Trump hails ‘very nice endorsement’ from RFK Jr as Kennedy siblings repudiate move – live | US elections 2024

Like JD Vance, the Republican vice-presidential nominee, Robert F Kennedy Jr previously condemned and insulted Donald Trump on numerous occasions. With news of Kennedy withdrawing and endorsing the Republican, here’s a look back at a few of his past quotes on the former president:

RFK Jr’s wife, actor Cheryl Hines, tweeted about her husband’s decision to suspend his presidential campaign this afternoon, thanking the campaign’s staff for helping Kennedy overcome “the roadblocks and lawsuits that have been brought against them”:

I’d like to extend a sincere, deeply heartfelt thank you to every person who has worked so tirelessly and lovingly on his campaign. … Over the last year and a half, I have met some extraordinary people from all parties – Democrats, Republicans, and Independents. It’s been my experience that the vast majority of all parties are truly good people who want the best for our country and for each other. It has been an eye-opening, transformative, and endearing journey.

Hines, who’s known for her role on the sitcom Curb Your Enthusiasm, reportedly opposed RFK Jr’s decision to endorse Trump.

Brain worm and a dead bear: RFK Jr’s campaign controversies

Adam Gabbatt

The decision by Robert F Kennedy Jr to suspend his presidential campaign brings to an end one of the most bizarre campaigns of recent times.

Kennedy, who introduced the general public to the concept of “leaky brain” and the idea that chemicals in water were making children transgender, initially ran for the Democratic nomination but launched an independent campaign in October 2023.

His efforts failed to gain traction but left the public with some unusual, and some unsavory, memories.

The scandals include revelations he dropped off a dead bear in Central Park; his claim that part of his brain had been eaten by a worm; an alleged photo he took of a barbecued dog; conspiracy theories about wifi radiation; and allegations of sexual assault.

Read more here for a detailed recounting of the most notable controversies:

After ranting live on Truth Social during Kamala Harris’s Democratic national convention speech last night, Trump couldn’t seem to shake it today. During an event at a Las Vegas restaurant, the former president complained about Harris’s speech, falsely claiming she had made no mention of the border and mocking her for repeatedly thanking the audience.

“She mentioned ‘thank you’ about 50 times,” said Trump. “Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you,” he said, making a guttural noise possibly for dramatic effect and then continuing to repeat the word: “Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank – thank, thank.”

“What the hell is wrong with her?” he said.

The Harris campaign immediately posted the clip:

Here’s a look at where things stand:

• RFK Jr announced the suspension of his presidential campaign and his endorsement of Donald Trump. In a nearly 50-minute address, the independent candidate cited his endorsement reasons as “free speech, war on Ukraine and war on our children”.

• Five of RFK Jr’s siblings have shared a statement denouncing their brother’s decision to endorse Trump. “We want an America filled with hope and bound together by a shared vision of a brighter future, a future defined by individual freedom, economic promise and national pride. We believe in Harris and Walz. Our brother Bobby’s decision to endorse Trump today is a betrayal of the values that our father and our family hold most dear. It is a sad ending to a sad story,” they said.

• JD Vance will attend a fundraiser next month hosted by Keith Rabois, Jacob Helberg and the “Trump 47 Jewish Coalition”. Rabois, an investor, and Helberg, an author and technology investor, are both Jewish (the two are also married). They have been critical of the Joe Biden administration’s handling of the war in Gaza, saying the president has not been vocally supportive enough of Israel.

• In separate appearances on Fox News on Thursday, Donald Trump and Georgia governor Brian Kemp set their long-held distaste for each other aside, with Kemp endorsing Trump and Trump calling Kemp “very nice”. “We’ve got to win from the top of the ticket on down,” Kemp said, speaking in response to Kamala Harris’s nomination at the Democratic national convention last night. “We need to send Donald Trump back to the White House.”

• Merrick Garland announced this morning that the justice department has filed an anti-trust lawsuit against the real estate software company RealPage. The DoJ alleges that RealPage’s algorithm provided landlords with recommended prices for rentals that allowed them to align their rents.

• Several Secret Service personnel from the Pittsburgh field office have been reassigned to administrative duties and ordered to work from home following last month’s assassination attempt on Donald Trump, according to sources speaking to CNN. In a report on Friday, CNN also reported that a member of Trump’s security detail has also been reassigned to administrative duties.

• In response to Kamala Harris’s speech at the Democratic national convention on Thursday, Donald Trump’s campaign released an email on Friday morning, calling Harris “dangerously liberal, not a centrist”. It went on to say: “Her record includes being named the most liberal senator, supporting eliminating private health insurance, and saying we need to ‘redirect resources’ from police. Kamala Harris is dangerously liberal, describing her as anything else is a lie.”

