GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump has reportedly named two former Democrats to his presidential transition team: Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and former Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard.
The New York Times was the first to report the news before the Trump campaign issued a statement Tuesday.
“As President Trump’s broad coalition of supporters and endorsers expands across partisan lines, we are proud that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard have been added to the Trump/Vance Transition team,” senior Trump campaign advisor Brian Hughes said. “We look forward to having their powerful voices on the team as we work to restore America’s greatness.”
Kennedy and Gabbard, both Democratic presidential candidates at one point, both endorsed Trump in recent days. They’re the only former Democrats with national name recognition to do so.
It’s unclear what they’ll do on the transition team for Trump’s potential second term, but the team overall is tasked with helping select people for roles in the administration and developing a broad policy platform.
Kennedy, who was originally running as a Democrat in the 2024 presidential election before switching to an independent candidacy, suspended his campaign Friday and urged his supporters in battleground states to vote for Trump. Though Trump was brandishing him as a “Radical Left Lunatic” just a few months ago, the environmental activist turned anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist has taken a right-wing shift as his campaign progressed, namely on abortion rights.
Gabbard, once a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus and a Democratic presidential candidate in 2020, has an extremely mixed record when it comes to policy. She was an anti-LGBTQ+ activist in the early 2000s but apologized and shifted course once she was elected to Congress. But in recent years, she’s introduced anti-transgender legislation and endorsed Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill. She supported progressive drug reform and a shift to renewable energy sources but later, in more recent years, spoke in favor of Trump’s border wall and leaned into some anti-abortion rhetoric.
Just five years ago, she called Trump “corrupt” and “unfit” for office.
Democrats, too, have looked across the aisle to lure in voters. Last week’s Democratic National Convention featured eight Republicans explaining why they’re voting for Democratic nominee Kamala Harris, including some former members of the Trump administration.
“Here I am behind a podium advocating for a Democrat, and that’s because I love my country more than my party,” former White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham said.
“The Republican Party is no longer conservative,” former Republican Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois said. “It has switched its allegiance from the principles that gave it purpose to a man whose only purpose is himself.”
