If Trump’s aim is to make each of his cabinet picks more controversial than the last – he’s succeeding
First came Pete Hegseth, the Fox News host as defence secretary. Then Tulsi Gabbard, an apparent Vladimir Putin and Bashar al Assad sympathiser as intelligence chief.
Then came Matt Gaetz, under active investigation for allegedly sex trafficking a 17-year-old, as attorney general, the most powerful lawyer in the United States.
Thursday afternoon brought the nomination of Robert F Kennedy Junior, arguably the most prolific peddler of anti-vax conspiracy theories in the nation, as health secretary.
Not a shock, perhaps, given what had gone before. But in terms of upsetting the apple cart, it’s right there.
Kennedy is best known in the UK for being the son of Robert Kennedy, part of the great Kennedy political dynasty.
But on this side of the Atlantic, he’s gained a reputation for promoting baseless theories about vaccines being dangerous.
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Trump picks RFK Jr as health secretary
“I do believe no vaccine is safe and effective,” he said, while also linking childhood vaccines and autism.
Decades of research by the medical and scientific community has found no link between vaccines and autism.
In January 2022, I attended a rally headlined by Robert F Kennedy Junior in Washington DC. It took place on the stairs of the Lincoln monument.
Thousands of people, very few of them wearing masks even though the US was in the grips of the pandemic, packed together and listened to him speak.
He likened vaccine policies in the US to the actions of a totalitarian state, even suggesting Anne Frank was in a better situation when she was hiding from the Nazis.
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The week before I had been to a hospital in Florida, inside an intensive care unit where the nurses told me that up to 99% of the COVID-19 patients hooked up to ventilators and struggling to breathe were unvaccinated.
I asked Kennedy about this. He said he doubted whether it was true.
I also asked if he was enriching himself as a result of the pandemic. He denied it.
He then said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the official US health protection agency, is a “sock puppet for Moderna and Pfizer” which “manipulates data” on COVID vaccines.
If he is confirmed, he would effectively be in charge of the CDC.
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People on both sides of the political aisle are expressing shock at Kennedy’s nomination.
Some wonder whether he will defund research for infectious diseases, which could make it one of Trump’s most impactful and potentially dangerous decisions.
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Vaccine sceptic RFK Jr has been nominated as US health secretary. He abandoned his presidential campaign to endorse Donald Trump.
One thing is certain, and that is Trump rewarding loyalty.
After abandoning his own presidential campaign, Kennedy spent a huge amount of time and energy advocating for Trump in the final two-and-a-half months of the campaign.
“Promises made, promises kept,” Donald Trump Jr wrote on social media alongside a montage of photographs of himself and Kennedy.
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Kennedy will perhaps be the most difficult of president-elect Trump’s picks to get past the nomination process because notions of vaccines being dangerous is personal.
Some senators and their own families will have been touched by diseases which have vaccines.
Former senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell, nearly died as a child from polio, a disease that has largely been eradicated in the USA due to vaccines.
As one observer pointed out – he and his colleagues will now vote to make an anti-vaxxer the top health official in the United States.
Iranian state television says a ceasefire in its war with Israel has now begun, following a night of missile strikes.
Israel’s ambulance service says at least four people were killed in overnight strikes, with footage from southern Israel showing extensive damage to what appeared to be a residential building.
Sirens sounded in several areas – and members of the public who received an alert were ordered to take shelter – with explosions heard over Tel Aviv.
Israel-Iran latest: Ceasefire deal has been reached
Early on Tuesday morning, US President Donald Trump declared: “The ceasefire is now in effect. Please do not violate it!”
The message on Truth Social followed a series of posts on Monday, in which the president declared that a “complete and total ceasefire” had been agreed upon between the two countries and would begin at approximately 5am UK time.
Footage appeared to show a residential building in southern Israel that was extensively damaged. Pic: AP
In a post on X, Iran’s foreign minister Abbas Araghchi, confirmed that Tehran “has no intention” to continue its response to Israel – provided it “stops its illegal aggression against the Iranian people”.
Israeli media reports suggested Benjamin Netanyahu was also on board – provided Iran stops firing missiles towards the country – but there has been no official confirmation.
