The conventional wisdom for a solid year had been that Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s vanity campaign for president would be a spoiler, helping Donald Trump defeat President Joe Biden in November.
But recent polling reframed that insight, suggesting that Kennedy is as much – if not more – of a threat to Trump than to Biden.
Then there is Kennedy's view, which he shared Wednesday – Biden is the real spoiler in the race and should drop out so that Kennedy can go head-to-head with Trump.
Earth to RFK Jr.: This view has some serious flaws.
Biden has way more money than Kennedy (or Trump) to fund his campaign. He's an incumbent president who won the electoral college in 2020 by defeating Trump. And he is polling much, much stronger than Kennedy, even as he trails or ties with Trump.
Just imagine the absurd sense of entitlement it takes for Kennedy to see all those factors and then suggest that an incumbent president should get out of his way.
Kennedy on Wednesday was hawking a delusional proposal for Biden that he pitched as a "No Spoilers Pledge" during a speech in Brooklyn, where he took no questions from the stage
Here's how he said things should work: Biden and Kennedy would co-fund a 50-state poll in mid-October of at least 30,000 likely voters, surveying the race in one-to-one match-ups, Biden versus Trump and Kennedy versus Trump. The candidate who performs better against Trump stays in the race while the other guy drops out.
Kennedy justified this by touting a 50-state poll conducted last month by John Zogby Strategies that asked 26,408 likely voters about the race for president and found Biden losing to Trump in a rematch and Kennedy beating them both in head-to-head races.
For reference, an average of polls compiled from October to April by RealClearPolitics shows Trump leading Biden in a three-way race, 41.7% to 36.3%, with Kennedy far behind at 10.7%.
Kennedy considers his new poll superior. Politicians always feel that way about polls that please them.
Kennedy and his campaign manager, daughter-in-law Amaryllis Kennedy, also repeatedly referenced a pledge they claimed Biden made during the 2020 election to only serve one term as president.
There were rumblings about that in 2019, suggesting Biden was open to the idea. But Biden publicly shot that down more than once, long before the 2020 voting started.
Trump's hush money trial:Trump is likely to violate his gag order again. Jail him if he does.
You can't hold a guy to a pledge you can't prove he ever made.
Biden did tell supporters in December that "If Trump wasn’t running I’m not sure I’d be running." But Trump is going to be the Republican nominee. Biden is very much in this race.
Kennedy used his event Wednesday to cast Biden and Trump as similar politicians, even while citing key differences between them about abortion, guns, border security and transgender issues. He shrugged those off as "culture war issues" that are not as "existential" as the dissatisfaction Americans feel with the way the country is run.
Push pause there.
Abortion has been a major motivating factor for Democratic voters since the U.S. Supreme Court undid nearly five decades of constitutional protections for the medical procedure in June 2022. But to Kennedy, who started his campaign in April 2023 as a Democrat before going independent in October, abortion is a throw-away line in a long speech about spoilers.
There is one way Biden and Trump are similar. They both see Kennedy as a spoiler.
Biden and the Democratic National Committee have been trying to push him to the margins for months. The DNC parked a mobile billboard outside of his event Wednesday noting that one of Trump's biggest donors, conservative billionaire Timothy Mellon, gave $20 million to a super PAC backing Kennedy.
Trump had been friendlier to Kennedy, praising him last year as a "common sense guy." Those days are over. Trump, on his social media site Truth Social Friday, accused Kennedy of being a Democratic Party "plant" on the ballot to help Biden win in November.
What changed? A national NBC poll released last week showed Trump leading Biden by 2% in a head-to-head race but losing to Biden by 2% when other candidates like Kennedy, Jill Stein of the Green Party and independent Cornel West are on the ballot.
RFK Jr.'s VP:Kennedy's VP pick shows his presidential bid for what it is – a vanity project all about him
A Florida Atlantic University Poll released Tuesday suggested that Biden benefits from Kennedy being on the ballot as the former Democrat saps support from Trump.
Kennedy wrapped up his Wednesday pitch by presenting himself as the only viable alternative to another four years with Trump in the White House.
It takes all kinds of ego to run for president. But a grip on reality helps too. What we know from all the information available is that Kennedy will play spoiler in November. We don't know yet if that helps or hurts Biden or Trump.
But Kennedy's conception that he would be the inevitable victor if Biden would step aside defies logic and should raise serious questions for voters about how this guy thinks of himself and the race.
Follow USA TODAY elections columnist Chris Brennan on X, formerly known as Twitter: @ByChrisBrennan
RFK Jr.'s delusional proposal is for Biden to drop out. It's comical.
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02.05.2024
The conventional wisdom for a solid year had been that Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s vanity campaign for president would be a spoiler, helping Donald Trump defeat President Joe Biden in November.
But recent polling reframed that insight, suggesting that Kennedy is as much – if not more – of a threat to Trump than to Biden.
Then there is Kennedy's view, which he shared Wednesday – Biden is the real spoiler in the race and should drop out so that Kennedy can go head-to-head with Trump.
Earth to RFK Jr.: This view has some serious flaws.
Biden has way more money than Kennedy (or Trump) to fund his campaign. He's an incumbent president who won the electoral college in 2020 by defeating Trump. And he is polling much, much stronger than Kennedy, even as he trails or ties with Trump.
Just imagine the absurd sense of entitlement it takes for Kennedy to see all those factors and then suggest that an incumbent president should get out of his way.
Kennedy on Wednesday was hawking a delusional proposal for Biden that he pitched as a "No Spoilers Pledge" during a speech in Brooklyn, where he took no questions from the stage
Here's how he said things should work: Biden and Kennedy would co-fund a 50-state poll in mid-October of at least 30,000 likely voters, surveying the race in one-to-one match-ups, Biden versus Trump and Kennedy........
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