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New poll shows RFK Jr. is unpopular among Pa. voters amid feud with Shapiro over measles

Pennsylvania voters really don't like RFK Jr. "He's the one person who does worse than President Trump," said pollster Don Levy.

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. takes the stage on the second day of the Republican midterm convention at the American Airlines Center in Dallas, Sept. 10, 2026. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. accepted $4 million in book advances and more than $270,000 in gifts over the past year from close allies who are working to advance his Make America Healthy Again agenda, according to his latest financial disclosure form. (Ruth Fremson/The New York Times)
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. takes the stage on the second day of the Republican midterm convention at the American Airlines Center in Dallas, Sept. 10, 2026. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. accepted $4 million in book advances and more than $270,000 in gifts over the past year from close allies who are working to advance his Make America Healthy Again agenda, according to his latest financial disclosure form. (Ruth Fremson/The New York Times)Read moreRUTH FREMSON / New York Times

A large majority of likely Pennsylvania voters dislike Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., according to a poll conducted in the wake of his clash with Gov. Josh Shapiro over the state’s measles outbreak.

The poll, released Thursday, found that 61% of respondents have an unfavorable view of Kennedy, while only 33% said they hold a favorable one of him.

“He’s the one person in the poll that does worse than President [Donald] Trump,” said Don Levy, the director of the Siena Research Institute, which conducted the poll on behalf of The Inquirer and New York Times.

Kennedy, who has a history of anti-vaccine activism, has been embroiled in a heated debate with Shapiro, the state’s popular governor, over measles-associated deaths in Pennsylvania.

“The poll shows that people see RFK Jr. for what he is: the single worst person to be HHS secretary during a massive measles epidemic,” said Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and a longtime critic of Kennedy.

State health officials have been responding to a measles outbreak of more than 800 cases, as of Wednesday, that included four deaths, two of them infants.

Kennedy accused Shapiro of fabricating two of the deaths, although he later acknowledged one was caused by measles.

The survey of likely voters was conducted between Sept. 15 and 21, a period that overlaps the war of words between the Democratic governor and Trump’s health secretary.

“This serious situation continues to be made worse by RFK Jr. playing games with public health and safety,” Shapiro said on X last week. “It’s long past time for [Kennedy] to stop stoking vaccine skepticism and misinformation and compromising the serious mission of the nation’s public health agencies.”

For his part, Kennedy, in a post on X last month, accused Shapiro of choosing “to politicize this outbreak instead of implementing a unified public health response.” He also contended in that post that he has promoted vaccination as the “most effective way to prevent measles infection.”

But Kennedy has explicitly stated that vaccines cause autism, Offit noted, and late last year, Kennedy ordered the CDC to change its website to say its long established position that vaccines don’t cause autism is not an evidence-based claim.

Kennedy has also said that the measles vaccine was never fully tested and that it wanes over time, both of which have been disputed by medical authorities with decades of evidence backing its safety and efficacy.

Lesa Yeager, a 63-year-old independent voter from State College who participated in the survey, said she was concerned about the spread of measles in Central Pennsylvania, and she wished Kennedy would “encourage people to the get the vaccines.”

She wasn’t familiar with his back-and-forth with the governor, but said her frustration with Kennedy is longstanding.

“I have a kid with special needs, and [Kennedy] is going on about how the vaccines cause autism, and everybody knows that’s not true,” she said. “He has spread such misinformation, and he’s wackadoodle.”

For weeks, the CDC did not publicly list Pennsylvania’s measles-associated deaths, reportedly at Kennedy’s order, a charge his agency denied. “It looks as thought RFK is ignoring measles deaths here,” Offit said.

On Wednesday, the CDC acknowledged that a measles-associated death had occurred in 2026, without saying where it happened. The CDC said the number is “subject to change.” Pennsylvania is the only state where a measles death has been widely reported.

In a statement, Emily Hilliard, HHS press secretary, declined to address the poll, but said that the public’s trust in vaccines was eroded significantly during the pandemic, caused by “mismanagement, overreach, misinformation, and mandates.”

“Attributing the measles resurgence to the Trump administration fundamentally misrepresents when and why the resurgence began,” Hilliard said, adding that Kennedy has “been clear that vaccination remains the most effective way to prevent measles.”

Kennedy and Shapiro have repeatedly battled over vaccine policy during the Trump administration. Shapiro joined a lawsuit earlier this year over federal changes to the childhood vaccine schedule.

Trump last month signed an an executive order that said the MMR vaccine — a combination vaccine that protects against measles, mumps and rubella — “should be administered in three separate single-disease shots” during three separate doctor’s visits. Immunologists have disparaged the idea, saying there’s no medical reason to do so.

Shapiro has said Pennsylvania won’t alter immunization guidelines in response to Trump’s order.

The poll found that 53% of likely voters trust Shapiro to do a better job on vaccine policy than his Republican opponent Stacy Garrity, a Trump-backed candidate who participated in Kennedy’s “Make American Healthy Again” event in Harrisburg earlier this year.

Staff writers Michelle Baruchman and Gillian McGoldrick contributed to this report.