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By Frank Bruni
Mr. Bruni is a contributing Opinion writer who was on the staff of The Times for more than 25 years.
The hubris. The narcissism. The convenient and fraudulent anti-elitism. The out-of-his-mind theories presented as out-of-the-box thinking.
Many of us have noted how these fetching traits and tics connect Donald Trump and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is in some ways Trump with better manners, fewer lawyers and discernible pecs.
But we underplay another commonality. Like Trump when he made his 2016 presidential bid, Kennedy has zero experience — none at all — in elected office, a fact made comically clear in his interview last summer with the New Yorker editor David Remnick, who did focus on Kennedy’s lack of preparation for the presidency, asking the candidate about his credentials.
“I’ve been around government and studying government since I was a little boy,” Kennedy said, not so subtly stressing his bloodline — he’s a septuagenarian nepo baby — and casting proximity as seasoning. It’s not. I’ve been “around” many physicians in my life. You do not want me performing your appendectomy.
Kennedy added that he has attended most of the Democratic Party’s conventions since 1960, that he has visited every country in Latin America and that he “began writing about foreign policy” as a teenager. I began writing about movies as an adolescent. You do not want me directing another “Manchurian Candidate” remake.
I bring this up for three reasons. One, Kennedy exemplifies the degree to which family connections can act as distraction and shield, protecting someone from a kind of scrutiny that a person without a storied surname would receive. Two, his announcement of his running mate last week underscored his utterly cavalier attitude about experience. Three, he’s not going away. Recent developments, including that running-mate announcement, are reminders that he really could be a spoiler in this election.
Although Kennedy is officially on the 2024 ballot only in Utah so far, his campaign this week said that he’d collected enough signatures to qualify for the ballot in four additional states — including, God help me, my home state, North Carolina, which President Biden’s re-election campaign has been eyeing with at least a sliver of hope. Kennedy’s naming of a running mate makes him potentially eligible for the ballot in states that require a two-person ticket, and that running mate — the fantastically wealthy tech entrepreneur Nicole Shanahan — promises to be the kind of cash spigot and fund-raiser that’s hugely helpful to signature collection.
Her riches are her credential, though perhaps — I don’t know — she wrote a paper about vice presidents in the fifth grade. Defending her in an interview with Chris Cuomo on NewsNation, Kennedy led with this: “I’m guessing she probably has a higher I.Q. than almost anybody who I’ve seen in public life today.”
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