About

RFK Jr Saying Autistic People Will Never Play Baseball refers to memes, jokes and discussions about U.S. Health Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr. discussing a CDC report about rising autism diagnoses in children in April 2025. Specifically, the jokes address his claim that autistic children will, "never hold a job, they’ll never play baseball, they'll never write a poem." The statement went viral on Twitter / X and prompted internet users and baseball fans to post evidence of their favourite baseball "autists" and savants.

Origin

On April 16th, 2025, Axios^[1] reported that U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. abruptly held a news conference in Washington, D.C., following a CDC report^[2] showing autism diagnoses had risen to 1 in 31 children. Kennedy attributed the rise to environmental toxins and called autism "preventable." He asserted that autistic children would "never hold a job," "never play baseball," and "never write a poem."

ABC News shared the address on its official YouTube^[3] channel on April 16th, gathering over 17,000 likes in a day.

On April 16th X^[4] account @RT_com posted the relevant clip from the conference, gathering over 1,000 likes in a day.

RFK Jr. gets emotional about autism in kids: 'we are doing this to our children'

They'll never hold a job, they’ll never play baseball, they'll never write a poem' https://t.co/RRpm8RNKOd pic.twitter.com/2Hww91Q3Lh

— RT (@RT_com) April 16, 2025

Spread

Several internet users reacted to RFK Jr's comments, including Redditor /u/justletmeregisteryou, who posted to the subreddit^[7] /r/GenZ on April 16th, 2025, writing, "The fuck does this dude think Autism is?" The post gathered over 3,000 upvotes in a day.

On April 16th, X^[5] user @LiamFennessy_ shared a video of Mariners pitcher Luis Castillo planting sunflower seeds in the dirt near the dugout. The caption on the post read, "Need I say more?," gathering over 30,000 likes in a day.

Need I say more? pic.twitter.com/OhR1o7oBdc https://t.co/l7fDaznbar

— Liam Fennessy (@LiamFennessy_) April 16, 2025

Also on April 16th, X^[6] user @BaseballHSTRN shared news reports about L.A. Angels outfielder Mike Trout and his knowledge of meteorology. The post read, "Autistic people can’t play baseball," and gathered over 13,000 likes in a day.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References