US Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. just posted another one for the highlight reel—a video of himself casually grabbing two writhing black snakes by their tails in a dress shirt and tie. It’s the latest in a genuinely bewildering catalog of animal encounters that have made Kennedy something of an eccentric icon in government, though“icon”might be generous.
The snake incident happened at Dr. Mehmet Oz’s patio, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services administrator who works under Kennedy’s health department umbrella. In the video, Kennedy hauls up the black racers (non-venomous, though apparently not harmless enough to avoid biting him mid-video) while his wife, actress Cheryl Hines, can be heard off-camera pleading“Bobby, Bobby, please.”It’s the kind of footage that plays like a sketch, except it’s real, and Kennedy posted it himself, seemingly unbothered.
But this is just the opening act of a much stranger narrative. In 2024, Kennedy acknowledged stuffing a dead bear cub into New York City’s Central Park with a bicycle to stage a biking accident—a mystery that had authorities puzzled for years. He claimed he’d found the cub upstate after a car hit it and planned to skin it at home, then abandoned that plan. Then there’s the whale head incident: according to his daughter, Kennedy once chainsawed off a dead whale’s head that washed ashore in Massachusetts and strapped it to the family minivan roof to study the skull. A 2026 biography revealed he’d also dissected a road-killed raccoon. And if that wasn’t enough, a doctor found a parasitic brain worm that had burrowed into Kennedy’s gray matter—the New York Times reported it after he’d complained of memory loss.
None of it seems to embarrass him. Washington Post columnist Monica Hesse captured the vibe perfectly:“He has a relationship with animals that most of us only dream of. Nightmares are also dreams.”
Here’s the real problem: Cameron Young of the Center for Snake Conservation has already sounded the alarm.“What I don’t want is people copying him,”Young told AFP.“If a kid picks up a venomous snake because RFK did, then the kid may receive a medically significant bite.”It’s a sharp reminder that viral moments with government officials and dangerous wildlife don’t mix, especially when your audience includes curious kids who might think barehanded snake-grabbing is a life skill worth imitating.
Kennedy’s animal antics are symptoms of a larger pattern: he’s an unconventional government minister surrounded by controversy over vaccine skepticism, false links to autism, and claims that fluoride in drinking water is unsafe. The snakes, the whale heads, the bear cub—they’re all just noise on top of a much louder signal about who he is and what his appointment represents.
About the Author
Andrew Johnson
Andrew Johnson is a contributor to LocalBeat, covering local news and community stories.