Donald Trump in the Situation Room at the White House over the weekend. Pic: Reuters
Mr Trump had written: “Officially, Iran will start the CEASEFIRE and, upon the 12th hour, Israel will start the CEASEFIRE and, upon the 24th Hour, an Official END to THE 12 DAY WAR will be saluted by the World.
“On the assumption that everything works as it should, which it will, I would like to congratulate both countries, Israel and Iran, on having the stamina, courage, and intelligence to end, what should be called, ‘THE 12 DAY WAR.’
“This is a war that could have gone on for years, and destroyed the entire Middle East, but it didn’t, and never will!”
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Iran’s nuclear capabilities
In an interview with Sky News’ partner network NBC, the president said it was a “great day” for the US and the Middle East – and a “wonderful day” for the world.
“I’m very happy to have been able to get the job done. A lot of people were dying, and it was only going to get worse. It would have brought the whole Middle East down,” he said.
Mr Trump said he thinks the ceasefire is “unlimited” and is “going to go forever” – adding: “I don’t believe they will ever be shooting at each other again.”
Just hours earlier, people in the Qatari capital Doha had stopped and gazed up at the sky as Iranian missiles flew to the American al Udeid base and interceptors fired.
Officials said there were no casualties, and the US later confirmed it had been warned about the attack by Iran.
Mr Trump was in the Situation Room in the White House as the strikes took place.
He later claimed on his social network that the missiles were a “very weak response”, which the US “expected” and “very effectively countered”.
The Iranian attack came after the US dropped “bunker buster bombs” on three key nuclear sites in Iran over the weekend.
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In a new interview on Fox News, US Vice President JD Vance claimed Iran is no longer able to build nuclear weapons after the American attacks.
“Iran was very close to having a nuclear weapon,” he said. “Now Iran is incapable of building a nuclear weapon with the equipment they have because we destroyed it.”
US
Can Tehran regard Trump as a trusted broker of peace when he floated the idea of regime change in Iran?
These days, peace is a post on social media. On Donald Trump’s Truth Social site, it came in two parts.
Part one read: “CONGRATULATIONS WORLD, IT’S TIME FOR PEACE.”
The Magna Carta it wasn’t, but it was a peace treaty for our times – a US president announcing there would be no retaliation against Iran’s missile attack.
An anxious world watching for US bombers returning to Iranian skies could cool its jets – and the primetime president could feel vindicated, having enjoyed strategic success.
Donald Trump at a meeting in the Situation Room at the White House. Pic: Reuters
Trump has tweaked the politics and military landscape around Iran to suit US interests, without a single American life lost.
He had framed US intervention in Iran as an effort to prevent a “forever” foreign war, not to provoke it, and he is sitting pretty, following ugly predictions he’d be sucked into conflict.
Live updates: Three killed as Iranian missiles strike Israel
Footage appeared to show a residential building in southern Israel that was extensively damaged. Pic: AP
Then, on Truth Social, there was peace “part two”.
A couple of hours after announcing non-retaliation, Trump wrote the sequel: “Ceasefire.”
He posted: “CONGRATULATIONS TO EVERYONE!” – saying a “complete and total” ceasefire had been fully agreed between Israel and Iran.
Quite the day of problem-solving for the self-styled “peacemaker-in-chief”. Quite the day of problems unsolved too – time will tell.
As deadlines loomed, neither Israel nor Iran appeared fully committed to the Trump script, and fresh missiles were fired overnight.
Daytime will test the durability of a ceasefire. There are motivations on both sides to continue a conflict in which both see the other as an existential threat.
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Can Tehran regard Donald Trump as a trusted broker of peace when he floated the idea of regime change in Iran, as pursued by Israel?
Can Israel be convinced to pull back on its military advantage when its instinct will be to reinforce superiority and undermine an Iranian rebuild?
Trump’s influence will be tested, as ever, when he flies to a NATO summit in The Netherlands today. For him, it can be a difficult crowd and one for whom he remains a mystery.
A positive result in the Middle East will help to confound their curiosity, for the better.
It’s the most important day for Donald Trump since the last one.
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