Max Kennedy, the brother of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has urged the public to ignore his brother’s decision to withdraw from the 2024 presidential election and support Donald Trump’s campaign to return to the White House.
In an op-ed for the Los Angeles Times, Max Kennedy said that “Trump was exactly the kind of arrogant, cocky bully” his father, former U.S. Senator and Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, fought against before he was assassinated in 1967 while pursuing the Democratic presidential nomination.
Max Kennedy predicted that his father would have admired the Democratic candidate for the November election, Vice President Kamala Harris, because she was also a former prosecutor.
“Her career, like his, was about decency, dignity, equality, democracy and justice for all,” wrote Max Kennedy.
“I am devastated by my brother Bobby’s support for Donald Trump,” the piece added. “Robert F Kennedy’s life was dedicated to advancing the safety, security and happiness of the American people.”
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced Thursday that he was suspending his independent presidential campaign. He soon appeared with Trump at a political rally in Arizona, where he formally endorsed the former president, who won the Republican nomination despite being convicted of 34 felonies, including falsifying business records to conceal hush-money payments to adult film actor Stormy Daniels, among several other legal troubles.
Kennedy said he planned to remove his name from the 2024 presidential ballot in swing states to boost Trump’s chances of retaking the Oval Office. But Kennedy said he would remain on the ballot in other states that are not expected to decide the presidential race.
In an interview with Fox News on Sunday, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. claimed his campaign was undermined by media “censorship” — and that he was left out of the June presidential debate that preceded Joe Biden’s decision to suspend his re-election campaign.
Kennedy also described conversations he had with Trump before his endorsement announcement on Thursday, including a conversation an hour after the failed assassination attempt on the former president in July.
While they agreed they could continue to criticize each other on issues they disagreed on, “he invited me to form a unity government,” Kennedy said of Trump.
Kennedy’s presidential bid and endorsement of Trump have drawn sharp criticism from the rest of his family. And before the suspension, his campaign was mired in controversy, including an allegation of sexual assault against him by a former staffer and the spread of numerous conspiracy theories about the safety of vaccines, Covid-19, wireless internet, the 9/11 attacks and antidepressants.
Max Kennedy, a lawyer, is younger than his former brother, the presidential candidate. He is the ninth child of Robert F Kennedy and Ethel Kennedy – and was the nephew of John F Kennedy, who was president when he was assassinated in 1963.
He characterized his brother’s endorsement of Trump as “unthinkable,” noting that he had offered Harris his endorsement in exchange for a position in her administration if she won. But Max Kennedy said his brother received no response from the Harris camp and successfully offered Trump the same deal.
“It is all the more tragic because of our brother’s name. To bear the name Robert F Kennedy Jr. means a special legacy within a legacy,” wrote Max Kennedy, who explained that his father’s record contrasted sharply with Trump’s on anti-racism, immigration, the rule of law, the environment and gun control. Max Kennedy said the same was true on truth and democracy, an apparent reference to Trump’s lies about being robbed of victory in the 2020 presidential race by election fraud, which prompted his supporters to carry out the deadly attack on the U.S. Capitol in early January 2021.
“I love Bobby. But I hate what he is doing to our country,” Max Kennedy wrote. “It is worse than disappointment. We are in mourning.
“Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would be motivated to write something like this. It is with a heavy heart that I ask my fellow Americans today to do what will honor our father most: ignore Bobby and support Vice President Kamala Harris and the Democratic platform. That is what is best for our country.”
