Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. confessed on Sunday that in 2014, he dumped a dead bear cub in Central Park in Manhattan and staged it to look like the animal had been hit by a bicycle.
The staged bicycle accident first made headlines in 2014. Then-New York Times reporter Tatiana Schlossberg—who is the granddaughter of former President John F. Kennedy—covered the story for the outlet.
A woman was walking her dog in Central Park when she noticed it lying under some bushes, partly concealed by an abandoned bicycle. The cub was 6 months old and 44 pounds.
On Sunday, Aug. 4, the 70-year-old shared a video on X showing him recounting the story to Roseanne Barr, 71.
He noted that he decided to share the story now because the New Yorker will be including the incident in a forthcoming article. “Looking forward to seeing how you spin this one,” he said in his post, tagging the magazine.
Looking forward to seeing how you spin this one, @NewYorker… pic.twitter.com/G13taEGzba
— Robert F. Kennedy Jr (@RobertKennedyJr) August 4, 2024
In the video, Kennedy started his explanation by saying he and some friends picked up the animal after he saw a woman in a van hit and kill a young bear while driving through the Hudson Valley.
“I pulled over and I picked up the bear and put him in the back of my van because I was going to skin the bear,” he said. “It was in very good condition and I was going to put the meat in my refrigerator.”
He then detailed how he had to attend a dinner at Peter Luger Steak House in New York City and then head to the airport, which meant he had to get rid of the bear.
To resolve his dilemma, he decided to leave the bear in Central Park with an old bicycle to make it look like it had been hit by the bike because there had been “a series of bicycle accidents in New York” and thought it would be a “good idea” to stage the incident—mentioning it would be “funny.”
“We thought it would be amusing for whoever found it, or something,” he said.
“The next day it was on every television station,” he recalled of the headline-making story. “I was like, ‘Oh my God, what did I do?’”
“I was worried because my prints were all over that bike … Luckily, the story died down after a while,” Kennedy shared.
“It’s gonna be a bad story,” he added while talking about the New Yorker‘s proposed piece.
On Monday, the outlet published a piece titled “What Does Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Actually Want?” which included details surrounding the bear incident.
