(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Long-shot Kennedy suspends his quixotic campaign ... to join forces with Trump [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2024-08-24 The quixotic, shambolic presidential campaign of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has completed its death spiral. On Friday, in a court ruling and at a campaign announcement event in Phoenix, Ariz., Kennedy officially suspended his bid for the White House, and, as widely expected, endorsed former president Donald Trump, previously an adversary on the 2024 campaign trail. Kennedy’s announcement was in many ways anti-climactic. His running mate, California attorney Nicole Shanahan, spilled the beans on a next move for the Kennedy-Shanahan campaign on the Impact Theory With Tim Bilyeau podcast on August 20. Shanahan spoke with Bilyeau about plans for the foundering upstart campaign. “There’s two options that we’re looking at, and one is staying in, forming that new party, but we run the risk of a Kamala Harris and [Tim] Walz presidency because we draw votes from Trump,” said Shanahan. “[Or] we walk away right now and join forces with Donald Trump … and we explain to our base why we’re making this decision.” ◊ ◊ ◊ Kennedy ended speculation on Friday. “Many months ago, l promised the American people I would withdraw from the race if I became a spoiler,” he said after fulsome praise for his campaign staff and volunteers, and a catalog of grievances to rival Trump’s own. “In my heart, I no longer believe I have a realistic path to electoral victory in the face of this relentless, systematic censorship and media control.” Though the Democrat turned independent was reportedly on the ballot in about 20 states, the campaign was said to be hemorrhaging money and shedding staff. Despite Kennedy’s tidy way of shuttering his campaign, questions remain about the timing and the rationale for his action. If Kennedy had so much in common with Trump — enough to join forces with him now — what was the point of mounting his own campaign? For some, the RFK White House bid never had much of a raison d'être. Lis Smith, DNC communications adviser, told Politico: “From the beginning of this race, we’ve said that RFK Jr. is nothing more than a spoiler for Donald Trump, and we’re glad that his running mate is finally admitting it.” It’s very questionable whether tying up with Trump endows Kennedy with any leverage over Vice President Kamala Harris. The prevailing wisdom among 2024 campaign insiders is that Kennedy was already drawing votes from Trump, owing to how his policy proposals and overall perspective have more fully aligned with conservative thinking than with that of Democrats. So, since Kennedy was already pulling supporters from Trump, tying up with Trump only nets the Trump campaign an advantage if none of Kennedy’s supporters walk away now. And that’s not likely to happen. ◊ ◊ ◊ Why? Supporters of Kennedy, who launched his independent campaign for the White House in October 2023, always knew they had the option of going with Trump, who mounted his re-election bid in November 2022. But they chose to go with RFK instead. With that option now taken away because of Kennedy’s alliance with Trump, those Kennedy voters can be expected to walk — having been denied the option of voting for Kennedy, and already having made the decision not to vote for Trump. Does Kennedy really think those voters will suddenly fall in line behind Trump just because Kennedy did? Or because Trump may have promised Kennedy a Cabinet post? (Mitt Romney can no doubt enlighten Kennedy on how that could play out.) Those Kennedy supporters weren’t prepared to vote for RFK to be a Secretary of Anything, they were preparing to vote for a potential president. With that now off the table, those diehard Kennedy backers have nothing to hold on to. Kennedy ending his own campaign underscores the idea, right or wrong, that he wasn’t serious in the first place, but his true believers stayed to the end. The Kennedy campaign was the hill they were ready to die on ... until Kennedy blew up the hill. The candidate they supported didn’t think enough of his own campaign to hang around. Why should they? ◊ ◊ ◊ Larry Sharpe, a consultant for the super PAC supporting Kennedy, said in an interview with Politico that “the Kennedy campaign owns a chunk of American voters. I don’t know what that chunk is — he’s been as low as 5 percent, as high as 19,” he said. “So who knows what that percentage is, but any of that, whatever that number is, that will decide the election.” But Sharpe no doubt understands that Kennedy only “owned” that “chunk” if his campaign stayed intact. With Kennedy signing on with Trump, some hefty percentage of that chunk almost certainly evaporates, due to the exodus of disaffected voters unsure of what Kennedy ever stood for. Ramsey Reid, a Democratic party adviser, came to that conclusion in a Friday memo. “Once around 15 percent, RFK Jr.’s support has been in free fall — now under 5 percent — and he's not positioned to deliver any electoral benefit to Trump,” Reid wrote in the memo, excerpted Friday in The Washington Post. Kennedy’s gambit, hardly conclusive at this point to anyone but him, raises numerous questions. But for voters now suddenly without a candidate, some may be asking themselves, in a moment of reflection, just one: “What was it about Kamala Harris that I didn’t like, anyway?” [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/8/24/2265411/-Kennedy-the-long-shot-takes-a-parting-shot-as-he-suspends-a-quixotic-campaign?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=more_community&pm_medium=web Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/