Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s relationship with Donald Trump is back in the spotlight — at a moment of upheaval in the presidential race and after a video of a phone call between the two was posted online and then deleted by Kennedy’s son.
In the video, Trump can be heard talking with Kennedy about children’s vaccines and the gunshot wound he suffered at a Pennsylvania rally on Saturday. “It sounded like a giant — like the world’s largest mosquito. And it was, it was a bullet going round,” Trump said in the video.
Appearing to commiserate with Kennedy about vaccines, Trump said, “I agree with you, man, something’s wrong with that whole system,” talking about dose size and vaccinating children.
He added: “And then you see the baby all of a sudden starting to change radically. I’ve seen it too many times, and then you hear it doesn’t have an impact, right?”
And Trump appeared to signal openness to doing something with his now-rival, though it’s unclear what. (In 2017, Kennedy told reporters that the then-president had extended an invitation to him to chair a committee on “vaccine safety and scientific integrity,” which the Trump camp later walked back in a statement.)
“I would love you to do some — I think it would be so good for you and so big for you,” Trump said, according to the video, without mentioning anything specific.
Neither Kennedy nor his campaign returned requests for comment. Trump’s campaign, when asked for comment, pointed to Kennedy’s social media post apologizing for his eldest son, Bobby Kennedy III, posting the video.
The conversation comes at an unusual point in the 2024 campaign, with Kennedy talking to Trump at least twice in two days. The two candidates, who share some major donors and other overlapping support, met in person Monday in Milwaukee, site of the Republican National Convention. Kennedy is also seeking a meeting with Democratic leaders, according to his campaign, but he is not preparing to drop out, said his press secretary, Stefanie Spear. And it’s still unclear exactly what effect Kennedy will have on the 2024 election as he pushes for ballot access in every state and for a spot on the September debate stage.
The independent candidate was set to hold a few events in Wisconsin this week but canceled because of “unforeseen circumstances,” according to a release. The campaign did not elaborate.
Democrats say the Trump video confirms what they’ve been saying all along: that Kennedy’s presence in the race helps Trump and that it shows them now openly coordinating. “He’s a spoiler for Trump,” said Lis Smith, who is leading anti-third party efforts for the Democratic National Committee.
The latest NBC News poll illustrated Kennedy’s complicated and ever-shifting role in the 2024 election. When offered Kennedy as a choice on the 2024 ballot, more respondents who initially chose Trump shifted his way. In terms of how people said they voted in 2020, about equal numbers of Biden and Trump supporters said they’d support Kennedy on a multicandidate ballot test.
And while Kennedy’s favorability numbers have declined since the previous NBC News survey in April, with 23% of registered voters viewing him positively and 35% viewing him negatively, Kennedy has maintained a positive rating among self-identified Republicans: 33% positive, 22% negative.
Kennedy and Trump have had up and down moments over the last few years. There was a meeting during Trump’s presidential transition, with nothing ever coming of it during the administration. Trump often egged on Kennedy while he was challenging President Joe Biden for the Democratic nomination — but the former president and his family turned critical when Kennedy became an independent general election rival.
During an interview with Telemundo in March, Kennedy claimed that multiple people from the Trump campaign had reached out about him being considered a potential running mate. Chris LaCavita, a senior adviser for the Trump campaign, responded to Kennedy on social media: “your a leftie loonie that would never be approached to be on the ticket.”
But Trump hasn’t always been hostile toward Kennedy this year. In June, Trump said he would have “no problem” with Kennedy joining that month’s CNN debate, but he ultimately did not qualify.
Trump and Kennedy’s shared critical statements about vaccines have drawn them together over the years — and may be part of the reason there’s a degree of overlap in their support.
The comments recorded in Kennedy’s video aren’t the first time Trump has expressed false beliefs about childhood vaccinations. In 2014, he tweeted that he was “against them in 1 massive dose,” falsely suggesting that childhood vaccines are administered all at once and that the recommended schedule — which is determined by an advisory committee made up of doctors, scientists and public health professionals — somehow causes autism in children.
Nearly every doctor and scientist around the world agrees: There is no link between autism and vaccinations. The 1998 study that alleged the measles, mumps and rubella vaccines caused autism has been debunked and retracted, and the author, Andrew Wakefield, had his medical license revoked for ethical violations. Trump also met with Wakefield in 2016.
Before he was a presidential candidate, Kennedy was an outspoken anti-vaccine activist as chairman and chief litigation counsel for the country’s largest anti-vaccine organization, Children’s Health Defense.
Kennedy announced he would go on leave from the Children’s Health Defense to run for president in April 2023, and he has been more measured in his public anti-vaccine rhetoric since then — while at the same time staffing his campaign with anti-vaccine activists.
In his own campaign, Trump has had to walk a delicate line between taking credit for Covid vaccines that saved lives and placating a conservative base that is more likely to distrust the vaccines. Trump attacked Kennedy’s anti-vaccine bonafides in a video in May. ”He’s not really an anti-vaxxer,” Trump said of Kennedy, “that’s only his political moment.”
