepers, a history of the early Riverkeepers and a primer for the Waterkeeper movement. In 2000, a majority of Riverkeeper's board sided with Kennedy when he insisted on rehiring William Wegner, a wildlife lecturer and falcon trainer whom the organization's founder and president, Robert H. Boyle, had fired six months earlier after learning that Wegner had been convicted in 1995 for tax fraud, perjury, and conspiracy to violate wildlife protection laws. Wegner had recruited and led a team of at least 10 who smuggled cockatoo eggs, including species considered endangered by Australia, from Australia to the U.S. over a period of eight years. He served 3.5 years of a five-year sentence and was hired by Kennedy a few months after his release from prison. After the board's decision, Boyle, eight of the 22 members of the board, and Riverkeeper's treasurer resigned, saying it was not right for an environmental organization to hire someone convicted of environmental crimes and that it would hurt the organization's fundraising. Kennedy resigned from Riverkeeper in 2017, writing in his resignation letter that he had co-founded the organization. Pace Environmental Litigation Clinic In 1987, Kennedy founded the Environmental Litigation Clinic at Pace Universit.... Discover the Jonathan Kennedy popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Jonathan Kennedy books.