Robert F Kennedy Jr, the scion of the Democratic Kennedy family whose independent presidential campaign threatened to draw votes from both Republicans and Democrats, has suspended his campaign and endorsed Donald Trump.
Kennedy said he would be removing his name from the ballot in critical swing states, but will remain on the ballot in other states and some voters could still cast ballots for him.
In a rambling statement that started three-quarters of a hour behind schedule, Kennedy said he would be giving his support to Trump following a series of conversations with him, the first of which took place days after the Republican nominee survived an assassination attempt on 13 July.
“I was surprised to discover that we are aligned on many key issues,” Kennedy said, explaining that he and Trump met several times. “In those meetings, he suggested that we join forces as a unity party. We talked about Abraham Lincoln’s team of rivals. That arrangement would allow us to disagree publicly and privately and seriously, if need be, on issues over which we differ while working together on the existential issues upon which we are in concordance.”
He also praised Trump’s call for an end to Russia’s war with Ukraine, which he blamed on the US and the Nato alliance.
Kennedy said the war was one of three “great causes” that drove him to enter the race and ultimately to give his support to Trump, with the others being free speech and what he called “the war on our children”, a phrase covering his well-known opposition to vaccines, about which he has peddled conspiracy theories.
Kennedy, whose uncle, John F Kennedy, and father, Robert F Kennedy, were both assassinated, announced that he was running against Joe Biden for the Democratic nomination in April 2023.
He left that race last October, however, warning that under the two-party system the US was “cycling from despair to rage and back to despair”, and ran as an independent.
Kennedy’s campaign was seen as a threat to both Harris and Trump, but in the past few months Kennedy was dogged by controversies. He was accused of assaulting a former babysitter, it emerged that Kennedy believed that part of his brain had been eaten by a worm, and in early August he admitted to having staged a bizarre bicycle hit-and-run incident with a dead bear cub in a New York City park.
As his election bid floundered, Kennedy reportedly made overtures to the Harris campaign in August to discuss dropping out and endorsing her in exchange for a job in her administration, while he was also courted by Trump in July.
Having initially hovered at about 10% in national polling, Kennedy’s popularity dropped amid the scandals, with the 70-year-old averaging about half of that in August. The campaign struggled to raise money, with just $3.9m cash-on-hand at the end of July, and debts of $3.5m. Politico reported that Kennedy spent more than $7m in July – more than the $5.6m he raised.
Both Democrats and Republicans watched Kennedy’s campaign closely, however, mindful that his mix of vaccine skepticism, hardline policies on the border, and ties to the most famous Democratic family in politics, could draw votes in key swing states.
Kennedy, as a former Democrat, was initially seen as more of a threat to Democrats winning the presidential election, but in recent months he was seen to be drawing more votes from Trump, something his running mate, Nicole Shanahan, admitted on Tuesday.
“There’s two options that we’re looking at,” Shanahan told the Impact Theory podcast.
“One is staying in, forming that new party, but we run the risk of a Kamala Harris and [Tim] Walz presidency, because we draw votes from Trump. Or we walk away right now and join forces with Donald Trump. We walk away from that and we explain to our base why we’re making this decision.”
There has been evidence that Trump did see Kennedy as a threat.
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A video posted online on 16 July showed a phone call between Trump and Kennedy where Trump appeared to offer an opportunity for the pair to work together in the future. The video came after reports – denied by Kennedy – that he might drop out and endorse Trump.
At an event in Nevada, Trump thanked Kennedy for his decision to endorse him, and in a statement the campaign called the decision “good news”.
The Harris campaign responded less directly, with a statement apparently directed at Kennedy supporters: “for any American out there who is tired of Donald Trump and looking for a new way forward, ours is a campaign for you.”
Kennedy’s apparent efforts to meet with Harris to discuss endorsing her in exchange for a possible cabinet secretary position were snubbed by the Harris campaign.
His run for president has been controversial. Recently Kennedy responded to an allegation that he sexually assaulted an employee by stating: “I am not a church boy,” while in July 2023, a video surfaced of Kennedy making false claims that Covid-19 was “ethnically targeted” to attack Black people and white people while sparing Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese people.
Last year Kennedy claimed that wifi causes “leaky brain” and has linked antidepressants to school shootings. In 2023 he also claimed that chemicals in water were making children transgender, while Kennedy has longstanding, and wrong, beliefs about apparently any and all vaccines.
In a joint statement, five of Kennedy’s siblings – Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, Courtney Kennedy, Kerry Kennedy, Chris Kennedy and Rory Kennedy – denounced his endorsement of Trump as a betrayal of the values of their father, Robert F Kennedy, the former attorney general and Democratic senator.
“We want an America filled with hope and bound together by a shared vision of a brighter future, a future defined by individual freedom, economic promise and national pride,” they said. “We believe in Harris and Walz. Our brother Bobby’s decision to endorse Trump today is a betrayal of the values that our father and our family hold most dear. It is a sad ending to a sad story.”