Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. held talks this month with former president Donald Trump about endorsing his campaign and taking a job in a second Trump administration, overseeing a portfolio of health and medical issues, according to four people familiar with the matter.<\/p>\n
The discussions, which began hours after the attempted assassination of Trump at a rally on July 13, did not result in an agreement amid concerns in Trump\u2019s orbit about the complications about promising a job in exchange for a political endorsement, according to the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe private conversations.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll I will say to you is I am willing to talk to anybody from either political party who wants to talk about children\u2019s health and how to end the chronic disease epidemic,\u201d Kennedy said Monday in an interview, adding that Trump has been more open to him than the Democratic National Committee. \u201cI have a lot of respect for president Trump for reaching out to me. Nobody from the DNC, high or low, has ever reached out to me in 18 months. Instead they have allocated millions to try to disrupt my campaign.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kennedy said he planned to continue his campaign. \u201cWe are in it to win it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
A person familiar with the conversations said a person who knows both men reached out to Kennedy Saturday night, hours after the assassination attempt on Trump, after Kennedy had done a series of cable news appearances to talk about the attack. Kennedy said he was open to speaking with Trump.<\/p>\n
Kennedy then received a group text that included a phone number used by Trump, prompting a phone call between the two men later that night after Trump had returned to his Bedminster, N.J., home, the person said.<\/p>\n
Kennedy and Trump agreed to meet in person in Milwaukee early last week during the Republican National Convention. Trump has been intrigued by Kennedy even as he publicly criticized him, the people familiar with the matter said.<\/p>\n
Their discussions included possible jobs that Kennedy could be given in a second Trump administration, either at the Cabinet level or posts that do not require Senate confirmation. The discussion also included Kennedy potentially leaving the race and endorsing Trump, the people said.<\/p>\n
The discussions surprised Trump and his aides. But there were concerns among some Trump advisers that Kennedy \u2014 a fervent critic of vaccines \u2014 would not be appropriate in such a job and that such an agreement could be problematic, the people said. Two of these people did not rule out the campaign eventually wanting Kennedy in the fold or potentially giving him a job in the administration if Trump wins.<\/p>\n
The conversations ended without any definitive conclusion, the people said.<\/p>\n
\u201cPresident Trump met with RFK and they had a conversation about the issues just as he does regularly with important figures in business and politics because they all recognize he will be the next president of the United States,\u2019 said Danielle Alvarez, a Trump spokeswoman.<\/p>\n
Trump and Kennedy\u2019s private effort to cut a deal with each other contrasts with Kennedy\u2019s public opposition to a second term for Trump or President Biden, who on Sunday bowed out of the presidential race and endorsed Vice President Harris.<\/p>\n
In comments from Massachusetts on Sunday, Kennedy denounced the \u201ccorporate\u201d leaders that Trump included in his administration in 2017, along with similar people that Trump may consider to hire for a second term.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is the swamp. These are swamp creatures,\u201d Kennedy said. \u201cAnd his pick as vice president is a salute to the CIA, to the intelligence community and to the military industrial complex.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kennedy has previously called Trump\u2019s suggestion that he would use the Justice Department to punish political opponents \u201creprehensible,\u201d adding in an April CNN interview that \u201cthere are many things President Trump has done that are appalling.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWith the lockdown, the mask mandates, the travel restrictions, President Trump presided over the greatest restriction on individual liberties this country has ever known,\u201d Kennedy said in May at a Libertarian Party meeting.<\/p>\n
Trump has also attacked Kennedy publicly, calling him a \u201cDemocrat \u2018Plant\u2019\u201d and a \u201cRadical Left Liberal.\u2019<\/p>\n
Kennedy is polling below 15 percent in most five-way surveys of the presidential contest that includes both Trump and Biden, a cutoff that contributed to his failure to qualify for the CNN presidential debate in June.<\/p>\n
Public polls have shown Kennedy\u2019s campaign currently takes votes from both Biden and Trump in roughly equal measures. A Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll this month found 9 percent of registered voters saying they supported Kennedy in a five-way race that also included the Green Party\u2019s Jill Stein and independent candidate Cornel West. When forced to choose between Biden and Trump, 31 percent of voters who supported Kennedy chose Trump, while 23 percent chose Biden.<\/p>\n
Trump has repeatedly asked campaign advisers, guests at his Mar-a-Lago Club and others if Kennedy would help Biden or him in the presidential contest. He also posed the question for months if he should pick Kennedy as his vice president. \u201cTrump-Kennedy,\u201d he would say, has a nice ring to it. But many of his advisers were against the idea and Trump ended up choosing Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) as his running mate last week.<\/p>\n
One call last week between Kennedy and Trump was recorded by a videographer team following Kennedy, with portions posted online. In one excerpt, Trump says he shares Kennedy\u2019s concerns that children have been harmed by the current mandated schedule of vaccines, which has been found safe and effective by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other health authorities<\/p>\n
\u201cI agree with you, man. Something\u2019s wrong with that whole system,\u201d Trump said to Kennedy, who has the call on speakerphone.<\/p>\n
\u201cI want to do small doses, small doses,\u201d Trump tells Kennedy. \u201cRemember, I said you want to do small doses. Small doses. When you feed a baby, Bobby, a vaccination that is like 38 different vaccines, and it looks like it\u2019s meant for a horse, not a, you know, 10-pound or 20-pound baby.\u2019<\/p>\n
Trump has argued as far back as 2014 that children are being harmed by \u201c1 massive dose\u2019 \u2014 which is not the way that commonly mandated vaccines are administered \u2014 and that vaccines may contribute to autism. The CDC and other health authorities have studied the claim and concluded that \u201cvaccines do not cause autism,\u201d and that the current vaccination schedule is safe. Kennedy has continued to argue that the current science is not conclusive, that more testing is required and that there is a link between vaccines and a rise in chronic diseases like autism.<\/p>\n
Later during last week\u2019s call, Trump encouraged Kennedy to \u201cdo something,\u201d though it is not clear from the excerpt what they are specifically discussing.<\/p>\n
\u2018I would love you to do something,\u201d Trump said. \u201cAnd I think it would be so good for you. And so big for you. And we\u2019re going to win. We\u2019re going to win. We\u2019re way ahead of the guy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kennedy later apologized for what he said was a staff decision to post the video of the private phone call online. \u201cI am mortified that this was posted,\u201d Kennedy wrote on social media. \u2018I apologize to the president.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kennedy met in 2016 with the then-president-elect in Trump Tower in Manhattan to discuss vaccine safety. \u201cHe asked me to chair a commission on vaccine safety. . . and scientific integrity,\u201d Kennedy said after the meeting. The role never materialized, and Kennedy later blamed other officials in the Trump administration for shifting course.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. held talks this month with former president Donald Trump about endorsing his campaign and taking a job in a second Trump administration, overseeing a portfolio of health and medical issues, according to four people familiar with the matter. The discussions, which began hours after the attempted assassination of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":6475,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6474","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6474","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6474"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6474\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6475"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6474"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6474"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6474"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}