Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Selects Nicole Shanahan, Autism Mom, as Running Mate

Yesterday afternoon I watched the live-stream video of the gathering in Oakland, California, where Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. ultimately announced the name of the person who will be his Vice President. I was riveted throughout the entire two-and-a-half hours. I have never watched or listened to a political event in which my values and beliefs were so perfectly in alignment with what was being said; not by just one person, but by every single person who spoke. I felt hope. I felt heard. I boo-hoo’d through parts of it. Those deep, cleansing tears that come from a mixture of grief and relief. Grief for what has been done to our children. Relief, because, finally, someone hears me. Hears us.

As I watched and listened to Nicole Shanahan speak, I again felt validated in ways that I have never felt from any politician. Ever. Not even close. Kennedy and Shanahan’s focus on the effects of environmental toxins in our food, water, air, electronics, and pharmaceutical products and what these toxins are doing to American children and families is exactly the number one issue for me and has been since I realized what was happening to my children (and myself) more than twenty years ago. In my first blog, I started out writing about the environment and the synergistic toxicity of heavy metals, pesticides, and vaccines. For me, there could not be a more perfect choice for President, and there could not be a more perfect choice for Vice President.

If you missed the live-stream, I hope you will make time to watch it, or at least listen as you go about your day. Here is a link.

The following article was written by John Gilmore, father of a son diagnosed with autism, and founder of The Autism Action Network.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced Nicole Shanahan as his Vice-Presidential running mate yesterday.  The 39-year-old Oakland, California native is a lawyer, investor, and philanthropist. She was previously married to Google co-founder Sergei Brin. 

The most interesting thing about Shanahan, from my perspective, is that Echo Brin, Shanahan’s 4-year-old daughter with Sergei Brin, is diagnosed with autism.  In her speech yesterday, Shanahan made clear that autism and the epidemic of chronic disease afflicting Americans, especially children, will be a major focus of her role in the campaign. The first issue she discussed in depth was chronic disease and her experience as the mother of a child who regressed into autism at age 10 months. She also made clear that autism and chronic diseases are caused by environmental factors, and that federal agencies have all the data they need to determine the causes of autism and chronic diseases if they only had the political will to look at the data honestly. 

The mission of the Autism Action Network since its inception has been to educate the public and decisionmakers about autism and its environmental causes, and to influence legislation and policy. Other than Robert F. Kennedy Jr., I have never heard any candidate for major office speak with such clarity, candor, and courage about autism and chronic disease. Shanahan’s autism knowledge comes from her own lived experience. 

The Autism Action Network has always been and will continue to be an organization composed primarily of the parents of children diagnosed with autism who were injured by vaccines and environmental factors. 

Nicole Shanahan is one of us.

Here are some excerpts from Shanahan’s speech and preceding video that relate to autism and chronic disease. They are worth reading.

See Shanahan’s speech HERE.  Shanahan begins at 1:54.

The following is from a video interview with Shanahan preceding her speech:

“I gave birth to a healthy baby girl in November 2018. That was the happiest day of my life. From time of birth until seven months. She smiled. She giggled. She paid attention. She hugged. She grasped for things. She had a great appetite. 

At ten months things had changed drastically. She wasn’t engaging as much, and her energy didn’t seem as high, and her muscle mass seemed weak. I would sit her to just sit on her own and she wouldn’t be able to hold herself up. When previously she could. She wasn’t speaking. She wasn’t pointing. She seemed in her own world. And the evaluator clearly identified symptoms associated with autism spectrum disorder. And it was then and there in 2020 that my life changed forever.

Chronic disease in children is due to environmental disruptors that cause inflammatory symptoms which then reduce the child’s ability to heal. I have learned that the top environmental health exposures are really in three categories: there is endocrine disruption which is caused by various chemicals; chemicals in our consumer products, chemicals in our water, and preservatives in our foods. The second category of environmental exposures is electrochemical in nature. That electrical interference comes in the form of our wireless technologies, our devices, our cell phones, and we have no regulatory body currently in the United States keeping an eye on this. The third category of environmental exposures is medications that we rely on for our healthcare system. Ironically, many of these medications are prescribed to help manage symptoms related to exposures caused by categories one and two. It’s a band-aid that actually poses new risks.

I’ve spent my life in data and technology, and I know that there is a solution here to this problem. We have the tools today to get there. And if we are open to this conversation, we are on the path to healing America. And that is a simple conclusion that I think any person in America can make once they have the information.

We owe it to the American family to take these toxins out of our food, and out of our water, out of our medicines.

