Robert F. Kennedy Jr. might not be able to topple President Joe Biden in the Democratic presidential primaries — but that doesn’t mean he won’t be in the next administration. Provided, of course, his own party loses.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis became the second Republican presidential candidate to express interest in finding a use for the presidential darkhorse if and when he loses to Biden in the Democratic race — although it isn’t as a bipartisan ticket with the environmentalist, vaccine skeptic and activist.
In an appearance on talk radio host Clay Travis’ podcast Wednesday, DeSantis ruled out RFK Jr. as his running mate but said Kennedy might be up for a post in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention or the Food and Drug Administration.
The governor cited his agreement with Kennedy on former White House chief medical adviser Anthony Fauci, the longtime head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
“Here’s the issue — I’m aligned with him on Fauci and the corruption in the health bureaucracies a hundred percent, and I think he’s probably done and said some other things that I agree with too, too,” DeSantis said when asked by Travis whether or not he would have the Kennedy family descendant as his veep candidate.
“But at the end of the day, he’s more liberal …. he used to say, I don’t know if he still believes this, that if you deny climate change you should go to jail. Things like that,” the governor said.
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DeSantis also noted that RFK Jr. opposed the Supreme Court ruling against affirmative action programs in college and that “conservative voters, they would want those positions flushed out.”
In the 2014 article for EcoWatch — no longer available online but still available on the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine — Kennedy said he supported the First Amendment, “which makes room for any citizen to, even knowingly, spew far more vile lies without legal consequence” in regards to so-called climate deniers, but that he did “believe that corporations which deliberately, purposefully, maliciously and systematically sponsor climate lies should be given the death penalty.”
Should a GOP president hire RFK Jr. in the administration?
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As the New York Post noted, he also said during a 2014 interview, “Do I think the Koch brothers should be prosecuted for reckless endangerment? Absolutely. That’s a criminal offense and they ought to be serving time for it.”
And then there was this series of tweets (or “X’es,” whatever we’re calling it this week) in which RFK Jr. said, “The effects of racist policies going back centuries are now self-perpetuating,” and, “Affirmative action understands this and uses race-based policies to undo the effects of racist policies.”
Affirmative action understands this and uses race-based policies to undo the effects of racist policies.
— Robert F. Kennedy Jr (@RobertKennedyJr) June 29, 2023
DeSantis is the second Republican to say that he admired Kennedy without explicitly offering him a job — particularly the vice presidency — after GOP frontrunner and former President Donald Trump said RFK Jr. was “a smart guy” in an interview last Thursday.
When asked by host Rob Schmitt whether Trump/Kennedy 2024 was in the works, Trump said, “No, but people have suggested it. I read the same things that you do.”
“There are a lot of people suggesting it, there’s no question about that,” the former president added. “I’ve known him over the years. He’s a smart guy and well-intentioned. I really believe he’s very well-intentioned.”
Trump also noted that national polling showed RFK Jr. as high as 23 percent, saying, “That’s a lot of vote.”
Donald Trump reacts to people suggesting Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as his running mate in 2024
— ALX 🇺🇸 (@alx) July 21, 2023
DeSantis was more skeptical on how far apart the two sides were.
“There’s a whole host of other things that he’d probably be out of step with,” he told Travis, adding: “If you’re president, sic him on the FDA if he’d be willing to serve or sic him on CDC, but in terms of being veep, there’s 70 percent of the issues that he may be averse to our base on.”
But his comments could show you where future bipartisanship might lie.
Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL), when asked if he would consider naming 2024 Democratic candidate RFK Jr. as his vice president:
“Sic him on the FDA if he’d be willing to serve, or sic him on CDC.” pic.twitter.com/C7wASCmbt6
— The Recount (@therecount) July 26, 2023
There are apparently plenty of Democrats who won’t be told to “trust the science” or put blind faith in venerated Dr. Anthony Fauci — enough that it’s freaking out the Democrat establishment, at the very least.
RFK Jr. in a position at the FDA or CDC would be a great way to harness that freak-out as well as put him somewhere that he could have influence. Moreover, it would tweak Biden supporters who would spend the next four years calling him a Russian plant or some such nonsense.
It might not be much, but it’s a start.
And with a surname like Kennedy, the left certainly couldn’t say that he wasn’t a true blue Democrat, no matter how much his family publicly flogs him. Talk about making cooperation seem that much sweeter.
