Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Democratic presidential candidate and anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist, made news again last week with comments at a perennial sand trap for politicians with presidential aspirations: the private dinner.
"COVID-19. There is an argument that it is ethnically targeted. COVID-19 attacks certain races disproportionately," Kennedy said in remarks first published by the New York Post (the Post also provided video). "COVID-19 is targeted to attack Caucasians and Black people. The people who are most immune are Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese."
On Twitter, Kennedy called the story "mistaken," writing, "I have never, ever suggested that the COVID-19 virus was targeted to spare Jews…a 2021 study of the COVID-19 virus shows that COVID-19 appears to disproportionately affect certain races since the furin cleave docking site is most compatible with Blacks and Caucasians and least compatible with ethnic Chinese, Finns, and Ashkenazi Jews. In that sense, it serves as a kind of proof of concept for ethnically targeted bioweapons."
This is a preview of Emily Tamkin's latest article. Read the full column here. |
