The DARK SIDE of RFK Jr., Ep. 1: Introduction & Prologue

President-elect Trump's controversial pick to run the Department of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., is visiting the nation's capitol this week for private meetings with 28 key Senators -- all of them Republicans -- who will decide his fate in next month's cabinet confirmation hearings.

Kennedy took no questions from reporters, who mobbed him in the hallway, preferring to reserve his answers for U.S. Senators behind closed doors.

One Senator who met privately with RFK, Oklahoma Republican Markwayne Mullin said on Monday that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told him he supports polio vaccination -- despite some recent media reports that Kennedy might do away with the polio vaccine.

"He said, 'I 100% support polio vaccination,'" Mullin told reporters after meeting with Kennedy, who has for years sown doubt over the safety and efficacy of vaccines, including asserting a debunked link between vaccines and autism.

According to Sen. Mullin, Kennedy said the polio vaccine is different because it was one of the first vaccines to be developed. He quoted Kennedy as suggesting that children receive too many shots and saying, the question is "why are we giving our kids 72 shots now?”

Trump has said he could end some childhood vaccinations if he thinks they are dangerous. "It could if I think it's dangerous, if I think they are not beneficial, but I don't think it's going to be very controversial in the end," he told Time magazine in an interview published last week.

Today, Trump downplayed his previous statement, telling reporters, "you're not going to lose your polio vaccine" under Kennedy's leadership at HHS. "That's not going to happen."

Kennedy faces an uphill battle in his Senate confirmation hearings, given his previous anti-vaccine statements, and his tendency to espouse debunked conspiracy theories. That, combined with a messy private life and a long history of adulterous affairs, will make it difficult for some conservative senators to support him.

My latest episode of the History Book Club series, "The Dark Side of RFK Jr." explores his checkered past; his 15 year struggle with alcohol, cocaine, and heroin addiction, his philandering, and the tragic suicide of his second wife, Mary Richardson Kennedy, in 2012.

Over the weeks ahead, we will be reading and discussing excerpted chapters from "Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the Dark Side of the Dream," an unauthorized biography of RFK Jr. written by Jerry Oppenheimer. The author also penned a scathing biography of RFK's late mother, Ethel Kennedy, who passed away in October at age 96.

As Kennedy's Senate confirmation hearings near, get a sneak preview of some tough questions Kennedy is likely to be asked, and will have to answer in the televised hearings.

Join me for "The Dark Side of RFK Jr." -- a continuing book club series -- and let me hear your thoughts on the book in the comments. I'll try to answer all viewer questions in future episodes.

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