Cheryl Hines Reportedly Spiraling as Explosive Claims Resurface That RFK Jr. Was Inches from Leaving Her for a Reporter
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Cheryl Hines’ marital woes are about to be thrust into the spotlight by a political journalist’s new memoir.
Over the past few years, whispers turned into headlines as reports suggested the Secretary of Health and Human Services had been romantically involved with a political reporter named Olivia Nuzzi, while still married to “Curb Your Enthusiasm” star.
Now, in her upcoming memoir, “American Canto,” Nuzzi is ready to share her side of their scandalous affair with a man who was very much off-limits. The timing says it all: her book buzz arrives only days after Hines’ memoir, and Hines is allegedly furious about what’s said about her husband.
While reporting for New York Magazine, Nuzzi was assigned to cover his 2024 presidential run — a job she says sparked a digital flirtation that escalated into a full-blown connection after her October 2023 profile on him. Their alleged relationship simmered quietly behind his 11-year marriage until evidence finally pushed it into public view.
By the fall of 2024, the company abruptly severed ties with Nuzzi, 32, after intimate texts and video chats between her and RFK Jr. were exposed.
Olivia Nuzzi is out at New York Magazine after relationship with RFK Jr. https://t.co/FZxMYwVSI9 pic.twitter.com/Wke9Y4ncBF
— philip lewis (@Phil_Lewis_) October 21, 2024
The 32-year-old writer later apologized for getting close to the unnamed “politician” she mentioned in her book — widely assumed to be Kennedy — who, she says, fantasized about having a child with her, professed his love, and confessed he was particularly mesmerized by her mouth.
Nuzzi insisted they shared “common language, common skepticisms, common ideas about what was beautiful, common beliefs about what was valuable.”
Hines’ husband allegedly referred to Nuzzi as “Livvy” and wrote her love poems.
Kennedy also allegedly told the journalist that he’d take a bullet for her, per The New York Post — a claim that raised even more eyebrows given her insistence that their “relationship was never physical.”
Olivia Nuzzi cheated on her fiancé (Ryan Lizza) and RFK Jr cheated on his wife (Cheryl Hines).
Who else thinks they’re equally to blame and equally despicable? pic.twitter.com/d8zUrfVwcv
— Jon Cooper 🇺🇸 (@joncoopertweets) September 22, 2024
One year after being let go, Nuzzi began working as the West Coast editor for Vanity Fair, which was announced in September 2025. Reactions to the new book were swift as readers speculated about Nuzzi’s motive for writing the tell-all, and how she landed on her feet so quickly.
“And imagine that you are fired as a reporter at New York Magazine, at which point your career should be over, but nope, Vanity Fair rings you up and asks you to be its West Coast editor,” the reader wrote. “The left has no standards, and the media is even lower.”
“That she got an editor’s job at Vanity Fair is indeed suggestive of her having been paid off. I didn’t expect her ever to find work,” added another.
One reader suggested the reporter was paid to write the tell-all book about the Kennedy affair, casting doubt on her story.
“Anytime the left want to bury someone they feel is threatening their power or money, someone suddenly comes out with a tell-all book. I wonder how much money Olivia Nuzzi was paid off from the radical left? Just because someone writes a book doesn’t mean it’s true,” they wrote.
“He has also spread a lot of misinformation, a lot of chaos, a lot of confusion. And I think it’s just a very dangerous thing.” The View co-host Sunny Hostin rips into RFK Jr directly to his wife Cheryl Hines. pic.twitter.com/9NeNa8zRn7
— Mike Sington (@MikeSington) October 14, 2025
Hines admitted in her recently released memoir, “Unscripted,” that Kennedy had already informed her over the phone — while she was vacationing in Italy with their children — that damaging stories were on the way. She writes that she chose to trust her husband over the media, and the two even agreed to float a narrative about a “fake separation” to shield her acting career from the blowback surrounding him.
“Bobby called to warn me of another breaking story,” she wrote, according to People. “At first, it was an ambiguous story about a political journalist who said she had some communication with a former reporting subject that had turned personal, also stating that it was never physical. There was a lot of speculation that she was referring to Bobby. The press was running wild with it.”
She said upon returning home, Kennedy laid everything “on the table” about him and Nuzzi, as the two began being more intentional about pouring into their marriage instead of others and identifying how they had become so distant.
But the claims about her husband wanting to have a baby with Nuzzi are far from the truth.
A friend of Hines told the New York Post there’s “intense anger she feels” toward Nuzzi, calling the statement in the reporter’s book “really, really irate” about “falsehoods.” They added, “He would never love THAT woman, let alone have her have his baby,”
The couple married in 2014 after three years of dating, though they do not have any children together. Kennedy has six children from his previous marriages, and Hines has one daughter.
With Hines’ memoir already out and Nuzzi’s set to drop next month, readers are left to sort through competing accounts and decide for themselves what to believe about Kennedy’s infamous scandal — one the public clearly hasn’t forgotten.
