Robert F. Kennedy Jr. suspended his independent campaign for president on Friday and endorsed Donald Trump, a late-stage shakeup of the presidential race that could give the former president a modest boost from Kennedy’s supporters.
Kennedy said his internal polls had shown that his presence in the race would hurt Trump and help Democratic nominee Kamala Harris, though recent public polls don’t provide a clear indication that he is having an outsize impact on support for either major-party candidate.
Kennedy cited free speech, the war in Ukraine and a war on the children as among the reasons he would try to remove his name from the ballot in battleground states.
However, he made clear that he wasn’t formally ending his bid and said his supporters could continue to back him in the majority of states where they are unlikely to sway the outcome. Kennedy took steps to withdraw his candidacy in at least two states late this week, Arizona and Pennsylvania, but in the battlegrounds of Michigan, Nevada and Wisconsin, election officials said it’s too late for him to take his name off the ballot even if he wants to do so.
Kennedy said his actions followed conversations with Trump over the past few weeks. He cast their alliance as a “unity party”, an arrangement that would “allow us to disagree publicly and privately and seriously”.
Hours after Kennedy made his announcement in Phoenix, Trump was to hold a rally in neighboring Glendale. Trump’s campaign teased that he would be joined by a special guest, though neither campaign responded to messages about whether Kennedy would be that guest.
A year ago, some would have thought it inconceivable that a member of arguably the most storied family in Democratic politics would work with Trump to keep a Democrat out of the White House. Even in recent months, Kennedy has accused Trump of betraying his followers, while Trump has criticised Kennedy as the most radical Left candidate in the race.
Five of Kennedy’s family members issued a statement on Friday calling his support for Trump a sad ending to a sad story.
“We want an America filled with hope and bound together by a shared vision of a brighter future, a future defined by individual freedom, economic promise and national pride,” read the statement, which his sister Kerry Kennedy posted on X. “We believe in Harris and Walz. Our brother Bobby’s decision to endorse Trump today is a betrayal of the values that our father and our family hold most dear.”
Kennedy Jr., the son of the late Attorney General and Sen. Robert Kennedy and the nephew of President John F. Kennedy, acknowledged his decision had caused tension with his immediate family. He is married to actress Cheryl Hines.
“This decision is agonising for me because of the difficulties it causes my wife and my children and my friends,” Kennedy said. “But I have the certainty that this is what I’m meant to do. And that certainty gives me internal peace, even in storms.”
The Kennedy and Trump campaigns have ramped up their compliments of each other and engaged in behind-the-scenes discussions in recent weeks, according to those familiar with the efforts. Both campaigns have spent months accusing Democrats of weaponising the legal system for their own benefit. And both have hinted publicly that they could be open to joining forces, with the shared goal of limiting Harris’s chances.
Last month, during the Republican National Convention, Kennedy’s son posted and then quickly deleted a video showing a phone call between Kennedy and Trump, in which the former president appeared to try to talk Kennedy into siding with him.
Trump told CNN on Tuesday that he would love an endorsement from Kennedy, whom he called a brilliant guy. He also said he would certainly be open to Kennedy playing a role in his administration if Kennedy dropped out and endorsed him.
Kennedy’s running mate, Nicole Shanahan, also suggested on a podcast this week that his campaign might walk away right now and join forces with Trump. While she clarified that she is not personally in talks with Trump, she entertained the idea that Kennedy could join Trump’s administration as secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services.
Earlier Friday, Shanahan posted on X that she isn’t a Kamala Democrat or a Trump Republican.
