Robert F. Kennedy Jr’s independent run will hurt the Republican party most
3 November 2023 •
Less than a month into his independent run for the presidency, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.shows surprising strength in political polling. That may be a warning sign of the pressure the US political system is under – and the deep frustration of the American electorate.
Where Kennedy stands in the polls remains somewhat unclear. A Susquehanna poll gives him 6 per cent in a three-way race with President Joe Biden and former president Donald Trump. Most other outlets place him in the double digits. A USA Today poll put him at 13 per cent. Quinnipiac had him at 22 per cent, which is not that far from Biden at 39 per cent and Trump at 36 per cent.
These polling numbers suggest the alienation a Trump-Biden rematch would provoke in many voters. Public-opinion aggregators show the two men with near-identical unpopularity: around 40 per cent approval rating, with a disapproval rating in the mid-50s. Numerous polls have indicated that many voters would like to pull the lever for someone other than Trump or Biden.
A Biden-allied pollster even coined the term of a “No-No voter” – someone who dislikes both Trump and Biden – to describe a crucial, disappointed swing bloc. No-No voters helped tip the scales in 2016, and they might play a similar role in 2024. The unpopularity of both men has not necessarily deterred the establishments of either party. Democratic powerbrokers have almost uniformly stood by Biden, and many key Republican officials have backed Trump – with some even calling for an end to the Republican primary.
At once an outsider and a scion of political royalty, Kennedy may appeal to voters dissatisfied with a Biden-Trump status quo. Many Trump allies boosted Kennedy during his failed primary challenge to Biden earlier this year, but this effort may have boomeranged now that Kennedy has gone independent. Electoral polling in the United States has grown harder in recent years, so any data should be taken with a grain of salt. Still, multiple polls have shown that Kennedy may draw more from Trump’s pool of support than Biden’s.
Quinnipiac gave Biden a one-point edge (47 per cent to 46 per cent) in a head-to-head with Trump. When Kennedy was included, this grew to a three-point Biden lead. In USA Today’s poll, Kennedy voters said by a 2-1 margin that they would vote for Trump over Biden if Kennedy were not on the ballot.
Kennedy’s campaign seems designed to appeal to the populist, “radical middle” voters who have been at the heart of Trump’s coalition. Echoing the way that Trump zig-zags across conventional ideological categories, Kennedy’s campaign website calls for more border security, a minimum-wage boost, the withdrawal of American armed forces abroad, the defence of free speech, new environmental policies, and efforts to tackle the cost of housing.
Just as Trump pits himself against the “deep state,” Kennedy portrays the federal government as captured by corporate interests and in need of a fundamental shakeup. On some of these issues, Kennedy may even be able to outflank Trump among the very alienated: he assails the “Covid lockdowns” that characterised Trump’s last year in office, and Kennedy is a well-known skeptic of many vaccines. Illustrating his appeal to voters anxious for something new, a recent analysis by Politico found that many of Kennedy’s donors had not previously donated to a presidential campaign in recent years.
How all this will cash out in November 2024 remains unknown. Third-party candidates tend to fall to earth as Election Day draws near. Once they kick the tires of his candidacy, discontented voters may decide that he’s not what they are looking for. A central political challenge facing Kennedy is ballot access.
If his campaign can’t clear the managerial hurdles of getting him on the ballot across the United States (especially in swing states), support for his candidacy will not necessarily translate into electoral consequences. Other third-party candidates more identified with the left, such as Cornel West, could compensate for any votes Kennedy might take from Trump.
Since the Second World War, third-party presidential candidates often do best during times of transition and great uncertainty. In 1968, George Wallace racked up 13 per cent of the vote amid the maelstrom of the 1960s and the Vietnam War. After years of stagflation, John B. Anderson mustered 6 per cent of the vote in 1980. Ross Perot’s 1992 third-party campaign represented the shattering of the electoral coalition that had given Republicans a near-lock on the presidency for decades; inveighing against NAFTA and other global trade agreements, Perot also anticipated the populist disruption that would consume American politics twenty years later.
