New York Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers confirmed that he passed on running for vice president on an independent ticket with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in order to keep playing football.
“I love Bobby, we had a couple of really nice conversations, but there were really two options. It was retire and be his VP or keep playing, and I want to keep playing,” Mr. Rodgers said at a press conference Tuesday.
His political motivations stem, however, from a sense that changes promised by former President Donald Trump did not materialize during his time in office.
“My thing is [Donald Trump] had four years to do it and didn’t drain the swamp … But that’s why I was interested when Bobby came to me and said, ‘Would you think about being my running mate?’ And I said, ‘Are you serious? I’m a f—ing football player.’ But I love this country and I’d love to be a part of bringing it back to what she used to be,” Mr. Rodgers told former Fox News host Tucker Carlson in an interview released on X last week.
Mr. Kennedy eventually selected Nicole Shanahan, a California attorney, to be his running mate.
Mr. Rodgers was on the field for a mere four plays in the first Jets game of the 2023-2024 season before he went down for the year with an Achilles tendon injury. He went hiking with Mr. Kennedy in February, according to the New York Post, as he continued to rehabilitate his heel.
The two share a skepticism of vaccines; Mr. Rodgers told reporters he was “immunized” against COVID-19 in the summer before the 2021-2022 season, only to be ruled out of a game due to being unvaccinated.
Mr. Kennedy, meanwhile, has been an activist against vaccination for years, connecting their use to autism in children. In 2015, he told Oregon CBS affiliate KOIN-TV that “I don’t think it’s appropriate to force people to undergo, to have their children undergo a medical procedure in this country,” referring to mandatory childhood immunizations.
In a July 2023 interview with podcaster Lex Fridman, Mr. Kennedy said that “there’s no vaccine that is, you know, safe and effective.”
• Brad Matthews can be reached at bmatthews@washingtontimes.com.