Robert F Kennedy Jr, the arguable black sheep of one of America’s biggest families in politics, has suspended his campaign for president and endorsed Donald Trump – and it has rocked some of his supporters.
On Facebook, where Kennedy groups have amassed thousands of members across the country, some expressed bitter disappointment. In their view, Kennedy was a way to buck, and even break, the two-party system in the US – and while the end of his campaign hurt, backing one of the major party candidates was seen as far worse.
Just before his formal announcement, Jenn Morgan said that if Kennedy “drops out and endorses Trump, then I will not be voting at all”. using an emoji with its tongue out on her post, meant to display the emotion “feeling disgusted”.
“If he becomes part of the cabinet with him, that’s great and I hope he’s able to do good things but he would not have any integrity in my eyes,” she wrote.
“He gave into the pressure just like they all do. If he drops out of the race, he has let us down about everything he said he stands for and what he said he was going to do for us. He will be no different than the rest of the politicians.”
Related: Brain worms and dead bears: has RFK Jr finally tanked his presidential bid?
In an interview, Ray Orta, a 23-year navy veteran from the Bronx, New York, who has lived in Nevada for 28 years, said he didn’t feel “betrayed” by Kennedy but he did feel “frustrated”.
In his view, the only way for this decision to make sense to his supporters, would be for Trump to name Kennedy as his attorney general, or a similar major role in his cabinet should he win in November.
“He has to get Trump to give [him] something or else it’s all talk, talk, talk – Kennedy goes to the abyss, and then we’re back to the two-party system,” he said.
Kennedy’s stance on Trump – and earlier in the race, Joe Biden – has previously been a bit all over the place. In a March episode of the New York Times podcast The Run Up, the independent said the Covid pandemic represented a break with the Democratic party. He cited the lockdowns as being the “driver” behind censoring people like him who dissent from government policies. Asked if he was worried about being a spoiler in the election, helping either Biden or Trump win, he responded: “I have a fear of both of them winning the election.”
Still, his endorsement of Trump is not wholly surprising when one remembers that a video of Kennedy speaking to the former president about working together emerged just last month after Trump’s assassination attempt.
In his speech on Friday, Kennedy thanked his supporters, attacked Democrats, and embraced Trump, but avoided the crux of why his supporters had been drawn to him in the first place: an alternative to the two-party system.
“What’s this about??? Did you actually endorse this buffoon?” wrote Marcia Horn Kayhanfar in a top Kennedy Facebook group. “What a let down.”
“I thought he was wanting to heal the divide, not make it deeper,” added Joey Martin, in the group “Robert F Kennedy Jr. America’s Best Hope”, which has 22,000 members. “I thought he wanted to give those who don’t want to vote out of fear an option. Is he now being divisive and saying that we should vote against what we fear? Did he give up on the dream and hope?”
Some supporters were moved by Kennedy’s calls to back Trump, but others rejected the endorsement from a candidate they had backed for months.
Told that not voting would be a vote for Harris, Marianne Moad responded: “No, actually it will be a vote for myself and all women.
“[Trump] is responsible for the rights being suppressed from 50% of the population. I don’t want my daughter or granddaughters to die because they can’t terminate a bad pregnancy. It is happening already,” she wrote, sharing a link to a BBC article on Amanda Zurawski, a Texas woman who almost died after being denied an abortion.
Now, as Kennedy suspends his campaign and lines up behind Trump just one day after Kamala Harris’s successful convention, attention turns to how his exit could affect the race.
Pew Research Center polling from July – when Biden was still in the race – shows that Harris’s entry halved Kennedy’s support, according to its new August poll, while a Washington Post analysis suggests more of what’s left of Kennedy’s support could tilt towards Trump.
But a Washington Post poll with ABC News and Ipsos from this past weekend found that Harris had a three-point edge against Trump with Kennedy in the race, and a four-point lead ahead of just Trump. That, the poll found, is because Kennedy supporters are more likely to view Harris favorably than Trump.
After initial rumors of Kennedy’s withdrawal broke in the Facebook group Robert F Kennedy Jr. for President 2024, Alex Arey, 35, wrote to its 15,000 members: “I feel betrayed. Yeah, I despise the Dems, but not enough to vote Trump.”
Arey, a special education teacher in Shenandoah county, Virginia, said he was a Kennedy true believer, having listened to about 100 hours of his interviews over the years. He has voted Democratic in the past, but chose to vote for the Libertarian candidate Jo Jorgensen in 2020. He called a Trump endorsement by Kennedy “disappointing”, because it represents him “just falling into the two-party duopoly”.
“‘Declare your independence’ was one of his slogans, but now he’s joining up with the lesser of two evils, that’s something you don’t like to see,” he said. “He’s just playing politics.”
Gabriela Morbitzer, 34, a retail manager from Tennessee, said she was disengaged during the 2020 election and not proud of it, but found both options poor and a “leadership gap” for president. After a friend told her to give a two-hour podcast with Kennedy a “real listen”, she was onboard believing he listened to people and filled that gap.
Now, she said she feels “immediate disappointment” because Trump has “never been” a viable candidate.
“What I don’t appreciate is I feel Donald Trump brings out the worst in us, the collective us,” she said. “He’s very divisive and feeds into that desire for people to behave in ways that are absolutely ridiculous.”
