Married couple Cheryl Hines and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. allegedly nearly staged a separation to ease backlash.
“When he said, ‘Well, we could fake a separation,’ because he felt so bad because nobody liked you anymore. And you’re like, ‘Let’s not do that,’” Heather McDonald said on the Thursday, October 30, episode of the “Juicy Scoop With Heather McDonald” podcast.
Hines, 60, replied, “But you know what? I understand it because I have some friends that — I don’t want people having feelings about my friends being friends with me. You know what I mean? I don’t want to bring anything bad into someone else’s life. He was watching it all happen.”
Hines and Kennedy’s relationship was placed in the public eye more than ever before amid his 2024 bid for the presidency. After the election, Kennedy, 71, was named the United States Secretary of Health and Human Services for President Donald Trump’s administration.
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Hines initially shared in an interview with Fox News Digital earlier this month that Kennedy suggested they fake a separation amid public scrutiny.
“In my book, Unscripted, I talk about this because things got … dramatic during this presidential campaign,” Hines said, referring to her new memoir. “Some people were very upset that I was even married to Bobby. They were vocally coming at me because I’m married to Bobby. So Bobby felt like, ‘You shouldn’t be having to take that heat. So why don’t we just say we’re separated?’”
While Hines thought it was “a very sweet notion” by Kennedy, she admitted that she didn’t think it was “helpful” to go through with it.
“What needed to happen — and what did happen — is we got closer together,” she said. “I understood the sentiment behind it, but this is why I think the book is so interesting: you’re in these unique situations that nobody else can imagine.”
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She continued, “For a couple to say, ‘Maybe we should just say we’re not with each other anymore and our lives would be easier’ — it’s like, well, things have gotten to that point. That’s pretty dramatic and pretty extreme. And that’s one of the reasons why I wanted to write the book … experiences that are very once in a lifetime.”
Hines was previously married to Paul Young for eight years until their 2010 divorce. The exes share daughter Catherine, 21. Kennedy, for his part, exchanged vows in 1982 with Emily Black, with whom he shares son Bobby III, 41, and daughter Kathleen, 37. After their 1994 split, Kennedy married the late Mary Richardson in 1994 and welcomed four kids: Conor, 31, Kyra, 30, Finn, 26, and Aidan, 23. Kennedy and Richardson called it quits in 2010.
Hines and RFK Jr., the son of former presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy and nephew of former president John F. Kennedy, tied the knot in 2014. “We share the same values. Family first,” Hines gushed to Us Weekly in 2014, one month before RFK Jr. popped the question. “We like to have a good time and work hard.”
