WEST DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) – Robert F. Kennedy Jr launched a one-day blitz Saturday to gain access to the Iowa presidential primary as an independent candidate. Whether he succeeded is an outstanding question.
Kennedy tried to qualify by holding a convention with at least 500 Iowa eligible voters representing at least 25 counties. Before adjourning the convention Saturday, Speaker Dave Owen announced that 686 delegates representing more than 35 Iowa counties were present, figures that could not be immediately verified.
Kennedy and his allies are working to secure a ballot line in all 50 states as they mount a bid that worries allies of both President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump for losing enough votes to swing the election. So far, Utah is the only state that has confirmed it is on the ballot.
A spokesman for the Iowa Secretary of State’s office confirmed before Saturday’s event that the office was approached by the Kennedy campaign and responded by providing this year’s publicly available guidance for applicants.
As people shuffled into a music venue on Saturday, announcements from the campaign team blared over loudspeakers. The audience was told there were 300 people at 2:36 PM Central Time; 400 about 20 minutes later. At 15:08 an official announced that they had exceeded 500 people.
As in other campaign events, Kennedy has drawn longtime fans of his message as well as people disillusioned with the upcoming rematch in the 2020 election.
Jeremy Youngers of Waukee, Iowa, said he doesn’t like Biden or Trump. Youngers has been listening to Kennedy’s podcast and his appearances on other podcasts for years and said he was excited when Kennedy announced his candidacy.
“This is an opportunity that we really need to change,” said the 42-year-old, accompanied by his wife and two children.
Christy Tierney, 45, traveled about 180 miles (280 kilometers) from eastern Iowa to do her part to ensure voters have another option on the ballot in November.
“All they need is 500 people to show up here to put Bobby on the ballot,” the Bettendorf resident said. “So I thought I could drive a few hours to make that happen.”
Tierney said she was sick of the two-party system and voting against candidates, not for them.
“I haven’t made up my mind,” she said of her run for president in November, “but I just think it’s important to have another opportunity.”
Kennedy is the nephew of President John F. Kennedy and the son of Robert F. Kennedy, a former attorney general and U.S. senator. Both his father and uncle were killed. Since then, he has built his own reputation as an activist, author and advocate for environmental causes.
Along the way, his activism has entered into conspiracies and contradicts the scientific consensus, esp on vaccines. Some members of his family did so publicly criticized his views.
Kennedy chose Nicole Shanahan to be his election of vice presidentwith both leaving the Democratic Party to launch independent bids for the White House.
Kennedy attracts attention with his famous name as an alternative to the main party candidates who are unstoppable American voters, even though no independent candidate has won the Electoral College vote in decades. He took the stage to cheers and applause from the standing crowd, immediately saying how his campaign — and the voters in the room supporting him — had been rejected.
“If you want more of the same, you should vote for them,” Kennedy said of Biden and Trump. “Does anyone here want more of the same?” A chorus of “no”s answered.
An anti-vaccine group led by Kennedy has a lawsuit pending against a number of news organizations, including The Associated Press, accusing them of violating antitrust laws by taking action to identify misinformation, including about COVID-19 and COVID-19 vaccines. Kennedy withdrew from the group when she announced her candidacy for president, but is named as one of its attorneys in the lawsuit.
Ann Charlson said she has Republican and Democratic values. She eats organic and wants to choose what goes into her body, so she was “horrified” when the Biden administration talked about vaccine mandates during the COVID-19 pandemic. She found herself “on the same side as the people who wanted gun freedom,” she said — not something she believed in.
“Kennedy is the best of both worlds,” said Charlson, 58, of West Des Moines. “I really believe what he has to say.”
Republicans and Democrats have united to criticize Kennedy, motivated in part by concerns that his candidacy could act as a spoiler for Biden or Trump.
Iowa Republicans said Friday that Kennedy was a “distraction.”
“He is spreading his toxic conspiracy theories instead of talking about the problems facing Americans caused by the Biden administration,” Chairman Jeff Kaufman said in a statement. “Iowans want solutions, not distractions.”
