RFK Jr. slams ‘ censorship’
Defends record, remarks during testy House hearing
The government’s interactions with social media companies and requests that they remove certain content during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2020 election amount to government censorship, presidential candidate Robert Kennedy Jr. told a House subcommittee.
During an at-times testy hearing of the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government, at which the scion of the Kennedy family was invited to testify by Republicans alongside the author of the New York Post article concerning Hunter Biden’s laptop, RFK Jr. repeatedly defended both his past record and recent speeches.
“Debate — congenial, respectful debate — is the fertilizer, it’s the water, it’s the sunlight for our democracy. We need to be talking to each other,” Kennedy said Thursday, before holding up a sheet of paper. “This is a letter that many of you signed, many of my fellow Democrats. I’ve spent my life in this party. I’ve devoted my life to the values of this party — 102 people signed this. This itself is evidence of the problem that this hearing was convened to address.”
In his hand was a letter calling on House Speaker Kevin McCarthy to withdraw the invitation extended to Kennedy to testify before the subcommittee regarding his experiences with social media and tech companies, some of whom have removed his ability to use their platforms.
“This is an attempt to censor a censorship hearing,” Kennedy said.
A watchdog group asked the committee’s Republican chairman, U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, to drop the invitation to Kennedy after he shared an argument he’d heard made that COVID-19 might have been engineered to spare Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese people.
“Mr. Kennedy has repeatedly and recently spread vile and dangerous antisemitic and anti-Asian conspiracy theories that tarnish his credibility as a witness and must not be legitimized with his appearance before the U.S. Congress nor given the platform of an official committee hearing to spread his baseless and discriminatory views,” the letter read.
McCarthy said he did not agree with Kennedy’s recent remarks but would nevertheless let the man speak.
“I disagree with everything he said. The hearing that we have this week is about censorship. I don’t think censoring somebody is actually the answer here,” McCarthy told reporters at the U.S. Capitol.
Kennedy also defended his campaign for the White House, which is apparently backed by a Super PAC called “Heal the Divide” which claims he is the only person who can bridge the divisions between the nation’s splintered political groups. Kennedy denied ever hearing of the political action committee or knowing the people behind it.
“It’s not a Super PAC that I’ve endorsed and it’s not one, as I said, that I’ve ever heard of,” he said.
U.S. Rep. Stephen Lynch defended the actions of the FBI and other agencies in working with tech companies to remove content they deemed misinformation or a risk to the public, saying the hearing was nothing more than an attempt to distract.
“This committee has come to embody weaponization itself, misusing congressional oversight to protect Donald Trump in an attempt to divert attention from the multiple federal and state criminal investigations surrounding President Trump’s misconduct in office,” Lynch said.
Kenedy added his family has long defended the First Amendment right to free speech.