‘Our beautiful Tatiana passed away this morning; she will always remain in our hearts’: Kennedy family grieves yet another tragic loss
Tatiana Schlossberg, an environmental journalist and one of the three grandchildren of the late President John F. Kennedy, has passed away at age 35 following her leukemia diagnosis last year.
Schlossberg—the daughter of President Kennedy’s daughter Caroline Kennedy and Edwin Schlossberg—made a revelation in a November 2025 essay published in The New Yorker. The John F. Kennedy Library Foundation posted a family statement announcing her death on social media this Tuesday.
“Our beautiful Tatiana passed away this morning. She will always be in our hearts,” the statement read. It did not specify the cause of her death or the location where she passed away.
Schlossberg recounted being diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia in May 2024 when she was 34. During her hospital stay for the birth of her second child, her doctor observed an elevated white blood cell count, which led to the diagnosis of acute myeloid leukemia with a rare mutation typically found in older individuals.
In her essay, Schlossberg described undergoing multiple rounds of chemotherapy, two stem cell transplants, and taking part in clinical trials. During her latest trial, she noted, her doctor informed her, “he could keep me alive for a year, maybe.”
Schlossberg also took aim at policies promoted by her mother’s cousin, the Health and Human Services Secretary, in the essay, arguing that the policies he supported might harm cancer patients such as herself. Her mother had previously urged senators to vote against his confirmation.
“As I spent more and more of my life under the care of doctors, nurses, and researchers striving to improve the lives of others, I watched as Bobby cut nearly a half billion dollars for research into mRNA vaccines, technology that could be used against certain cancers,” the essay reads.
Schlossberg previously served as a reporter for The New York Times’ Science section, focusing on climate change and environmental issues. Her 2019 book, “Inconspicuous Consumption: The Environmental Impact You Don’t Know You Have,” received the Society of Environmental Journalists’ Rachel Carson Environment Book Award in 2020.
In her New Yorker essay, Schlossberg expressed fear that her daughter and son would not remember her. She felt robbed and sorrowful that she would not be able to continue living “the wonderful life” she shared with her husband, George Moran.
Although her parents and two siblings attempted to conceal their pain from her, Schlossberg stated she could feel it daily. Her siblings—Rose and Jack Schlossberg—are the other two grandchildren of JFK.
“For my whole life, I have tried to be good, to be a good student and a good sister and a good daughter, and to protect my mother and never make her upset or angry,” she said. “Now I have added a new tragedy to her life, to our family’s life, and there’s nothing I can do to stop it.”
Schlossberg’s mother, Caroline Kennedy, was just 5 years old when her father, President Kennedy, was assassinated in Dallas in 1963. She was 10 years old when her uncle, Robert F. Kennedy, was killed in Los Angeles in 1968 during his presidential campaign.
Caroline’s brother, John F. Kennedy Jr., died in 1999 when the single-engine plane he was flying crashed into the Atlantic Ocean near Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts. His wife, Carolyn, and her sister, Lauren Bessette, were also killed in the accident.
___
Levy contributed reporting from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, while Brumfield reported from Cockeysville, Maryland.