A Tampa event featuring Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. ended abruptly on Wednesday as he was pressed on a $1 million donation from a kratom company that federal prosecutors had stopped pursuing.
Kennedy was pressed by a reporter about ties to the company selling the potentially addictive substance at Tampa Bay Boulevard Elementary School roundtable with Sen. Ashley Moody (R-FL).
Sky News correspondent Martha Kelner was still asking questions when Moody thanked the room and the two officials moved to leave.
"The Justice Department dropped its case against Feel Free, and MAHA PAC received a $1 million donation," Kelner said. "Does that have anything to do with the DOJ?"
The MAHA PAC is run by close Kennedy ally Tony Lyons.
"I don't know anything about either of the things that you just said," the health secretary insisted.
"It was from Terry Ross of Feel Free," Kelner pressed.
"Well, I don't know anything about that, and I don't make decisions for the Justice Department," Kennedy quipped.
Moody stepped in and cut the reporter off mid-question.
"Thank you very much for joining us today to talk about our kids and their healthy futures, and Florida is gonna continue to lead the way," the senator interjected.
"So, you have no knowledge about [the] $1 million donation?" Kelner shouted as the Trump officials sped out of the room.
Botanic Tonics, which makes Feel Free, donated $1 million to the Make America Healthy Again PAC, The New York Times reported. That was about 44 percent of the committee's total haul through April, the newspaper found.
A federal judge had cleared the way for prosecution in December, the Times reported. Within two weeks, the Justice Department moved to drop its own case, according to the newspaper.
"Well, [the] FDA is looking at that issue right now," Kennedy said earlier at the event, when Kelner asked about addiction to natural kratom leaf.
Kennedy announced a move last July to ban synthesized 7-OH, a far stronger kratom compound sold by competitors, according to the Times. The Food and Drug Administration's then-commissioner, Marty Makary, said the agency was "not targeting the kratom leaf."
Allies of Botanic Tonics founder J.W. Ross funded a lobbying operation named Stop Gas Station Heroin, the Times found. It has paid one firm at least $600,000, the outlet reported.
But not everyone agrees that the Feel Free product is harmless. Jack LaBounty went from one bottle of Feel Free a day to six or seven, he told The Wall Street Journal.
"I remember feeling the euphoria and wanting to do it again as soon as I could," LaBounty said. "I can just go get gas, and I don’t have to worry about seeing any kratom there.”
LaBounty entered detox in 2023 and was prescribed a drug used to treat opioid addiction, the newspaper reported.
Kennedy and the Health and Human Services Department did not respond to questions from the Times, which also reported that Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin holds a stake in Botanic Tonics worth as much as $1 million.
