Overview
- TMZ asked Robert F. Kennedy Jr. about the raccoon story on Thursday at a House hearing, and he laughed and walked away without answering.
- The claim appears in Isabel Vincent’s biography, which quotes an alleged 2001 journal entry describing him stopping on I-684 and removing the animal’s genitals to study later as his children waited in the car.
- Snopes reported it could not authenticate the diaries and left the claim unrated, and HHS has not provided a confirming response to inquiries noted in coverage.
- The anecdote resurfaced Kennedy’s history with animal remains, including his 2024 acknowledgment that he left a dead bear cub in Central Park and his daughter’s account of him taking a whale’s head home in the 1990s.
- The story spread across TV and social media with jokes and criticism, including a late-night monologue by Jimmy Kimmel, which increases pressure for an on-the-record response from Kennedy or his department.