Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s vice presidential running mate says the pair is thinking about dropping out of the race to “join forces” with former President Donald Trump, the GOP presidential nominee. Guys, this news is YUGE. Like, landslide kind of big. Strangely, RFK has managed to pull in a lot of support for being independent. A lot of those who are loyal to him as a candidate would follow him in his support of Trump. Every little bit helps at this point, especially now that the Democratic Party nominee is Vice President Kamala Harris.
“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,” Nicole Shanahan, the independent candidate’s vice presidential pick, went on to say during an appearance on the “Impact Theory with Tom Bilyeu” podcast.
Then she revealed the second option.
“We walk away right now and join forces with Donald Trump … and we explain to our base why we’re making this decision,” Shanahan told the show host. She then said it wasn’t an easy decision for the two of them to make.
The NY Post is reporting:
Shanahan indicated that she would be more comfortable with Trump and his vice presidential pick, Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio), running the country than with Harris and Walz.
“If we are splitting hairs, I would say that I trust the future of this county more under the leadership of Trump and the [Peter] Thiels and the JD Vances than I do right now under Harris and the Reid Hoffmans,” she said, referencing GOP megadonor Thiel and Democratic megadonor Hoffman, who are both venture capitalists. A Fox News poll released last week showed Trump leading Harris by 1 point in a head-to-head matchup. The race, however, was tied when voters were given the option of picking third-party candidates. Kennedy received 6% support in the expanded poll, down from his 15% November 2023 high and his 10% backing in July.
What also concerns Shanahan is that more voters from Trump’s neck-of-the-woods in a two-way race than Harris supporters did, with 9 percent to 7 percent respectively. The independent vice presidential candidate then said that as the Kennedy campaign comes to a fork in the road, she has been developing a “vision that goes beyond November,” pointing out that if RFK ends up staying in the race and gets more than 5 percent, it would mean that indie candidates in the future would be able to get automatic ballot access and have more access to public campaign financing.
“Technically, we could win,” Shanahan said during the conversation.
Trump attempted to get Kennedy to endorse him when they met at the Republican National Convention. The former president discussed the potential of giving Kennedy a cabinet position in his administration if he were to win in November.
“The Harris campaign reportedly rebuffed overtures to meet with Kennedy. The 70-year-old independent was reportedly willing to make a similar offer to the Harris campaign,” the New York Post reported.
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