BROOKLYN, N.Y. \u2014 Democrat turned independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. is firing back against repeated claims that he\u2019s a spoiler in the 2024 election rematch between President Biden and former President Donald Trump.<\/p>\n
Kennedy on Wednesday once again argued that he, rather than Biden, is the only candidate who can defeat Trump in November \u2014 and showcased a new internal poll conducted by his campaign to make his point \u2014 as he announced an unusual \u2018no-spoiler pledge.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u2018This is a no-spoiler pledge that we\u2019re announcing today. This is a pledge that I offer to take if President Biden also takes it,\u2019 Kennedy said at a news conference where the candidate took no questions from reporters.<\/p>\n
Kennedy said his pledge calls for him and Biden to \u2018agree to co-fund in October a 50-state poll with 30,000 or more likely voters. This is essentially, effectively, a zero margin of error, in October of 2024. The survey will test the results of a head-to-head race pitting President Biden versus President Trump and a second head-to-head race pitting me against President Trump.\u2019<\/p>\n
Kennedy emphasized that \u2018whoever performs weakest against President Trump in a two-man contest will drop out of the presidential race. This is a spoiler pledge.\u2019<\/p>\n
The longtime environmental activist and high-profile vaccine skeptic, who is the scion of the nation\u2019s most storied political dynasty, said he\u2019s \u2018happy to make the same pledge\u2019 with Trump. But he added that \u2018Trump is not a spoiler because he can actually win.\u2019<\/p>\n
The Biden campaign did not respond to Kennedy\u2019s proposal.<\/p>\n
But Democratic National Committee (DNC) spokesperson Matt Corridoni, in a statement to Fox News, charged that Kennedy \u2018is a spoiler \u2013 recruited by the MAGA GOP and propped by Trump\u2019s largest donor. His VEEP-like performance today does nothing to dispel that notion \u2013 it only reinforces how deeply unserious his campaign is.\u2019<\/p>\n
Corridoni is one of a handful of veteran communicators the DNC brought onboard earlier this year to target Kennedy and other third-party and independent candidates.<\/p>\n
In making his announcement, Kennedy and his campaign manager \u2014 daughter-in-law Amaryllis Fox Kennedy \u2014 spotlighted a campaign-issued internal poll of over 26,000 respondents from all 50 states that they used to make their point that Kennedy, rather than Biden, has the better shot of defeating Trump in a two-candidate showdown in November.<\/p>\n
\u2018The people who think I\u2019m spoiling it for Biden need to look at data,\u2019 Kennedy argued.<\/p>\n
Kennedy launched his campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination in April of last year, but in October the 70-year-old candidate switched to an independent run for the White House.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Biden campaign and the DNC have repeatedly slammed Kennedy as a potential spoiler whose supporters could hand Trump a presidential election victory in November.<\/p>\n
\u2018We are doing everything in our power to get President Biden and Vice President Harris re-elected. It\u2019s critical that we take seriously every possible obstacle to that goal,\u2019 Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. Austin Davis emphasized in a recent conference call with reporters. \u2018And let me be clear, that\u2019s exactly what Robert F. Kennedy is in this election. He\u2019s a spoiler.\u2019\u00a0<\/p>\n
Plenty of pundits and pollsters are making the case that Kennedy also could pose a similar problem for Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee.<\/p>\n
And as Kennedy has increased his appearances on conservative media the past couple of months, the former president and his campaign have increasingly characterized Kennedy, whose populism on some issues seems similar to Trump\u2019s, as a far-left politician.<\/p>\n
Trump this past weekend repeatedly went on his Truth Social site to blast Kennedy, charging he was a \u2018Democrat \u2018Plant\u2019\u2019 and \u2018far more LIBERAL than anyone running as a Democrat.\u2019 The former president argued that \u2018A Vote for Junior\u2019 would essentially be a WASTED PROTEST VOTE.\u2019<\/p>\n
Kennedy fired back, saying in a social media post, \u2018When frightened men take to social media they risk descending into vitriol, which makes them sound unhinged,\u2019 \u00a0<\/p>\n
And, he claimed, \u2018President Trump\u2019s rant against me is a barely coherent barrage of wild and inaccurate claims that should best be resolved in the American tradition of presidential debate.\u2019<\/p>\n
Kennedy\u2019s goal is to get on the ballot in all 50 states, which is a costly and time-consuming venture for independent candidates.<\/p>\n
Kennedy\u2019s campaign announced earlier this week he would be on the ballot in California, which has 54 electoral votes, the most of any state. Kennedy secured the nomination of the American Independent Party, a minor third party.<\/p>\n
Kennedy\u2019s also on the ballot as an independent in Utah and in Hawaii through a newly formed political party. Two weeks ago, Kennedy also made the ballot in Michigan, a crucial general election battleground state, courtesy of another third party.<\/p>\n
And his campaign said Kennedy has collected enough signatures to meet ballot access thresholds in the battlegrounds of North Carolina and Nevada, the swing state of New Hampshire, as well as Nebraska and Iowa.<\/p>\n\n
BROOKLYN, N.Y. \u2014 Democrat turned independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. is firing back against repeated claims that he\u2019s a spoiler in the 2024 election rematch between President Biden and former President Donald Trump. Kennedy on Wednesday once again argued that he, rather than Biden, is the only candidate who can defeat Trump in November <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":18640,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-18639","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-politics"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18639","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18639"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18639\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18640"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18639"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18639"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18639"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}