A prominent voice in the Make America Healthy Again movement is pushing for health secretary and anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to make the topic of chemtrail conspiracy theories a federal priority, according to a report by KFF News.
KFF obtained a memo, written by MAHA influencer Gray Delany in July, presenting the topic to Calley Means, a White House health advisor. The memo lays out a series of unsubstantiated and far-fetched claims that academic researchers and federal agencies are secretively spreading toxic substances from airplanes, poisoning Americans and spurring large-scale weather events, such as the devastating flooding in Texas last summer.
“It is unconscionable that anyone should be allowed to spray known neurotoxins and environmental toxins over our nation’s citizens, their land, food and water supplies,” Delany writes in the memo.
Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at the University of California, Los Angeles, told KFF that the memo presents claims that are false and, in some cases, physically impossible. “That is a pretty shocking memo,” he said. “It doesn’t get more tinfoil hat. They really believe toxins are being sprayed.”
Delany ends the memo with recommendations for federal agencies: form a joint task force to address this alleged geoengineering, host a roundtable on the topic, include the topic in the MAHA commission report, and publicly address the health and environmental harms.
It remains unclear if Kennedy, Means, or federal agencies are following up Delany’s suggestions. Department of Health and Human Services spokesperson Emily Hilliard told KFF that “HHS does not comment on future or potential policy decisions and task forces.”
However, one opportunity has already been missed: The MAHA Commission released its “Make Our Children Healthy Again” report on September 9, along with a strategy document. Neither document mentions any of the topics raised in Delany’s memo.
Kennedy’s agenda
Delany, a loyal follower of Kennedy, served as a staffer on the anti-vaccine activist’s failed presidential campaign. In June, Kennedy hired Delany to be the HHS’s director of MAHA implementation. But Delany was fired in early August, reportedly due to in-fighting with other Kennedy devotees.
According to reporting by MSNBC, the ouster occurred amid the fallout of Kennedy’s clumsy and widely decried cancellation of $500 million in federal funding for mRNA vaccine development. There was no preparation within HHS to communicate or explain the decision, and Delany tried to fill the void. But, Stefanie Spear, Kennedy’s top aide and longtime confidant, told Delany to step down. Delany ignored the order, producing a panned 181-page document for Steve Bannon’s podcast that Delany claimed was proof that COVID-19 mRNA vaccines are harmful. Delany was fired the next day after Spear had “lost confidence” in him.
While Delany may no longer be in an official position to steer federal health agendas, Kennedy has made statements in line with Delany’s July memo.
In an April 28, 2025, appearance on Dr. Phil Primetime, an audience member asked Kennedy what he would do about “stratospheric aerosol injections,” which she claimed are “continuously peppered on us every day.” Kennedy responded: “It’s done, we think by DARPA [a research agency in the Department of Defense] and a lot of it now is coming out of the jet fuel. … I am going to do everything in my power to stop it. We’re bringing on somebody who is going to think only about that—find out who is doing it and holding them accountable.”
In 2023, Kennedy spoke with chemtrail activist Dane Wigington on a podcast and credited actor Woody Harrelson for making him to believe in chemtrails after watching contrails from a plane transform into clouds.
“I’ve looked up many times since then and seen that happening, and I don’t have a good explanation for it,” Kennedy said.
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