Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a scion of one of the country’s most famous Democratic families, was embraced Monday by a slew of conservative figures eagerly promoting his long-term primary challenge to President Biden.
Mr. Kennedy engaged in an online audio chat on Twitter with the platform operators for more than two hours Increasingly right-leaning CEO Elon Musk. They exchanged friendly back-and-forths with the likes of Tulsi Gabbard, the former Democratic congresswoman-turned-right-wing commentator; a top donor to Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida; And a professional surfer who became a prominent voice raising doubts about coronavirus vaccines.
Mr Kennedy who announced his 2024 presidential campaign in April he is himself a leading vaccine skeptic, and has encouraged other conspiracy theories. Nonetheless, he did it consistently fluctuated around 20 percent in the vote on the Democratic primary, which the party otherwise ceded to Mr. Biden.
On Monday he looked like a candidate far more comfortable in the EU The Republican presidential campaign is growing like mushrooms.
He said he plans to travel to the Mexican border this week to “try to formulate policies that seal the border permanently,” urged the federal government to look at the war in Ukraine from the Russians’ perspective, and said drugs are to blame Increase in mass shootings in America.
“Before the introduction of Prozac, almost none of these events happened in our country and we’ve never seen them in human history where people walked into a classroom full of kids or strangers and started shooting people,” Kennedy said. who found that both his father and uncle were killed by guns.
Mr. Kennedy said he now has “about 50 people” working on his campaign. Unlike Marianne Williamson, Mr. Biden’s other announced Democratic challenger, he does not appear to want to aim to appeal to Democrats who are ideologically opposed to the moderate president or otherwise have concerns about reappointing him. Instead, he has used his campaign platform – and his famous name – to spread misinformation and ideas that have little resonance within his party.
Asked during discussion by David Sacks, a top DeSantis donor Mr Kennedy, who is also close to Mr Musk on “what happened to the Democratic Party,” spent nine straight minutes attacking Mr Biden as a warmonger and claiming that her party is under the control of the pharmaceutical industry.
“I think the Democratic Party became the war party,” Kennedy said. “I attribute that directly to President Biden.” He added, “He has always been a proponent of a very belligerent, combative and aggressive foreign policy and believes that violence is a legitimate political tool to achieve America’s goals abroad.”
The Democratic National Committee and Mr. Biden’s campaign declined to comment on Mr. Kennedy.
The event, which Twitter said had more than 60,000 listeners at its peak, at times felt like Mr Kennedy was interviewing Mr Musk about his leadership of Twitter, a platform that has lost more than half of its advertising revenue since The billionaire acquired it in October. At the start of the event, the presidential candidate spent more than 30 minutes questioning the tech mogul about the release the so-called Twitter filesself-driving cars and artificial intelligence.
“These are really interesting topics for people, but I think a large segment of the public would like to hear about your presidential bid,” Mr Musk told Mr Kennedy.
Mr. Kennedy, 69, is a longtime reinforcer and propagator of unfounded theories, beginning nearly two decades ago with his skepticism about the outcome of the 2004 presidential election as well as common vaccinations for children. His audience for such misinformation skyrocketed during the coronavirus pandemic.
On Monday, Mr. Kennedy repeated a number of false statements, including:
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He said that after the Affordable Care Act of 2010, “Democrats got more money from the pharmaceutical industry than Republicans.” analysis by STAT News found that political action committees linked to drug companies have given more money to Republicans than to Democrats in 14 out of 16 election years since 1990.
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He claimed without evidence that “Covid is clearly a bioweapons problem.” American intelligence agencies do I don’t think there is any evidence indicating that this is the case.
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And since he blamed the use of psychotropic drugs for the increase in gun violence in the United States, he claimed that the gun ownership rate in the US was similar to that in Switzerland. The United States had the highest civilian gun ownership rate in the world, with an estimated 120.5 firearms per 100 people. according to the latest International Small Arms Survey. That was more than double the rate of the second-highest country, Yemen, at 52.8 and much higher than Switzerland’s 27.6.
