RFK’s claims that he sawed off a whale’s head and took it home are ‘baseless’

After Kennedy sharply suspended his campaign in August and supported former President Donald Trump, intrigue about his personal life swirled on social networks. A 2012 interview with Kennedy’s daughter, Kick Kennedy, an article that appeared in Town & Country magazine resurfaced detailing Kik’s “addiction to extreme sports” that was “fueled by her father’s eccentric environmentalist.” The article describes Kik’s memories of a family trip to Squaw Island in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, when she was six years old. She remembers her father excitedly rushing to the beach with a chainsaw to saw off the head of a dead whale that had washed up on the beach.

She claimed Kennedy was tied up with a bungee cord. head on the roof of a family minivan.

“Every time we accelerated on the highway, whale juice would pour out of the car windows, and it was the most unpleasant thing on the planet,” Kick, who was 24 at the time, told the magazine. “We all had plastic bags over our heads with holes cut out for our mouths, and people on the highway pointed the finger at us, but for us it was just normal everyday things.”

The recent popularity of this story has prompted Center for Biological Diversity Action Fund, environmental organization, sent a letter to NOAA calling on the agency to investigate Kennedy’s alleged violation of federal laws protecting wildlife.

All marine mammals are protected Marine Mammal Protection Act, which in most cases prevents the pursuit, hunting, trapping, collection, or killing of mammals in U.S. waters.

Brett Hartle, national policy director for the Center for Biological Diversity Action, wrote in a letter that he believes Kennedy may have violated the Marine Mammal Protection Act. Endangered Species Act And Lacey’s Law a conservation law that prohibits the transport of illegally collected wildlife across state lines.

Kennedy, a former environmental lawyer, became famous during his independent campaign for admitting to several questionable acts involving animals, including dumping the carcass of a dead bear cub in Central Park a decade ago.

Kennedy told in an August video on a social network that the bear was in “very good condition” and he planned to skin it and put the meat in the refrigerator. But he didn’t have time to leave it at his home in Westchester before dinner in town, he said. Instead of leaving the bear in the car, he dumped it in Central Park by putting a bicycle on it, saying it would be “fun for whoever finds it.”

The mystery consumed the national news for some time before subsiding, remaining unsolved. Kennedy admitted as much earlier this year. telling the New Yorker during an interview, he may have contracted a brain worm by posing with his hands in the bear’s mouth.

Alexa Coultoff can be reached at [email protected]. Follow her @alexacoultoff.