The 2024 election is a year away, but RFK’s poll numbers may indicate similar discontent today.
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Core voters slipping away pose threat to Biden’s re-election
Among ethnic minorities and Gen Z, the president’s feel for economics and foreign policy is seen as a liability – and so is his age
By Tony Diver, US EDITOR
4 November 2023
If Joe Biden wants to hold onto the White House in 2024, Dorien Dudley is the man he has to convince.
At 19, Mr Dudley is voting for the first time next year at his home in Baldwin County, Georgia – one of the most reliable bellwether areas in the country.
Since 1984, voters there have chosen the successful presidential candidate in all but one election. In 2020, they helped Mr Biden over the line to win Georgia by just 0.2 per cent.
As a young black man, Mr Dudley also represents a caucus of ethnic minority and Gen Z voters that helped the 81-year-old president take power three years ago, and which he is now trying to hold onto.
So far, it does not seem to be working.
Mr Dudley’s apathy is reflected nationally in the latest polls, which show that among black voters, young people and in swing states more generally Mr Biden’s campaign is flagging.
Inside the campaign
The president also has the approval of just 39.5 per cent of voters overall – the worst polling position of any president seeking re-election since 1945.
one campaign insider told The Telegraph, pointing to a “strong performance” by Democrats in special elections (the congressional equivalent of by-elections) this year.
Leading the team since April is Julie Chavez Rodriguez, his campaign manager and the granddaughter of Cesar Chavez, a fearsome 1960s agricultural trade unionist who organised a five-year national boycott of grapes.
She is described by colleagues as dedicated and, unlike many top aides in US politics, camera-shy.
Joining her at the top table is Quentin Fulks, who masterminded the successful re-election campaign of Georgia senator Raphael Warnock, and Michael Tyler, a former national press secretary of the Democratic National Committee (DNC).
Much of the day-to-day media work is handled by Kevin Munoz, who ran the White House’s Covid-19 communications strategy and featured personally in ads for the vaccination programme on US dating apps, while the finance team is directed by Colleen Coffey and Michael Pratt, two other former DNC staffers.
They have had their work cut out. Although Mr Biden has made few campaign-specific appearances, with most of his speeches taking place on government time, the campaign has already spent more money than any other candidate. Federal Election Commission receipts show he has spent $24.8 million (£20.1 million) to Donald Trump’s $23 million.
As the campaign picks up in the coming months, more of Mr Biden’s trusted lieutenants are expected to make their way from his White House team to work on his re-election effort.
Two of his closest advisers, Anita Dunn and Steve Richetti, remain in their government positions and are thought to be making strategic decisions about the campaign while Ms Chavez Rodriguez runs day-to-day operations in Wilmington.
Ms Dunn, a senior adviser to Mr Biden in Washington, is a veteran of six Democratic presidential campaigns, while Mr Richetti chaired the president’s 2020 campaign and now serves as counsellor to the president.
On Sept 6, the campaign named Grace Landrieu, the White House’s top economic policy and labour adviser, as Mr Biden’s policy director.
Her appointment reflects Mr Biden’s focus as he heads into a year of campaigning. After three years of a presidency marred by high inflation, which has weakened voters’ savings and squeezed household budgets, his aides are in no doubt that a successful economic message is vital to his success.
Economy voters’ top priority
A poll for The Telegraph by Redfield & Wilton Strategies last month found that in the swing states of Arizona, Georgia, Florida, Pennsylvania, Michigan and North Carolina, the economy was voters’ top priority. A majority in all six states also said their financial situation had worsened in the last year.
“Voters do attribute Biden’s policies for playing a role in the rising inflation, for sure,” said Philip Van Scheltinga, who conducted the research. “Even if inflation comes down, voters are still feeling the cost of it having risen in the first place, and that’s difficult to overcome for any candidate.
