RFK Jr. Says He Won’t Be a Spoiler. Is Anyone Buying It?

CNN One Thing

May 12, 2024

19 mins

Earlier this month, independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. called on President Joe Biden to drop out of the race, insisting he is the only one who can beat former President Donald Trump. Despite running well behind Biden in the polls, some experts believe he will pull enough support from both candidates to impact the election. In this episode, we explore Kennedy’s controversial candidacy and how voters, Biden and Trump are responding to it. 

Guest: Aaron Pellish, CNN Campaign Reporter

David Rind 

President Joe Biden does not give a lot of one on one interviews. 

Erin Burnett 

Mr. president, thank you so much for being with me. 

President Joe Biden 

Thanks for having me. 

David Rind 

Which is why it was such a big deal when he sat down with CNN's Erin Burnett in Wisconsin earlier this week. 

Erin Burnett 

Consumer confidence, maybe no surprise, is near a two year low with less than six months to go to Election Day. Are you worried that you're running out of time to turn that around? 

President Joe Biden 

We've already turn around. Look, you look at the Michigan survey for 65% of American people think they're in good shape economically. They think the nation is not in good shape there personally good shape. The polling data has been wrong all along. 

David Rind 

Not only did he take credit for an economic turnaround, he made big news on the U.S. response to Israel's war in Gaza and hit former President Donald Trump over his threats to democracy. Of course, every interview and headline about the candidates from here on out will be closely watched as people really start to pay attention to the election. That goes for third party candidates, too. 

Jessica Dean 

A startling statement from Robert F Kennedy Jr has come to light. He said doctors found an abnormality on his brain scans in 2010 that was, quote, caused by a worm that got into my brain and ate a portion of it and then died. The quote is from new reporting by the New York Times. 

Brianna Keilar 

He was describing experiencing severe memory loss and mental fogginess a couple of years before that. He says that he's fully recovered from the parasite and that he has no after effects. 

David Rind 

Now, while that particular headline was, well, interesting to say the least, it did make me realize it seems like RFK Jr is going to play a role in November's election. But the question is, what exactly is it? My guest this week is CNN's Aaron Parrish. We're going to talk about RFK spoiler chances and his unusual approach to getting on the ballot in all 50 states. From CNN, this is One Thing I'm David Rind. 

David Rind 

Aaron, your job at CNN is what? 

Aaron Pellish 

Yes, I'm a campaign embed. There's six of us at CNN. We crisscrossed the country following candidates going to rallies. And the way they set it up is they have each of us covering a handful of candidates or regions or issues. And and one of my my major candidate right now is, Robert F Kennedy Jr. 

David Rind 

Yeah. And this is the reason I wanted to have you on the show, because we're less than six months out from Election Day. And I know people know plenty about President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump. Most people would probably say they know too much, but I think people know a lot less about RFK Jr. So what should we know about him? 

Aaron Pellish 

'Yeah, you're right. I think the thing that most people know about him, if they know anything about him, is his name, his lineage. You know, he's the son of a former attorney general, former senator, former Democratic presidential candidate. He's the nephew of a former president, as other uncle was also a senator, Ted Kennedy. But, you know, the other thing, I think if you're familiar with him at all, if you've, you know, found anything about him, you might know him as an environmentalist. He was environmental activist and a lawyer for for groups advocating for clean water. He helped clean up the Hudson River, you know, during the mid 2000. But, around that time, also, he started to dip into the area where people now most famously recognize him as, as an anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist. 

Brian Todd 

Kennedy has baselessly called Covid vaccines unsafe. Today, he made this claim. 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. 

I have never told the public avoid vaccination. 

Brian Todd 

But CNN fact checker Daniel Dale points out he did claim in a 2021 podcast to have told people just that. I see somebody on a hiking trail with a carrying a little baby and I don't know, I kind of knew. 

Aaron Pellish 

He was one of the first and most prominent people criticizing Trump's handling of the Covid pandemic and then ultimately, Biden's handling of the pandemic. 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. 

Even in Hitler's Germany, you could you could cross the Alps to Switzerland, you can hide in an attic like Anne Frank did his platforms. 

Aaron Pellish 

Many disproven conspiracy theories about vaccines. He was very, very critical of, vaccine mandates and locking down businesses. 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. 

The mechanisms are put in place. I will make it. None of us can run and not ask and hide. 

Aaron Pellish 

And that ultimately led to his Instagram account being suspended in 2021 for what Instagram said was violating their policies against misinformation about Covid and vaccines. 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. 

I come here today to declare our independence from the tyranny of corruption, which robs us of affordable lives. 

Aaron Pellish 

So going off to sort of rise in popularity he got from people being newly exposed to him in the wake of the pandemic, he decided to run for president. And he his family is all Democrats. He's been a Democrat his entire life. And so naturally, he joined the Democratic primary challenge, Joe Biden. 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. 

To do that, I must first declare my own independence, independence from the Democratic Party. 

