OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) — Robert F. Kennedy Jr. selected Nicole Shanahan on Tuesday to be his vice presidential choose, including a rich however nationally unknown determine to his unbiased White Home bid that’s making an attempt to enchantment to voters disaffected by a rematch of the 2020 election.
Shanahan, 38, is a California lawyer and philanthropist who’s by no means held elected workplace. She leads Bia-Echo Basis, a corporation she based to direct cash towards points together with ladies’s reproductive science, felony justice reform and environmental causes.
Kennedy, a former Democrat, made the announcement in Oakland, California, the place Shanahan was raised in an impoverished household.
“Nicole and I each left the Democratic Get together,” he mentioned. “Our values didn’t change. The Democratic Get together did.”
Kennedy’s marketing campaign has spooked Democrats, who’re preventing third-party choices that might draw help from President Joe Biden and assist former President Donald Trump. However allies for each Biden and Trump attacked Kennedy and Shanahan on Tuesday, reflecting the uncertainty about how People would possibly reply to an unbiased ticket that has little probability of profitable Electoral Faculty votes however may draw votes throughout the spectrum.
With out the backing of a celebration, Kennedy faces an arduous job to get on the poll, with various guidelines throughout the 50 states. He’s selecting a working mate now as a result of about half of the states require him to designate one earlier than he can apply for poll entry.
Kennedy has secured entry to the poll in Utah. He and an allied tremendous PAC, American Values 2024, say they’ve collected sufficient signatures to qualify in a number of different states, together with swing states Arizona, Nevada and Georgia, however election officers there haven’t but signed off.
In Nevada, Democratic Secretary of State Francisco Aguilar mentioned in a March 7 letter to unbiased candidates that they have to nominate a vice presidential candidate earlier than accumulating signatures. The letter got here days after Kennedy’s marketing campaign introduced he’d collected sufficient signatures within the state.
Kennedy acknowledged the hurdles he faces and urged People to “take a danger” and vote for him, saying the most important impediment to his marketing campaign is the idea that he can’t win.
“If Nicole and I can get People to refuse to vote from worry, we’re going to be within the White Home in November,” he mentioned.
In an almost 30-minute speech introducing herself to Kennedy supporters, Shanahan echoed the critique on the coronary heart of Kennedy’s marketing campaign — that each main events, the media and the U.S. authorities are beholden to grasping profiteers. She additionally embraced his discredited anti-vaccine message.
“It wasn’t till I met Bobby and other people supporting him that I felt any hope within the consequence of this election,” Shanahan mentioned.
Previously married to Google co-founder Sergey Brin, Shanahan is deeply enmeshed within the Silicon Valley know-how tradition that Kennedy incessantly critiques.
However he mentioned her connections would assist her confront the tech trade’s energy and affect, and her data of synthetic intelligence may steer the federal government to nurture transformative applied sciences.
Exterior the performing arts venue the place Kennedy introduced his choose, broken-down vehicles, discarded bicycles, tents and all method of family items took up the sidewalk and a park, a visible reminder of the housing disaster that has plagued California.
Daybreak Mitchell, a 52-year-old retired Military reservist and U.S. Postal Service employee from Chesapeake, Virginia, mentioned she was vacationing in Los Angeles when she heard Kennedy can be showing in Oakland and determined to make the six-hour drive to listen to him and Shanahan.
“I didn’t actually know her earlier than, however simply listening to her and listening to her ardour about serving to kids and the continual illness epidemic and regenerative farming, I’m fairly impressed by her,” she mentioned.
Audio system who entertained the group earlier than Kennedy took the stage included Angela Stanton-King, a lady pardoned by then-President Donald Trump for her function in a automotive theft ring that led to a 2004 federal conspiracy conviction and two years in jail; Metta World Peace, the NBA all-star participant previously referred to as Ron Artest; and Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, a Stanford Medical Faculty professor who questioned the efficacy of lockdowns in the course of the COVID-19 pandemic and was a part of Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ presidential launch occasion final yr.
The Democratic Nationwide Committee is gearing as much as tackle Kennedy and different third-party choices, together with No Labels, a well-funded group working to recruit a centrist ticket. The hassle is overseen by veteran strategist Mary Beth Cahill, whose resume contains chief of workers to the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts, one other of RFK Jr.’s uncles.
Some members of his household have publicly criticized his views. Dozens of Kennedy relations despatched a message after they posed with Biden at a St. Patrick’s Day reception on the White Home in a photograph his sister Kerry Kennedy posted to social media.
“He’s a spoiler. He’s tried to coast on his household legacy and the goodwill they’ve within the African American neighborhood,” Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. Austin Davis mentioned of Kennedy on a convention name with reporters organized by the DNC. “However the Kennedy household has denounced this lame try they usually’ve fairly frankly stood with President Biden.”
Republicans, likewise, fear Kennedy’s anti-establishment bent and skepticism concerning the response to COVID-19 may entice voters who would possibly in any other case vote for Trump.
“Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is a far-left radical that helps reparations, backs the Inexperienced New Deal, and needs to ban fracking,” mentioned Alex Pfeiffer, a spokesperson for the pro-Trump tremendous PAC Make America Nice Once more Inc. “It’s no shock he would choose a Biden donor leftist as his working mate.”
Kennedy is a descendant of a storied Democratic household that features his father, Robert F. Kennedy, who was a U.S. senator, legal professional normal and presidential candidate, and his uncle former President John F. Kennedy.
Kennedy was an adolescent when his father, referred to as RFK, was assassinated throughout his personal presidential marketing campaign in 1968. RFK Jr. constructed a popularity of his personal as an activist, writer and lawyer who fought for environmental causes akin to clear water.
Alongside the best way, his activism has veered into conspiracies and contradicted scientific consensus, most infamously on vaccines.
An anti-vaccine group Kennedy led has a lawsuit pending towards quite a lot of information organizations, amongst them The Related Press, accusing them of violating antitrust legal guidelines by taking motion to determine misinformation, together with about COVID-19 and COVID-19 vaccines. Kennedy took go away from the group when he introduced his run for president however is listed as one in all its attorneys within the lawsuit.
Copyright 2024 The Related Press. All rights reserved.
