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WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden’s Democratic supporters, plagued by past election spoilers, are rallying against Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to block his solo presidential bid that would devastate the Democratic Party in November. Trying to.
In the 2024 campaign, Biden has ignored Kennedy, the son of the late anti-vaccine activist and liberal icon Robert F. Kennedy, in favor of former president and likely Republican nominee Donald Trump. is focused only on.
But behind the scenes, the Democratic National Committee recently announced that Biden’s Democratic National Committee will be monitoring Kennedy’s efforts to get his name on ballots in key battleground states before the upcoming spring and summer qualifying deadline. It has hired a team of lawyers led by former White House Counsel Dana Remus.
And the Democratic National Committee has expanded its campaign to portray Mr. Kennedy as a radical conspiracy theorist rejected even by his own family, a campaign that serves one purpose: boosting Mr. Trump’s chances. Democrats are confident that many of their voters are unaware of Kennedy’s controversial positions and theories, or that he is backed financially by the Trump super PAC’s largest donor. There is.
“We don’t take anything for granted. No one wants to see what happened in 2000 and 2016 again. That’s why we’re preparing early,” a DNC spokesperson said. said Matt Corridoni.
Preparing to vote: See who’s running for president and compare their positions on important issues with our voter guide
President Trump: “If I were a Democrat, I would vote for RFK Jr.”
Seven months after the election, Mr. Kennedy has the support of 11.7% of likely voters, according to RealClearPolitics polling averages. That doesn’t make him a serious candidate to win the election. But Mr. Kennedy’s current double-digit ranking is more than enough to swing the battleground states.
Democrats still accuse Green Party candidate Jill Stein of stealing progressive votes from Hillary Clinton in 2016 and potentially losing Clinton’s Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin states to Trump. ing. In 2000, consumer rights activist Ralph Nader received more than 97,000 votes in Florida, more than George W. Bush’s victory over Al Gore in the state that gave Bush the victory. The difference was significantly greater.
Bernard Tamas, a political science professor at Valdosta State University and author of “The End,” said, “No matter how much shift RFK takes from either candidate, no matter how much it takes away from them, is dangerous and could indeed overturn the election.” and the resurgence of the American third party. ”
“If I worked for the Biden campaign, I would take this issue very seriously, because we don’t know what’s going to happen to him. The numbers will probably go down significantly,” Tamas said. “But you don’t know. It’s a huge uncertainty.”
Political observers are debating whether Mr. Kennedy will take more votes from Mr. Biden than Mr. Trump, or about the same amount from both. Kennedy also faces increasing attacks from President Trump’s super PAC, MAGA, Inc., which is trying to lure progressive voters away from Biden.
President Trump’s allies are trying to shore up his campaign, believing multiple independent or third-party candidates in the race will improve his chances, The New York Times reported. Reported this week.
“If I were a Democrat, I would vote for RFK Jr. over Biden any day of the week because, frankly, he’s more aligned with the Democratic Party,” Trump said in a video released by his campaign on Thursday. Ta. “I believe RFK Jr. will do very well and I believe he will steal a lot of votes from crooked Joe Biden.”
Voters view Biden, Trump more negatively than Kennedy
Kennedy initially ran against Biden in the Democratic primary, but switched to running as an independent last year.
Cornel West, a left-wing activist who is running as an independent, and Stein, who is running as a Green Party candidate as he did in 2016, also threaten to draw voters away from Biden. For now, the DNC is primarily focused on Kennedy, whose fundraising and organization far exceeds West or Stein’s campaigns.
Democrats believe that Mr. Kennedy’s famous last name – perhaps the most iconic brand in Democratic politics – and his avoidance of intense scrutiny until recently, are boosting his approval ratings. Historically, third-party candidates have fared better in polls than in elections, especially when polls are months apart.
Polls regularly show that Americans know less about Kennedy than Biden or Trump, and many view him favorably. A Marquette University Law School poll last week found that 60% of voters had an unfavorable view of Mr. Biden, 56% had an unfavorable view of Mr. Trump, but only 39% had an unfavorable view of Mr. Kennedy. . Thirty percent of respondents said they had not heard enough about Kennedy to form an opinion.
Democrats see this unfamiliarity as defining Kennedy and preventing him from siphoning independent and Democratic voters away from Biden.
