Robert Kennedy Jr to run for president as independent in 2024 - report
Category: News & Politics
Via: vic-eldred • last year • 33 commentsBy: MartinPengelly (the Guardian)
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Scion of US political dynasty, who had been challenging Joe Biden for Democratic nomination, expected to announce on Sunday
Robert F Kennedy Jr is reported to be ending his challenge to Joe Biden for the Democratic presidential nomination and run instead as an independent candidate, in a move that could upset the 2024 race for the White House.
Kennedy, 69 and a scion of a famous political dynasty - a son of the former US attorney general and New York senator Robert F Kennedy, and a nephew of the former president John F Kennedy - will announce his run in Pennsylvania on 9 October, according to Mediaite.
RFK Jr draws quite a crowd - what does it mean for 2024?Read more
"Bobby feels that the Democratic National Committee is changing the rules to exclude his candidacy so an independent run is the only way to go," the website quoted a "Kennedy campaign insider" as saying.
Whether Kennedy; Cornel West, the Green party pick; or a notional nominee backed by No Labels, a supposedly centrist group, a third-party candidate is widely seen to be likely to peel more support from Biden than the likely Republican nominee, Donald Trump, thereby potentially handing the presidency to the Republican.
Kennedy is an attorney who made his name as an environmental campaigner before achieving notoriety as a prominent vaccine sceptic, particularly over Covid-19. His campaign has been rife with controversy, not least in a podcast interview released this week in which he repeated a conspiracy theory about the 9/11 attacks on New York.
His campaign has also been roiled by an antisemitism scandal after Kennedy told reporters at a press dinner that Covid-19 was "ethnically targeted" at white people and Black people, while Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese people had greater immunity. The false claim was embraced by neo-Nazi groups and condemned by scientists and Jewish organizations.
Kennedy's remarks echoed antisemitic tropes that circulated widely during the pandemic and portrayed the coronavirus as a global Jewish plot, causing members of Kennedy's own family to denounce him for "deplorable and untruthful" comments.
Polling has shown Kennedy performing relatively well against Biden, the incumbent president, in the Democratic primary, but not close to posing a serious threat.
However, Biden aides are reportedly nervous about the possible impact of third-party candidates in a likely presidential election match-up with Trump.
Polling shows widespread concerns, including among Democrats, that at 80, Biden is too old to serve an effective second term in the White House. Trump is only three years younger - and faces 91 criminal charges, including for election subversion, and assorted civil threats - but polls show less concern among his fervent Republican base that he could be unfit to return to office.
Rightwing figures - prominent among them Steve Bannon, formerly Trump's White House strategist - have encouraged Kennedy to run against Biden or as an independent.
As cited by Mediaite, in July the Fox News host Greg Gutfeld said: "I think he should run as a third-party candidate because I do think he should, he would win."
But not every observer thought Kennedy's move would be bad for Biden.
Joe Conason, the editor of the National Memo, said: "Go Bobby! Running 'independent' means you'll draw more voters from the candidate you resemble most in political ideology, personal conduct, and narcissistic mentality. (That's Trump, not Biden.)"
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He had no choice. The dems made it almost impossible for anyone to run against Biden.
providing an alternative for the low info voters is a good move, especially if trump ends up in jail before 11/24...
Bobby Jr is a democrat from head to toe.
He had 15% of the democratic vote last time I checked.
2024 is about whether trump goes to the white house or the big house and 2025 is about how many of those that support his anti-democracy authoritarian concept will be eliminated with extreme prejudice to sustain either outcome.
You mean it's not about the punishment Americans have endured under Biden?
Who knows maybe people have devolved to that point.
you can't name one thing that biden has done, on his own, that has adversely affected a majority of americans. while there are plenty of examples by your candidate during his final term in office.
no worries. I won't be doing anything the constitution says I can't do until trumpsters trigger their own self destruction and give democracy loving americans the constitutional right and authority to eradicate domestic enemies.
They're the only ones who would vote for the scumbag, the low info. voters/morons.
he's no Democrat, he's a DINO through and through and a whackjob scumbag
Such an easy question.
They got nothin', they're desperate.
Why do you have a problem housing, feeding, clothing, educating, and treating our fellow human beings?
You sound like another member who views them as feral cats.
Not very humanitarian or empathetic.
I know the cost of those programs is a fraction of the cost of taxpayer subsidies and tax credits for the businesses that fund the rwnj candidates supporting them. republicans control congress, why don't they legislate an immigration policy that is fair and equitable enough to get thru the senate and get a signature in the oval office? we both know why. pleasing their corporate masters goes against the will of the majority, and this issue has been a useful cudgel for 100 years, that started in texas.
Of course not, presidents don't do things on their own. You can't you can't name one thing that biden has done, on his own, that has aided a majority of americans
... deja vu
What tax increase did Biden get out of the Dem Congress in 21 or 22?
Did you mean the House were they have a very slim majority?
One could also ask why the Democrats didn't legislate and pass their version of an immigration policy when they held the majority of the House as well as a super-majority in the Senate during the 111th U.S. Congress which was during the first two years of Obama's first term. Would have been very easy for them to force thru almost anything they wanted at that time.
And, he had 20% Democrat support out of the starting gate when he announced his 2024 presidential candidacy. Democrats even denied him Secret Service protection even though everyone knows his father and uncle were assassinated.
Hope he has better luck than his dad and his uncles.
Thus far he hasn't tried to have Fidel Castro killed, or double-crossed organized crime or tried to prosecute a union leader by any means possible.
He simply hasn't accumulated powerful enemies.
And he has 15% of the democratic vote.
I don't think so
Very true.
Hopefully he won't end up like Vince Foster...LOl.
Yep, such is the hold the DNC and RNC have on the system.
Last guy I wish would have run was Jim Webb. Hillary and the DNC torpedoed his run.
I’d have voted for him in a heartbeat. A Vet, a truly moderate Dem with a strong foreign policy backbone.
Jr. is an embarrassment to the Democrats and the Kennedys, especially his father.
He's a whackjob anti-vaxxer. Isn't he also the one who was against legalizing marijuana but a smoker himself?
he was a heroin junkie for a long time.
Well, if the 'so called Kennedy' draws votes to maintain Biden then Zelenskyy and Ukraine will survive. If the 'so called Kennedy' draws enough votes to re-install Trump then Zelenskyy, his family and thousands of Ukrainians will perish. And the former Soviet Bloc will shudder. Not to mention that pregnant minor girls will become the norm.