Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is claiming that Joe Biden and Donald Trump are excluding him from upcoming debates because they are terrified of him.
“Presidents Trump and Biden are colluding to lock America into a head-to-head matchup that 70 percent say they do not want,” he stated. “They want to ban me from their argument because they are afraid that I will win.” Keeping viable candidates from the debate platform harms democracy.
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On Wednesday, Trump and Biden traded jabs about the debate, agreeing to do one on June 27 on CNN and another in September. However, they did not invite RFK Jr., who has seen his poll numbers rise, to the platform.
Mr. Kennedy railed against his opponents, noting that 43 percent of Americans identify as independent voters, saying that if the US is “ever going to escape the hammerlock of the two-party system, now is the time to do it.”.
“These are the two most unpopular candidates in living memory,” he stated.
Mr. Kennedy claimed Mr. Trump and Mr. Biden sought to keep him off the platform because they knew he would reveal their “failures.”
“By excluding me from the stage, Presidents Biden and Trump seek to avoid discussion of their eight years of mutual failure, including deficits, wars, lockdowns, chronic disease, and inflation,” the president wrote.
To participate in the CNN debate, a candidate must meet all five of the broadcaster’s qualification criteria.
The candidate must be constitutionally eligible to be president, file a statement of constituency with the FEC, have their name on enough state ballots to reach the 270 electoral votes required to win the election, agree to the debate’s rules and format, and have received at least 15% in four national polls of registered or likely voters that meet CNN’s standards.
While Mr. Kennedy is correct that more than 43% of Americans identify as independents, this does not imply that all of them support him.
His overall lack of support will keep him out of the CNN debate. Mr. Kennedy failed to meet two of the event’s eligibility requirements. In four national surveys, he has not received at least 15%, and he has not appeared on enough state ballots to demonstrate his ability to win the presidency.
According to a recent New York Times/Philadelphia Inquirer/Seneca College survey, Mr. Kennedy is the strongest third-party candidate in decades, but he still only attracts around 10% of registered voters in battleground states.
Approximately half of those who voted for Mr. Kennedy said they did so because they supported him, while the other half said they were voting against Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump.
“I would support him as kind of like a protest vote,” said Benjamin Sandoval, a 21-year-old University of Michigan student originally from Ecuador. He called Biden “weak” and Trump a “bad man.”
Nicole Shanahan, Mr. Kennedy’s vice presidential pick, asserted in a post on X/Twitter that if he were to debate Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump, he would win.
“When @RobertKennedyJr debates these two troubled presidents, he will win big,” she tweeted.