Aaron Pellish 

And then in October, he decided to abandon the Democratic primary and run as an independent. And that's been probably the major inflection point of his campaign so far. 

David Rind 

Yeah. So talk me through that decision to run as a third party candidate, an alternative to Biden and Trump. Obviously, he wasn't going to beat Biden in the Democratic primary, but does he actually think he can win as a third party candidate? 

Aaron Pellish 

Yeah, I think that's a fair question. He's polling against Biden and Trump in three way races or in open five way races, usually around the low to mid teens in most national polls, well behind both Biden and Trump. Yeah. You know, a third party candidate hasn't won a presidential election since before the Civil War. And it's natural to, I think, ask questions about, you know, the his path to victory. But he feels like he can be Biden and Trump. He's, you know, making the case pretty strongly that, you know, Biden and Trump are creatures of the same two party political system that enables Partizan gridlock at Washington. 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. 

We know what President Trump and President Biden are going to do if they win this election. They're they're going to do exactly what they did before. 

Aaron Pellish 

He you know, we'll often use this line in speeches where he'll say, if you want more of the same, you should vote for Biden, or you should vote for Trump. And then he'll ask the crowd, do you want more of the same? It's a call and response. They'll go. 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. 

No, I didn't think so. 

Aaron Pellish 

And then he goes, don't you want something different? 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. 

Does anybody here want a complete change? 

Aaron Pellish 

So he's making this case that, you know, he's an outsider. And Biden and Trump are these, you know, like products of. A system that feels like it is performing. 

David Rind 

And we've heard about these double haters, right? They don't want to vote for either Biden or Trump, but those are the two main options they have. And I guess from RFK this perspective, he offers an alternative of some sort. 

Aaron Pellish 

Yeah. And that alternative is, it's hard to kind of easily map whether that's an alternative for Biden voters who are dissatisfied with Biden's record or with people who voted for Trump or are dissatisfied with Trump's legal troubles and his general conduct. One of the issues that he has this sort of confusing position on is how he's talked about January 6th. 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. 

I mean, listen, I can make the argument that President Biden is a much worse threat to democracy. 

Aaron Pellish 

And the he didn't interview with CNN last month with Erin Burnett, where he argued that President Biden is a bigger threat to democracy than Trump. 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. 

Ever tried to send. What president in history, as ever, tried to censor political opponents? What president has weaponized, you know what? 

Aaron Pellish 

My father. And he acknowledged that Trump's effort to overthrow the 2020 presidential election was wrong. But he continued to make this argument that Biden was a bigger threat, pointing to the fact that he was banned from social media and other people were banned from social media during his administration. 

Erin Burnett 

Well, Trump of course has said that he would do that. And we're seeing it. He has said that he would do that. 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. 

Of course, and that is reprehensible. 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. 

And he is the only president who's tried to overthrow the results of an election. 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. 

Well, you know, let me let me just say something about I'm not going to defend President Trump on that. And it was appalling. And there's many things that President Trump has done that that are appalling. 

Aaron Pellish 

There's a big segment of the population from voters that I've talked to on the Republican side, voters who attend Kennedy rallies, who see the weaponization of government as a serious issue. And I think you see that reflected in the statement that Kennedy put out on January 6th, shortly after this Erin Burnett interview, where he again condemned people who committed crimes at the Capitol on that day, but expressed real concern about the weaponization of government against people who attended the rally that day. And I think he's trying to speak to those people who who are distrustful of the government's response to that in its prosecutions of January 6th protesters. But I think there's real concerns from other voters about the fact that it sounds like he might be downplaying what happened on that day. 

Kerry Kennedy 

My name is Kerry Kennedy, and I am the seventh child of Robert and Ethel Kennedy. 

Aaron Pellish 

But I think you can also see the impact he's having on the race and how he's affecting both candidates. By the way, Biden and Biden allies are responding. So you saw Biden welcome the endorsement of Kennedy's family members. 

Kerry Kennedy 

We want to make crystal clear our feeling that the best way forward for America is to reelect Joe Biden and Kamala Harris to four more years. 

David Rind 

Oh, wow. His own family doesn't want him to run. 

Aaron Pellish 

Exactly. And they. They're calling him a spoiler for Trump. There's a lot of. And that's pretty pretty explicitly about the fear and the risk that endorsing Kennedy could hurt Biden and therefore. Build a pathway for Trump. 

Former President Donald Trump 

R.F.K is a Democrat plant a radical left liberal who's been put in place in order to help Crooked Joe Biden, the worst president in the history of the United States, get reelected. A lot of people think. 

Aaron Pellish 

Then Trump has also sort of echo the similar idea and a lot of truth. Social posts. He's called a vote for Kennedy a wasted vote. He's propped up the idea that Kennedy is a spoiler for Biden. He's trying to paint him as a liberal to discourage some of his supporters who might be curious about Kennedy to stay away from him. And a lot of people will remember 2016. The impact that third party candidates like Jill Stein or Gary Johnson had in key battleground states, and a lot of Democrats specifically, I think, still harbor resentment towards Jill Stein's candidacy for pulling away support from Hillary Clinton that could have ultimately put her over the edge in some of those states. 

