CNN’s Abby Phillip has criticized Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for copying Michelle Obama’s health initiative, despite right-wingers ridiculing it at the time.
The NewsNight host played a clip of the health secretary’s embarrassing workout video featuring Kennedy and MAGA singer Kid Rock exercising shirtless, plunging into ice baths, and drinking whole milk in hot tubs, with Kennedy wearing jeans throughout.
“I’ve teamed up with Kid Rock to deliver two simple messages to the American people: GET ACTIVE + EAT REAL FOOD,” Kennedy posted on X while sharing the “Rock Out Workout.”
“But if that sounds very familiar to you, that’s because it is,” Phillip said after playing the video on Wednesday night. Phillip then referenced the former first lady’s “Let’s Move!” website from 2010, which also encouraged children to “get active and eat healthy.”
“Something Republicans, at least back then, took issue with,” Phillip added, before playing clips of high-profile conservative figures around 2010 mocking Obama for essentially the same initiative Kennedy is now pushing as part of his MAHA agenda.
“Why would you want to raise your own kids when Michelle Obama will do it for you?” Tucker Carlson said on Fox News. “In fact, she’ll do it at gunpoint.”
Conservative commentator Glenn Beck added: “When I heard this, I thought, get your damn hands off my fries, lady. If I want to be a fat, fat, fatty and shovel french fries all day long, that is my choice.”
Another clip showed former Iowa Rep. Steve King saying he wanted the “nanny state out of my life, and I don’t want my body commandeered” by suggestions that people should keep an eye on their health.
“Look, they’re both right, but will conservatives and Republicans ever admit that they were wrong to lampoon Michelle Obama for basically common sense?” Phillip asked NewsNight panelist Xochitl Hinojosa.
“Absolutely not,” replied Hinojosa, who previously served as communications director for the Democratic National Committee.
“I think that Michelle Obama’s initiative was geared toward families and children, making sure people are active and eating healthy. This RFK video, or whatever this is, was a vanity project,” Hinojosa added.
“It wasn’t about anyone eating healthy. It was not even geared toward our kids. Honestly, I think it was geared toward Olivia Nuzzi at this point.”
Nuzzi, a former Daily Beast reporter, was fired from New York magazine after it was revealed she had a relationship with RFK Jr. during his 2024 presidential campaign, although it was “never physical.”
Nuzzi was also let go from her role as West Coast editor at Vanity Fair in December 2025 after further salacious details emerged about the professionally unethical relationship.
