DeSantis Said He Wanted to “Burn” the NIH “To the Ground”

How the pandemic radicalized the governor of Florida and the capture of the federal government by special interest groups.

Gage Skidmore / Waterkeeper Alliance Inc.

In a recent interview with actor Russell Brand, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. revealed that he met with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis during the coronavirus pandemic. The two talked policy over breakfast, and DeSantis, in particular, seemed keen to break eggs for an omelet.

“We talked about him possibly running for the presidency, and I said, how will you handle the NIH?” Kennedy told Brand. “And he said: ‘I’ll burn it to the ground.’”

Those words are significant for a few reasons.

First, DeSantis was speaking candidly to Kennedy and had no reason to believe his remarks would see the light of day. Their disclosure shows his private and public views on a hot-button issue have aligned. That is rare in politics.

Semafor, which first reported about the interview between Brand and Kennedy, also noted that in February, DeSantis told Fox News host Mark Levin that he became convinced during the pandemic that the NIH and Centers for Disease Control were interested in control rather than public health.

“If you look at like all these entrenched bureaucrats, CDC, NIH, FDA—they need to be cleaned out because they totally failed and they are not advocating for the best interests of the people of this country,” DeSantis told Levin.

Second, the chat between the two shows Kennedy and DeSantis have more in common than is immediately obvious.