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MAGA’s relationship with the German far-Right has been a topic of recent concern — specifically with regard to Alternative for Germany (AfD), which has been accused of having deep neo-Nazi ties and has been deemed a threat to democracy by German intelligence.
President Donald Trump hosted an AfD parliamentary candidate at Mar-a-Lago on Election Day and invited members of the party to his inauguration.
Elon Musk published an opinion piece in support of AfD in a German newspaper, calling the party the country’s “last spark of hope,” hosted the party’s co-leader for a livestream on Twitter/X, and appeared virtually at a recent campaign event.
And another MAGA inner-circle member has ties to the German far-Right as well: Trump’s nominee to run the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Robert F. Kennedy Jr., whose confirmation hearings — delayed by concerns among senators from both parties regarding conflicts of interest and unacceptable policy positions — will begin on January 29.
In August 2020, Kennedy spoke at a rally in Berlin protesting COVID-19 mitigation measures like masking and social distancing. The event was organized by the conspiracy-friendly German group Querdenken, which has also been accused of having ties to neo-Nazis, and promoted by far-right political groups, including AfD.
In footage from the rally, Kennedy can be seen on stage with Querdenken founder Michael Ballweg, who launched the group in Stuttgart to oppose COVID-19 lockdowns and is currently on trial for fraud and tax evasion. Per his Twitter/X posts, Ballweg traveled to Washington to celebrate Trump’s inauguration — to which he claims to have been invited by Kennedy.
In 2021, German intelligence began monitoring Querdenken for “delegitimization of the state,” owing to concern over connections between Ballweg’s group and right-wing extremist factions including the Reichsbürger movement, whose members sought to overthrow the German government.
Kennedy used Ballweg’s Querdenken rally to launch a European branch of his organization, Children’s Health Defense (CHD), a prolific source of vaccine misinformation that has become very lucrative throughout the pandemic. Kennedy went on leave from his post as CHD’s chairman to launch his presidential campaign, and recently resigned from the organization as he gears up for his confirmation hearings.
A day ahead of the Berlin rally, Kennedy hosted a press conference to discuss CHD’s European expansion. Seated alongside Kennedy was Querdenken member Markus Haintz, who has also appeared with AfD.
Also present was a leader of the Hamburg-based anti-vaccine group Doctors for Enlightenment, Heiko Schöning, known for spreading conspiracies about the pandemic, including that it was a “previously planned crime.” Schöning was also part of the international COVID-19 disinformation-pushing group World Doctors Alliance, under the umbrella group World Freedom Alliance — which counts CHD as a partner organization.
In a rambling speech impugning Dr. Anthony Fauci, Bill Gates, and 5G technology, Kennedy accused those governmental agencies that impose pandemic mitigation measures of “orchestrating obedience,” adding,
It’s not the product of democracy. It’s the product of a pharmaceutical driven, biosecurity agenda that will enslave the entire human race and plunge us into a dystopian nightmare.
Kennedy went on to claim the pharmaceutical industry had captured US public health agencies, the press, and Congress, and had “effectively subverted American democracy.” He asserted this was not just an American issue, and that “the pharmaceutical industry is operating and capturing politicians, running governments in every nation on the globe.”
Despite his denunciation of the pharmaceutical industry, Kennedy’s financial disclosures for his HHS nomination have revealed investments in biotech and pharma.
While in Berlin, Kennedy also took the opportunity to pose for a photo op with Haintz and Schöning at the Brandenburg Gate, which his late uncle President John F. Kennedy visited when he gave his 1963 “Ich bin ein Berliner” speech.
Kennedy’s dynastic family famously does not support his anti-vaxxism or right-wing political turn.
Back home, as the Kennedy black sheep has grown in favor with MAGA throughout the pandemic, he has cozied up with US right-wing extremists and has been a fixture at American anti-vax rallies.
Kennedy infamously compared the societal treatment of unvaccinated Americans to Holocaust victim Anne Frank at the January 2022 “Defeat the Mandates” rally in Washington, which CHD sponsored.
And he spoke alongside MAGA personalities and conspiracy peddlers at the latest iteration of that rally series, “Rescue the Republic,” just ahead of the election and just after announcing his and Trump’s joint “Make America Healthy Again” effort.
As Time reported, “Defeat the Mandates” was “scheduled to coincide with global anti-vaccine protests organized by a far-right German group, under the banner ‘World Wide Rally for Freedom.’” The group was called Worldwide Demonstration and had been organizing such events throughout 2021.
It is worth noting that Kennedy’s 2020 rally appearance in Berlin is not the only instance of a US anti-vax politician engaging with the extremes of German political thought over COVID-19.
MAGA loyalist Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI), a staunch supporter of Kennedy’s HHS nomination, hosted the fifth iteration of the International Crisis Summit (formerly International Covid Summit) during the Conservative Political Action Conference last February. The international roster of speakers featured some of Kennedy’s American anti-vax colleagues from “Defeat the Mandates” as well as two members of AfD, Christine Anderson and Andreas Lichert.
When discussing Kennedy’s candidacy for HHS leadership, his capacity for damage must be assessed both within and beyond American borders. He is not just a public health risk to the US, which is now the leading exporter of online vaccine misinformation, but a global health threat.
The COVID-19 pandemic provided fertile ground for political bad actors to sow mistrust in governments and public health organizations. While the US is unique in the strength of its embrace of the anti-vax movement, which has grown thanks in no small part to MAGA’s embrace of Kennedy, rhetoric against the collective action needed to combat COVID-19 has become central to many right-wing party platforms across the globe.
And it’s no secret that Russia has deployed vaccine disinformation campaigns throughout the pandemic in its ongoing information war aimed at destabilizing democracies like the US.
Involvement in anti-public health agitation efforts throughout the pandemic helped Kennedy ascend within the far-Right and expand (both financially and geographically) his organization — which had already been accused of causing harm internationally via the spread of vaccine misinformation.
The success of this anti-public health agitation embraced by MAGA over the past few years is now being used to nominate into positions of power those, like Kennedy, who seek to dismantle US public health agencies.
It has also been used to protest against involvement in global health institutions like the World Health Organization, from which Trump just withdrew the US via executive order in fulfillment of his transition team’s promise.
When discussing his candidacy for HHS leadership, Kennedy’s capacity for damage must be assessed both within and beyond American borders. He is not just a public health risk to the US, which is now the leading exporter of online vaccine misinformation, but a global health threat. Like Trump, Kennedy is also a broader political risk, given his willingness to work with bad actors domestically and abroad as he furthers his own agenda.
Karam Bales is a UK-based disinformation researcher and freelance journalist who writes regularly for the Byline Times as well as his own initiative, the Counter Disinformation Project. He is a former executive for the National Education Union, Europe’s largest education trade union.