This campaign is so much more than politics. This campaign is about what is sacred. And what is sacred is our health, and our families, and this land. This beautiful land that deserves much greater attention and care than we have given it. I am making this move as an independent now because I am finding it harder and harder to find the leadership in the White House that represents the issues closest to my heart, and in order for us to get there. I think we all need to rethink what has happened to the DNC, and the RNC, for that matter. We need an opportunity; we crave an opportunity to see how we can serve in the best interests of the American public outside of a system that hasn’t worked. We deserve a real election of optimism. And that’s what Bobby Kennedy gives us a chance at.”

The following is from Shanahan’s speech yesterday:

One of those issues also happens to be a passion of mine and a focus of my philanthropic work: chronic disease. I got into it through my own journey in reproductive health followed by a steep learning curve caring for my daughter who has an autism diagnosis. And in that journey, I discovered that women’s fertility is in precipitous decline throughout the world. We are facing a crisis in reproductive health that is embedded in the larger epidemic of chronic disease. Because it has been so personal for me and my daughter, I got deep into reading the research and consulting some of the best scientists and doctors. Let me tell you what I found. There are three main causes: one is the toxic substances in our environment like endocrine disrupting chemicals in our food, water, and soil, like the pesticide residues, industrial pollutants, the microplastics, the PFAs, the food additives, and the forever chemicals that have contaminated nearly every human cell.  Yes, and it makes you angry to hear this, it makes me angry to say it, because we shouldn’t have to be here right now. Second, it is electromagnetic pollution. You don’t hear politicians talking about that much either, but it is something that we must look at, and as Bobby says, we must look into every possible cause of the chronic disease epidemic that is devouring our nation from the inside. Third, I am sorry to say, is our medications. Pharmaceutical medication has its place, but no single safety study can assess the cumulative impact of one prescription on top of another prescription, and one shot on top of another shot on top of another shot throughout the course of childhood, we just don’t do that study now and we ought to. We can and we will.”

Pharmaceutical medication has its place, but no single safety study can assess the cumulative impact of one prescription on top of another prescription, and one shot on top of another shot on top of another shot throughout the course of childhood, we just don’t do that study now and we ought to.

“Conditions like autism used to be 1 in 10,000. Now in the state of California it is 1 in 22.  One in 22 children affected! Allergies, obesity, anxiety, depression… our children are not well, our people are not well, and our country will not be well for very much longer if we do not heed this desperate call for attention.

I have spoken to our government agencies; trust me, I have tried. I’ve spoken to Senators. I have spoken to Governors. They all know something is wrong but none of them take any action.

There is only one candidate for President who takes the chronic disease epidemic seriously and that is Rober F. Kennedy. And I will be his ally in making our nation healthy again. 

It is not about a new pill or finding the cure. We know the cure is cleaning up our environment and providing the basic public goods that are the foundational conditions of health and healing. It is about a shift in our priorities. It is about compassion. Chronic disease, addiction, poverty… this is where Americans are hurting the most and it is about time that politicians listened.

So here is how the Kennedy/Shanahan ticket is going to end the chronic disease epidemic. While Bobby is focusing on ending the corporate capture of our federal agencies. I am going to assemble the best technologists and scientists in the world, and we will use the latest in AI and computation and examine the health records databases of our nation, and those other nations that are on a quest to solve chronic disease. We will find the answers to our most pressing health concerns within weeks, not decades. We can if we have access to those databases.

It is time to move out of the dark ages of medicine, we can solve the mysteries guarded by corporate influence. We can move from band-aid solutions and end this chronic disease epidemic, I believe it. 

You know, my sense is that most America moms and dads already know the truth of the matter and it is just long overdue that the duty and care owed to the American family is actually given. We can find the answers conclusively.

You know I have a background in tech, so I tend to think in terms of data.

The CDC and other institutions have the data we need. We can apply technology and figure out environmental factors. We can figure out what is making us sick. We just have to ask the right questions, do the right research, and apply the tools. We have to rid science of the corporate bias that contaminates it today. Then we put this thing into reverse.”

“Finally, I come to you as a mother. You know, most of the philanthropists I work with are women, other mothers. And initially I was a mother, who is here today, who reached out to inspire and support this campaign. I never thought in a million years I would be up here running as vice president. No. But what I am doing is joining the millions of other mothers out there who support his candidacy. They are Democrats and Republicans and independents. They read the labels in the supermarkets to keep their kids healthy. They watch in anguish, many of them, when their children suffer from chronic disease. They cry silently as their teenagers deal with depression, anxiety, and addiction. They do their best to hold it together. And they do because they are fricking strong. They are my heroes. These moms. They are my heroes. They are the moms trying to make a normal life for their children in a world that has gone crazy.
As a mother myself who knows firsthand the challenges of raising a child with special needs, I promise to you to make this world a little less crazy.”

Kennedy-Shanahan 2024