A DNC-funded mobile billboard features a doctored photo of Kennedy and new vice presidential nominee Nicole Shanahan, wearing red “Make America Great Again” hats, at a fundraiser in Florida last week. Followed Kennedy in his activities.
The Democratic National Committee’s “MAGA Spoiler Candidates” ad ran in the Los Angeles-based Spanish-language newspaper La Opinion ahead of its March 30 “Viva Kennedy” event aimed at Hispanic voters. I warned you.
Democrats, in a cable TV appearance, echoed President Kennedy’s longstanding conspiratorial statements about the 9/11 attacks, including that the coronavirus was “ethnically targeted” to attack specific ethnic groups. President Kennedy’s uncertainty about the government’s explanation, and his warnings of a U.S. attack, are increasingly alarming. They are collecting DNA from Russia and China to create “ethnic biological weapons.”
And they highlight President Kennedy’s significant financial support from President Trump’s donors. The largest donation, $20 million, to Kennedy’s main super PAC, American Values 2024, came from Timothy Mellon, 81, a Republican mega-donor from Wyoming. Mellon has also donated $15 million to MAGA Inc. for the 2024 election, making him the largest donor to President Trump’s super PAC.
Kennedy campaign says ‘spoilers for both’
Kennedy’s press secretary, Stephanie Speer, said in a statement that the campaign “plans to be a spoiler for both President Biden and President Trump.”
“We’re also going to be spoilers for the war machine, Wall Street, Big Agriculture, Big Tech, Big Pharma, Big Energy, and corporate media,” Spear said. “If Americans are ever going to escape the hammer of two major political parties and their corrupt supporters, now is the time. These are the two most unpopular candidates in living memory.”
Over the past week, Democrats have been buoyed by President Kennedy’s comments in a CNN interview that President Trump is a greater threat to democracy than Biden, and by comments from a New York-based Kennedy campaign consultant who said, “Biden is a no.” I paid attention to what he said. The campaign announced Wednesday that it had terminated its contract with consultant Rita Palma, citing “false reporting.”
The scale of the DNC’s anti-Kennedy campaign and whether the DNC will spend more resources on television advertising remains unclear. The outcome may depend on whether Mr. Kennedy can qualify to vote in six to eight battleground states that will determine the outcome of the election.
Deep red Utah is the only state in which Mr. Kennedy is officially eligible to run as an independent in the 2024 election, but the Kennedy campaign has touted that it has enough signatures in several other states. ing. Laws governing eligibility to run for president vary by state, and a team of lawyers hired by the DNC will scrutinize Kennedy’s efforts.
“We’re going to make sure Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is playing by the rules,” Corridoni said.
In addition to the DNC, several members of the Kennedy family have also expressed alarm about their relative’s bid. To show support for Biden, dozens of members of the late John F. Kennedy’s family visited the White House to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day last month, but Robert F. Kennedy was conspicuously absent.
Mr. Kennedy has garnered attention in 2024 election polls, in part because of the huge number of voters known as “double haters” who dislike Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump. Opinion polls have found that double haters make up 15% to 20% of voters.
A poll conducted by USA TODAY and Suffolk University in March found that 44% of double haters now support a variety of third-party candidates, led by Kennedy, who drew support from 21% of voters. There was found. The poll showed Trump leading Biden among double haters, 25% to 18%. Mr. Stein was supported by 7% of double haters, and Mr. West was supported by 6%.
However, Tamas, an expert on third-party politics in the United States, said there are independent and third-party candidates that are gaining support, most notably Ross Perot, who won 19% of the national vote in 1992. , said they tend to tap into the dissatisfaction of a bloc of voters who feel this way. Underrated. They often focus on a single theme. For Perot, it was economic populism.
Mr. Tamas questioned whether Mr. Kennedy’s candidacy had the right ingredients to get off the ground, given the hodgepodge of issues he would discuss.
At the same time, Kennedy has touted his environmentalist credentials to appeal to left-leaning voters, for example by questioning medical experts about vaccines and the coronavirus while promising to “close our borders to illegal immigration.” ing.
“He hasn’t defined himself, so maybe the Democrats and Trump will do a better job of defining him,” Tamas said, arguing that Kennedy is probably not as big of a threat as polls suggest. .
“But, and this is a huge thing, since 2000, these elections have been so close that maybe just a 1% or 2% change in votes could flip an election,” Tamas said. said.
X Contact Joey Garrison at @joeygarrison.
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