--- title: "Trump’s Raw Milk Zealot Accused of Inappropriately Touching Babysitter" description: "Accusations of sexual assault against Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Trump's Health Department pick, are threatening to impede his confirmation." date: "2024-11-26" modified: "2024-11-26" authors: - name: "Noor Al-Sibai" job_title: "Senior Staff Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/nooralsibai" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/trump-rfk-jr-sexual-misconduct" categories: - "Future Society" tags: - "donald trump" - "rfk jr" - "sexual misconduct" - "the digest" --- # Trump’s Raw Milk Zealot Accused of Inappropriately Touching Babysitter ![Accusations of sexual assault against Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Trump's Health Department pick, are threatening to impede his confirmation.]() *\Image: Chris Unger / Zuffa LLC via Getty\* ## Him Too Accusations of [sexual assault against Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.](), Donald Trump's Health Department pick, are threatening to impede the [president-elect's regressive agenda]() — not to mention [RFK Jr.'s enthusiasm for raw milk](). In an [interview with the *Wall Street Journal*](), Eliza Cooney recalled the instances, half her lifetime ago, when Kennedy groped and harassed her while she was working for him and his family. Now 49, Cooney began working for the political scion as an intern at his law clinic and live-in babysitter when she was 23 years old. During that time, Kennedy allegedly groped her backside and breasts, touched her leg underneath a table, and came into her room shirtless to ask her for a back rub. "It seemed like he thought I was somebody else or wasn’t paying attention," Cooney wrote in a diary entry, viewed by the *WSJ*, of the leg-touching. "Like he would come to every once in a while and snap out of it or I would move away." Though she kept working and living with Kennedy's family for four months after the alleged incidences — and continued at his law clinic for several years after that — Cooney told the newspaper that she was less confident after the encounters and experienced a constant sense of unease. ## Choir Boy In the aftermath of the #MeToo movement, the woman realized how inappropriate the politician's actions had been. As his profile as a 2024 presidential candidate rose, she eventually went public in an [exposé published by *Vanity Fair*]() this past summer — and after all those years, Kennedy reached out to his old babysitter in calls and text messages confirmed by the *WSJ*. "I read your description of an episode in which I touched you in an unwanted manner," he wrote in the text, which was also [confirmed by the *Washington Post*]() earlier this year. "I have no memory of this incident but I apologize sincerely for anything I ever did that made you feel uncomfortable or anything I did or said that offended or hurt your feelings." "I never intended you any harm," the politician continued in his missive to Cooney. "If I hurt you, it was inadvertent." In an [interview with the *Breaking Points* podcast]() after the *VF* article came out, however, he called her accusations "garbage." "I am not a church boy," the former heroin addict and current anti-vaxxer told journalists Saagar Enjeti and Krystal Ball. "I had a very, very rambunctious youth." As with Trump himself, it's unclear how much damage these accusations will do to RFK Jr. when he goes through his Senate confirmation hearings. Nevertheless, they cast a major shadow over the president-elect's incoming cabinet — in which a third of all his picks have [some sort of sex scandal]() surrounding them. **More on the Trump agenda:** [*Farmers Beg Trump Not to Deport the Immigrants They Use for Cheap Labor*]() ## Author At Futurism, I've often been drawn to unpacking the narratives that underlie technological, scientific and medical progress, with a special interest in areas of conflict and ambiguity that end up setting agendas and steering the fates of both elites and the hoi polloi. I'm a committed generalist, but I often find myself returning to work involving NASA and the private space sector, the effects of AI on media and society, and the mechanics of the pharmaceutical industry, with a specific focus on the spread of GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy. Prior to Futurism, I worked for publications ranging from Media Matters and Truthdig to Raw Story and Bustle. I'm also the author of "Myspace Scene Queens," a 2024 title in Instar Books' acclaimed "Remember the Internet" series. My work at Futurism has been cited by outlets including the New Yorker, Slate, Nieman Lab, the Verge, the MIT Technology Review, the Sunday Times, and the Daily Beast. I grew up in North Carolina, attended the University of North Carolina at Asheville, and now live in Brooklyn, New York. In my free time, I'm an avid reader and music fan; you can probably find me at a local poetry reading, concert, underground rave, or DJ set. I'm the proud parent of an ineffable orange cat named Mee-Mow. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()