A member of the longtime Democrat Kennedy family, RFK Jr. has been a familiar name in politics for over 40 years. Through his work in environmental policy, corporate corruption, and social rights, RFK Jr. has been a major figure within the democratic party. Recently however, RFK Jr. made national headlines for his endorsement of Republican party nominee Donald Trump.
During the 2024 Democratic primaries, RFK Jr. initially ran as a forefront longshot candidate for the party, but soon fell out of the race. While there are a variety of reasons as to why he did fall out of the running, RFK attributed most of his falling out with the fact that he was blocked by his own party to be placed on voting ballots. “It’s pretty clear that the DNC does not want a primary… Essentially, they are fixing the process the process so that it makes it almost impossible to have a democracy function. They are effectively disenfranchising the Democratic voters from having any choice in who becomes president, the Democratic nominee,” Kennedy said.
In response, RFK Jr. started his own party We the People, which aims to directly support the middle class of America above all else. His policies, which can be found here, are a mix between Democrat stances on the environment and corporate corruption and Republican stances on immigration and foreign policy. However, seeing that he had “no realistic path to an electoral victory,” Kennedy dropped out and on August 23, appeared at a Trump rally to endorse the Republican nominee, citing how he agreed with Trump on the issues of free speech, the war in Ukraine, and the war on our children. Kennedy’s monumental decision to endorse Trump, a man who has attacked the Kennedy name, drew great criticism from his own family and the democratic party as a whole. “Our brother Bobby’s decision to endorse Trump today is a betrayal of the values that our father and family hold most dear. It is a sad ending to a sad story,” five other Kennedys said in response.
Now, RFK Jr. is trying to remove his hard-fought name off voting ballots to encourage his supporters to vote for Trump. More specifically, RFK Jr. is attempting to remove his name off swing state ballots, while staying on democrat state ballots in order to demonstrate his allegiance with Trump. However, states are now blocking this move, citing that it is too late for such a drastic action within the election. North Carolina, for example, has refused RFK’s attempts at swinging the election citing that it “would not be practical to reprint ballots that have already been printed and meet the state law deadline to start absentee voting”. In response, Kennedy is now attempting to sue the state for breaking free speech and election laws. “NCSBE (the North Carolina State Board of Elections) ignored controlling statues and instead elected to insert their own indeterminate, subjective ‘practicality’ standard in denying his request,” Kennedy’s lawyers said.
In a similar vein, Democrat Tulsi Gabbard, who ran against Kamala Harris in 2019 also had a shock endorsement of President Trump. “I am proud to stand here before you today, whether you’re a Democrat, a Republican, or an Independent. If you love our country, as I do, if you cherish peace and freedom as we do, I invite you to join me in doing all that we can to save our country and elect President Donald J. Trump and send him back to the White House to do the tough work of saving our country and serving the people,” Gabbard said.