• Jerome Powell, chair of the Federal Reserve, said on Friday that “the time has come” to cut rates, Reuters reports. During a speech at the Fed’s annual economic conference in Wyoming, Powell said: “The time has come for policy to adjust. The direction of travel is clear, and the timing and pace of rate cuts will depend on incoming data, the evolving outlook and the balance of risks.”

Robert Kennedy Jr. announced Friday that he is dropping out of the US presidential race and throwing his support behind Donald Trump.

The 70-year-old scion of the expansive and reliably Democrat family said in a Pennsylvania court filing that he was dropping out of the 2024 race for the White House, according to the Associated Press.

Kennedy, a life-long Democrat before he switched to independent – a reflection of his frustration after he was essentially blocked from challenging Joe Biden for the party nomination and later lost Democrat-financed challenges to appearing on state ballots -, said during a press conference that “in an honest system, I believe I would have won the election…”

Kennedy point to the system that his father, attorney general Robert F. Kennedy, and uncle, president John F. Kennedy, he said, had thrived in – ‘a system with open debates, primaries with regularly scheduled debates, a truly independent media untainted by government propaganda and censorship, a system of non-partisan courts and election boards, everything would be different.”

He said polls had shown him beating existing candidates in terms of favorability. “I’m sorry to say that while democracy may still be alive at the grassroots, it has become little more than a slogan for our political institutions, for our media, for our government and most sadly of all for me and the Democratic party.

Kennedy’s running mate, Nicole Shanahan, had hinted the Kennedy campaign might join forces with Trump or forming a new party “because we draw votes from Trump” or “we walk away right now and join forces with Donald Trump. We walk away from that and we explain to our base why we’re making this decision.”

At the height of his campaign. Kennedy was polling at 10% of voters but since Biden dropped out from re-election in July and vice president Kamala Harris stepped in, Kennedy’s polling support halved. The big question is where that remaining 5% of voters go – with Kennedy and Trump, to Democrats, or withhold their vote entirely.

At a campaign stop at a restaurant in Las Vegas, Nevada, Donald Trump opened his remarks with a focus on tipped income, and his proposal to abolish taxes on tipped income if elected.

“Nobody ever heard of this concept before,” said Trump, of his proposal to do away with taxes on tips, a form of taxation that especially affects restaurant workers. He called Kamala Harris, who has said she supports the same kind of policy, a “copycat” and complained about her decision to back the policy.

“Can we get the culinary union to vote for Trump?” he said. “A lot of them are voting for us, I can tell you that.” The Culinary Union, which represents workers in food service, hotels and gaming, has already endorsed Harris for president.

“The path to victory runs through Nevada, and the Culinary Union will deliver Nevada for president Kamala Harris and vice president Tim Walz,” wrote Ted Pappageorge, secretary-treasurer of the Culinary Workers Union in Las Vegas, in a 9 August statement.

Speaking in Las Vegas today, Donald Trump acknowledged a “very nice endorsement from RFK Jr”.

“That’s big,” Trump said, adding: “He’s a great guy, respected by everybody.”

Trump added that he will discuss the endorsement further at a rally in Arizona this afternoon. RFK Jr was still concluding his remarks at the time.

Five of RFK Jr’s siblings have shared a statement denouncing their brother’s decision to endorse Trump.

“We want an America filled with hope and bound together by a shared vision of a brighter future, a future defined by individual freedom, economic promise and national pride. We believe in Harris and Walz. Our brother Bobby’s decision to endorse Trump today is a betrayal of the values that our father and our family hold most dear. It is a sad ending to a sad story,” Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, Courtney Kennedy, Kerry Kennedy, Chris Kennedy and Rory Kennedy said in a statement.

RFK Jr’s campaign has clarified that it did not intend to endorse Donald Trump in a Pennsylvania court filing, according to reports.

“Mr Kennedy has not endorsed president Trump,” Stefanie Spear, a campaign spokesperson, said in a statement to the Washington Post. “The filing was made by an attorney and not reviewed by the campaign. The filing is being updated.”

The news comes as RFK Jr is speaking live to the nation.

RFK Jr said he will “now throw my support to president Trump”.

Citing the reasons for his endorsement of Donald Trump, he said the causes “were free speech, war in Ukraine and the war on our children”.

“I want everyone to know that I am not terminating my campaign. I am simply suspending it and not ending it,” RFK Jr said.

“My name will remain on the ballot in most states. If you live in a blue state, you can vote for me without harming or helping president Trump or Vice-President Harris,” he added, saying: “In about 10 battleground states where my presence would be a spoiler, I’m going to remove my name, and I’ve already started that process and urge voters not to vote for me.”

“As you know, I left that party in October because it had departed so dramatically on the core values that I grew up with,” RFK Jr said.

“It had become the party of war, censorship, corruption, big pharma, big tech … and big money. When it abandoned democracy by cancelling the primary to conceal the cognitive decline of the sitting president, I left the party to run as an independent.”