“Even if you have wage growth outpacing inflation, everyone’s savings will have been hit pretty severely.”
SOURCE: REDFIELD & WILTON
With inflation now down to 3.7 per cent, Mr Biden is attempting to take control of the economic narrative by talking about his unique blend of eye-watering state subsidies, labour market regulations and investment in technical education.
The president has passed legislation that pours $422 billion (£359 billion) into the US green energy and semiconductor manufacturing industries and $1.2 trillion into public infrastructure and argues that the spending will replace “trickle-down” economics by giving America a stronger manufacturing base and reversing the decline of the so-called Rust Belt heartlands in the north-east of the country.
The scornful nickname “Bidenomics”, given to the project by the conservative Wall Street Journal, now adorns the stage behind the podium when he gives political speeches and comes with a strapline: “Investing in America.”
For his campaign staff, the policy is also a way to win over the support of blue-collar workers in the crucial states of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. All three supported Biden in 2020 but by a margin of less than three per cent.
In almost every economic speech he delivers, Mr Biden talks about “growing the economy from the middle out and bottom up instead of the top down” because “when the middle class does well, the poor have a ladder up and the wealthy still do very well”.
While Mr Biden’s focus on the economy may be necessary, it is also a risk. Unlike most other elections in US history, the incumbent president’s most likely challenger has a White House record of his own to sell.
At his most recent rallies, Mr Trump has spent a significant portion of his lengthy addresses talking about the economy, falsely claiming to have created millions more jobs during his time in office than Mr Biden.
Mr Trump, by far the Republican frontrunner, is also fond of rehearsing his record on foreign diplomacy – not thought of as his strong suit at the time – which he says would have prevented war in Ukraine and Gaza.
Young people unsure on Biden’s foreign policy
The latest polls show less than half of Americans now think Washington should send weapons to Ukraine, with the biggest fall among Democrats.
The Middle East also presents an electoral challenge for Mr Biden. Although more Americans support Israel than Palestine, the biggest support for Palestinians is found among core Democrat voters.
While 59 per cent of Arab-Americans supported Mr Biden in 2020, just 17 per cent say they would now vote for him, creating a headache for his campaign in the swing states of Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania, which have large Muslim populations. For the first time since 1997, a majority of Arab-American voters do not identify as Democrats.
not the world police. I feel like there are more important things that can help people here and now that we could be focusing on.”
On the age issue, he adds: “I’m not gonna get any social security because there are so many old people. They paid in, so they’re getting it out, but there aren’t enough young people to put that money in.”
Age concerns
Concerns about Mr Biden’s age have heightened following a series of public gaffes, including referring to the “nine wonders of the world”, confusing the All Blacks rugby team with the Black and Tan constables that battled with the IRA and referring to Rishi Sunak, the Prime Minister, as “Mr President”.
More than three-quarters of Americans think Mr Biden is too old to run a second time. Privately, aides worry he could trip on stage at a campaign event and bring his presidential bid to an end, through public humiliation or injury.
Karlyn Bowman, a public opinion analyst at the American Enterprise Institute, a centre-Right think-tank, said Mr Biden is facing a particular challenge appealing to young liberals who see him as an elderly, inactive president who does not have their best interests at heart.
“Younger people want action. They want things done more quickly, whether it’s Black Lives Matter or climate change, whatever it happens to be, and so therefore they probably don’t see Biden doing enough,” she said.
“If inflation remains high, if Biden stumbles, if things get worse nationally on all fronts, they could stay home, and so the Biden campaign should be very worried about that.”
Campaign not ‘taking black and brown voters for granted’
In recent weeks the campaign has launched $25 million of television advertisements in battleground states, addressing issues where the campaign may stumble. Top of the list are the economy, the war in Ukraine and ethnic minority voters.
