Ethel Kennedy, a human rights advocate and the widow of former United States Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, is recovering after suffering a stroke last week, her grandson said in a statement on Tuesday.
Ethel, 96, is the sister-in-law of former President John F. Kennedy.
“Unfortunately on Thursday morning she suffered a stroke in her sleep,” her grandson Former Rep. Joe Kennedy III, D-Massachusetts, said on X. “She was brought to an area hospital where she is now receiving treatment.”
Ethel Kennedy attends the 30th Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Awards Ceremony, in the Russell Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill, Nov. 21, 2013 in Washington, D.C.
Drew Angerer/Getty Images, FILE
“She is comfortable, she is getting the best care possible, and she is surrounded by family,” Kennedy said of his grandmother. “She is, as you may know, a strong woman who has led a remarkably fulfilling life. We are here looking after her.”
The Kennedy family matriarch is mother to 11 children, including Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and has several grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
“She has had a great summer and transition into fall,” Kennedy III wrote in his statement. “She was able to get out on the water, visit the pier, and enjoy many lunches and dinners with family.”
The former congressman concluded his statement by requesting privacy for the family.
Ethel founded the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights nonprofit in her late husband’s honor a year after he was assassinated while running for president in 1968.
She became a widow at the age of 40 years old with 10 children and while pregnant with the couple’s 11th child. She never remarried.
Among other human rights organizations she’s been involved with, Ethel co-chaired the Coalition of Gun Control.
In 2014, former President Barack Obama presented Ethel with the Congressional Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest honor for a civil, saying at the time, that her “love of family is matched only by her devotion to her nation.”
“She’s an emblem of enduring faith and enduring hope even in the face of unimaginable loss and unimaginable grief,” Obama said during the White House ceremony. “And she has touched the lives of countless people around the world with her generosity and grace.”
