Caroline Kennedy (Mark Schiefelbein/Associated Press)

Caroline Kennedy, daughter of president John F. Kennedy and cousin to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., wrote to senators opposing her cousin’s confirmation as health secretary. She said he was unqualified for the job and that his “conspiratorial half-truths” about vaccines have “cost lives.”

“Bobby is addicted to attention and power. Bobby preys on the desperation of parents of sick children,” Caroline Kennedy wrote. “His views on vaccines are dangerous and willfully misinformed.” Referring to his birds, she said as a younger person he “enjoyed showing off how he put baby chickens and mice in the blender to feed his hawks. It was often a perverse scene of despair and violence.”