RFK Jr. lambasted over bizarre claim about 8-year-old Charlie Kirk: 'Weird even for GOP'

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy reminisced about his relationship with right-wing influencer Charlie Kirk Sunday in the wake of his killing last week, recounting a 2001 meeting in which he said they became close friends.

Online critics, however, were quick to point out that RFK Jr.’s timeline had at least one major issue.

Speaking Sunday at a memorial vigil for Kirk at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., RFK Jr. said that after meeting Kirk, the two would go on to become "spiritual brothers,” and credited the right-wing influencer with his unification with President Donald Trump.

“I met Charlie for the first time in July of 2001,” RFK Jr. said. “I went on his podcast, and I think we approached each other with a lot of trepidation at that time, but by the end of the podcast, we were so amazed, we were spiritual brothers and we were friends.”

RFK Jr.’s supposed meeting date with Kirk, however, quickly drew attention online.

“Charlie Kirk was born in 1993,” wrote Dianne Callahan in a social media post Monday on X, who owns a Georgia-based college prep organization and has amassed nearly 8,000 followers. “He would have been eight years old.”

Kirk was 31 years old at the time of his fatal shooting last week while speaking at a Utah Valley University event in Utah. He would go on to co-found the conservative advocacy organization Turning Point USA in 2012 when he was 18 years old, making a meeting with RFK Jr. in 2001 highly unlikely.

“Maybe 40-year-olds becoming soulmates with 8-year-olds is normal in MAGA,” wrote X user “The Radical Left,” who describes themself as an “LGBTQ ally’ and has amassed more than 1,000 followers.

Kirk has seen an outpouring of support in the wake of his killing from conservative figures, including from President Donald Trump himself, who announced last week that he would be posthumously awarding the right-wing influencer with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian award in the United States.

“Why did RFK Jr become soul mates with an 8-year-old Charlie Kirk?” wrote political consultant and commentator Julien Hoez on X, who’s amassed more than 17,000 followers. “That’s weird, even for the GOP.”