“I’m not an ideal presidential candidate for normal times,” Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told a packed ballroom at the Boston Park Plaza on Wednesday, April 19, 2023. “In normal circumstances, I would not do this, but these are not normal circumstances. I’m watching my country being stolen from me.”
The 69-year-old environmental lawyer was there to challenge President Joe Biden for the Democratic nomination for 2024. ABC News counted roughly 2,000 people in the room, and the speech ran for nearly two hours.
A Kennedy Democrat with a vaccine problem
Kennedy is the son of the slain senator and attorney general Robert F. Kennedy and the nephew of President John F. Kennedy. He introduced himself as a “Kennedy Democrat”. Dennis Kucinich, the former congressman, and Kucinich’s wife, the actress Cheryl Hines, introduced him on stage. His stated aim was to “end the corrupt merger of state and corporate power”, and he asked Americans to forget whether they were Republicans or Democrats.
He also founded Children’s Health Defense, which is known mainly for its anti-vaccine work. CBS News pointed out that he did not mention the group in Boston, or his own vaccine views, and that Facebook and Instagram have removed its accounts for spreading misinformation. NPR’s Shannon Bond said that, while he did not address vaccines directly, he talked about chronic illness, autism and “poisoning our children”, which she described as references to debunked claims he has promoted for years.
Much of what he did say attacked the pandemic response. He called lockdowns the biggest transfer of wealth in the country and said they did not work. He blamed Donald Trump too: “the worst thing that he did to this country, to our civil rights, to our economy, to the middle class in this country is lockdowns.” Kennedy also promised to end the “chronic disease epidemic as president”. And he joked that his family was not in the audience. Members of the Kennedy family have spoken out against his anti-vaccine advocacy, CBS noted.
Support from odd corners
The crowd was mixed. Rowan May, a 25-year-old Democrat, said he regretted voting for Biden in 2020. Diane McKamey, 62, a former Trump voter, said Kennedy “represents mainstream America” and had her vote. Patience Warnick, 61, whose daughter reacted badly to a round of vaccines as a child, said: “I’m here because I believe in health freedom.”
Attention also came from the right. Steve Bannon, a former Trump adviser, had urged Kennedy to run for months and said he could do better in a Republican primary than anyone except Ron DeSantis and Trump, according to ABC. The longtime Trump ally Roger Stone suggested Trump pick him as a running mate, NPR said.
The odds
CBS judged that Kennedy had little to no chance of unseating Biden and that his anti-vaccine stance clashes with most Democrats. He had filed a statement of candidacy with the Federal Election Commission in early April. Self-help author Marianne Williamson had entered the race on March 4. Biden had not yet formally said he was running again. Asked about Kennedy, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre cited the Hatch Act, the law limiting political activity by federal employees, and declined to comment.
Sources
- Robert F. Kennedy Jr. formally announces bid for president (CBS News)
- Robert F. Kennedy Jr. launches long shot presidential bid as a Democrat (ABC News)
- Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announces he's running for president (NPR, All Things Considered)