An advert that aired on Saturday at a college football game declared that the Biden-Harris campaign was “putting in the work for black America”, highlighting the administration’s policies on funding for black businesses, racial equality and healthcare.
“This is the largest investment in black media in campaign history,” one campaign staffer told The Telegraph.
A separate campaign push is rolling out on radio stations with a large number of black listeners in the coming weeks, while a second outreach pilot is launching in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
“The campaign is very cognisant of the need not to take black and brown voters for granted,” said an aide.
“In past campaigns they have parachuted into these communities at the last minute. That is the opposite of what we are doing here.”
Jitters about Mr Biden’s electability among both ethnic minorities and young liberals have already seen him make greater use of what one Gen Z Biden-outrider describes as his “secret weapon”: Kamala Harris.
The vice president surprised some analysts by appearing in Mr Biden’s campaign launch video in April after what some saw as a lukewarm first two years in office. Many had expected her to be replaced for Mr Biden’s re-election campaign.
But, since last year’s mid-term elections, when the Democrats’ strong performance eliminated her constant requirement to be in the Senate to cast tie-breaking votes, Ms Harris has embarked on a “Fight for Our Freedoms” tour of historically black US college campuses, giving firebrand speeches designed to emphasise her youth and passion.
It is hoped that the vice president, who is 22 years younger than Mr Biden and whose parents are African-American and Asian-American, will be more able to convince those communities to stick with the Democrats in 2024 than her boss.
In all its literature, the Biden campaign has tried to adopt a positive message to counter the declinism of Mr Trump and a widespread view that democracy in the US is broken.
“There are some who say America is failing,” says a narrator in one recent ad, as the screen is filled with a slow-motion clip of Mr Trump.
“Not Joe Biden. He believes our best days are ahead because he believes in the American people.”
But, with a year until the election and Mr Biden’s campaign off to a faltering start, a key question remains. Do the American people still believe in him?
Posts like this don’t help Ukraine imo
Biden’s disapproval rating took a leap right at the beginning of his term. Why? Because the first thing he did after moving into the White House was to open the flood gates of illegal immigration on our southern borders. The next faux pas was the debacle in Afghanistan. He continues his bumbling, stumbling incumbency with his uncertain approach to the war in Ukraine. And, not developing a sound strategy for this war and communicating it to the American people does not help with either his or Ukraine’s cause and is dangerous for the free world in the long run.
Okay, Afghanistan is history. There’s nothing to fix anymore. But, Biden could fix the border issue. This is very important for millions of citizens. He could also finally pour the concrete for a solid foundation for the procedure we must take regarding the war in Ukraine. Finally, he could communicate with the American people on that to let them in on this strategy instead of ignoring their concerns.
He could and he should do all those things. Will he? It’s five before twelve and time is running fast. It’s beyond me how someone can dither so stubbornly as Joe Biden. No wonder his nick is Sleepy.
I read in one article, possibly one that you posted facts, that speculated that the Biden administration may be able to get one reasonably big tranche of military supplies through to the Ukrainians before the election. So they’ve got to make it count.
By his trickledown approach, Biden has prevented Ukraine from taking large swathes of thieved land back in the current counteroffensive and now, due to uncertainty caused by the haggling on Israel/Ukraine support, has virtually ensured that Ukraine still to be fighting in 2025.
If he’d helped Ukraine win this year, he might have defeated Trumpkov, but now he may be dependent on the odious putlerite conspiracy theorist RFK to take votes off Trump.
Indeed, if Biden doesn’t start waking up to reality, then he can forget being elected again. I am positive about this.
“they’ve got to make it count.”
President Biden has proposed $61.4 billion to support Ukraine.
“haggling on Israel/Ukraine support”
Blame that on the Republicans in Congress. (I think that only a minority of Republicans in Congress are opposed to supporting Ukraine, but the others are enabling the MAGA morons by refusing to work with Democrats to do what needs to be done.)