David Rind 

Like, it doesn't have to be a Ross Perot level of support to sway which way this thing goes. 

Aaron Pellish 

The race is close enough right now where it doesn't have to be anywhere near a Ross Perot level of support. It could be something significantly less than where Kennedy is polling right now for it to have a huge impact on the race. 

David Rind 

So with all that in mind, can you paint the picture for me of a hypothetical RFK Jr voter? Like you've spoken to a lot of people out on the trail. What did they tell you they like about him? 

Aaron Pellish 

So I think it's important to say that, you know, with every voting coalition of a certain size, there are factions and some factions. But I think what a lot of RFK voters share is a resentment towards government, a frustration with government, frustration with the two party system and the way Washington works. And then they seems principled and authentic and and speaking to the issues that matter to them. You know, I think there's a couple of conversations I had recently with voters that the jump out. 

Aaron Pellish 

And where are you from? 

Rich Costa 

Farmingville. 

Aaron Pellish 

Farmingville, New York. 

Rich Costa 

Yeah. 

Aaron Pellish 

I was on Long Island for a Kennedy rally last month and talk to this one guy. His name is, Rich Costa. 

Speaker 7 

Biden is senile. 

Okay, Great. 

Rich Costa 

I watched Trump be a jackass my entire life. 

Aaron Pellish 

Okay. but you're from, uh, your local. You grew up in New York, so you've seen it. you've seen the whole deal. Fair enough. 

Aaron Pellish 

He's going for Democrats in the past. Voted for Clinton in 2016. He didn't vote in 2020. And I asked him, what about Kennedy's message? Spoke to him. 

Rich Costa 

Really? It's not about the message. It's how I feel about a person. If I feel like they're telling the truth, then I usually go with that person. I believe that, a lot of these guys are puppets and that the system is, you know, just the tribal, warfare against each other. So I want somebody who I think is telling the truth. 

Aaron Pellish 

And, you know, that sentiment was pretty succinctly evoked in that quote, but it's something that I hear when I talk to people at his rallies all the time. 

Aaron Pellish 

Are you concerned at all about kennedy is a path to victory and to becoming president or his, ability? He's on the ballot in all the states. He's not going as high as him. Is that like something that factors into your decision? 

Donielle Pliss 

Oh, look I'm not a rich person. I can not buy my influence. All, I can,all I can offer is my vote. I value it very highly. My vote is never wasted. And that's that's my take on it. 

David Rind 

And I guess finally. Will he even be on the ballot in every state? Because you obviously can't win a race if you're not on the ballot, right? 

Aaron Pellish 

Yeah. So Kennedy says he's going to be on the ballot in every state by July. It's, a pretty ambitious goal. He's going to be having to gather signatures in, you know, 40 some odd states, but he's doing it in a lot of different ways. 

Eva McKend 

In Iowa, Kennedy attempted to qualify for the ballot in a single day by holding a convention with 500 eligible voters from across the state. 

Aaron Pellish 

He's using a lot of volunteers. He's using paid, circulators. He's reaching out to minor parties in different states. 

Eva McKend 

In some states where it is easier to use a new political party to get on the ballot. Kennedy has formed the We the People Party. 

Aaron Pellish 

But that kind of puts him in some company with some strange people. You know, he partnered with the American Independent Party in California, which is the former party of George Wallace, the segregationist, governor of Alabama. He, partnered with the Natural Law Party in Michigan to get on the ballot in Michigan, which is a party that was founded promoting, among other things, the power of transcendental Meditation. So it's all in the service of this, this larger mission on his part, to get on the ballot. And and he's making progress and they're they're expressing a lot of optimism. The ballot access effort. If you talk to volunteers, you talk to staff. They see it as the first domino that has to fall before they can sort of demonstrate viability with voters. Because, like you said, if you guys aren't on the ballot, you can't win. And I think voters can kind of smell that too. That like, if he's not everywhere, then he's not a legitimate candidate. 

David Rind 

Well, Aaron, thank you very much. Appreciate it. 

Aaron Pellish 

Yeah. Thanks, David. 

David Rind 

One thing is a production of CNN audio. This episode was produced by Paola Ortiz and me, David Rind. Our senior producer is Faiz Jamil. Our supervising producer is Greg Peppers. Matt Dempsey is our production manager. Dan Dzula is our technical director. And Steve Lickteig is the executive producer of CNN Audio. We get support from Haley Thomas, Alex Manasseri, Robert Mathers, John Dianora, Leni Steinhart, Jamus Andrest, Nichole Pesaru, and Lisa Namerow. Special thanks to Katie Hinman. We'll be back next week. I will talk to you then.