The leaked footage shows recorded phone conversations between Donald Trump and independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., in which the former president is seen expressing vaccine skepticism in an attempt to woo Trump, as well as talking about a phone call he had with President Biden after he was nearly assassinated.
Trump, 78, reportedly contacted Kennedy to try to convince him to drop out of the race and support him. Kennedy later acknowledged the video was authentic on Tuesday and apologized.
“I agree with you, there’s something wrong with the whole system. And it’s a matter of the doctors you find. Remember I said I want to give it in small doses. Small doses,” Trump said in the leaked call.
“When you give a vaccine to a baby, Bobby, there’s 38 different vaccines being given. It’s like it’s for a horse, not a 10- or 20-pound baby. It looks like it’s a vaccine that should be given to a horse, have you seen the size of it?” he added.
“It’s a huge event and you see your baby suddenly start to change dramatically.”
Throughout his 2024 presidential bid, Kennedy has criticized Trump over his response to the coronavirus pandemic and has long expressed skepticism about the safety measures taken in approving certain vaccines.
In 2017, Rumors swirled. Trump will establish a commission on autism, chaired by Kennedy, to conduct a broader investigation into “vaccine safety and scientific integrity.”
In the end, that didn’t happen, and doctors ruled out any link between vaccines and autism.
Kennedy said Tuesday he was “deeply embarrassed” by the leak.
“I was recording with our in-house videographer when President Trump called me. I should have instructed the videographer to stop recording immediately. I am embarrassed that this was posted. I apologize to the President,” he posted on X.
Later in the leaked, roughly two-minute call, Trump appeared to mention pleading with Kennedy to step aside.
“I just want you to do something and I think it would be very good for you and a big thing and we’re going to win,” he said. “We’re way ahead of that guy.”
Trump then began speaking about the assassination attempt on him at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania on Saturday, and appeared to also talk about his subsequent phone call with President Biden.
“It’s a very interesting story. He called me and asked, ‘Why did you choose to move to the right?'” Trump recalled. “I said, ‘I’m just showing you a graph.’ I didn’t have to tell him that the graph was the total number of people that were streaming into our country.”
“Then something hit me. It was like a giant, the biggest mosquito in the world.”
Trump survived the shooting, which left him with blood coming from his ears, killed at least one person, and seriously injured at least two others. The suspect, Thomas Matthew Crooks, was instantly shot and killed by a police sniper.
Kennedy was one of a number of prominent politicians who reached out to Trump after the shooting.
“I sent a message, a note to President Trump and his family this evening, expressing my relief that he was not seriously injured, my best wishes for a speedy recovery, and my gratitude for the inspirational role he played in that incident,” Kennedy recalled in an interview with Fox News a few hours after the shooting.
The 45th president attended the Republican National Convention at Fiserv Forum on Monday, listening to several speeches and showing off with most of his right ear bandaged.
That same day, Republican delegates voted to select him as their presidential candidate, and he announced that Senator J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) would be his running mate.
President Trump is scheduled to speak at the Republican National Convention later this week.
The Washington Post has reached out to the Trump and Kennedy campaigns for comment.
