A pair of political insiders questioned Donald Trump's willingness to align himself with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and risk alienating crucial voting blocs.
Kennedy's running mate Nicole Shanahan has said they were considering dropping their third-party White House bid and backing Trump, who told "Fox & Friends" on Thursday that he would be "honored" by Kennedy's endorsement, and a former adviser to Hillary Clinton said the Republican nominee would be making a mistake to offer him a Cabinet role, as they've reportedly discussed.
"If you've been accused of being weird and dangerous, it seems like Trump is doubling down on that," said former Clinton adviser Richard Goodstein. "I mean, we've heard RFK Jr. say that wifi, you know, creates cancer and chemicals in the water make kids gay, and the list goes on of just absolutely nuttiness."
Kennedy is currently polling at less than 5 percent, and there's some question whether his voters would move to Trump or Kamala Harris if he ended his long-shot campaign, but Goodstein said their support wasn't worth tying himself to the political scion.
"If your target is the suburban swing voter mom, the notion you're going to have two anti-vaxxers making the call at the top of the administration is going to freak you out for your kids," Goodstein said. "So I don't see that this is a particularly good move for Trump, but it's not the last one, I suspect."
Maura Gillespie, who served as chief of staff to former GOP congressman Adam Kinzinger and spent years working for former House Speaker John Boehner, agreed that Kennedy's supporters might find their way to Trump while also potentially sacrificing other voters.
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"I think there are a handful of voters who weren't politically active, and saw in 2016, which largely contributed to Trump winning because he tapped into the fear and anger and this concern and vulnerability for a population that was never politically active, but became politically active," Gillespie said. "Yes, he largely used conspiracy theories to do that. RFK Jr. is doing the same thing, so there is a small part of the population that will find it appealing, but I think on a large scale it should be concerning because it's not going to reach the independent voters, the moderate voters, the moderate Republicans who aren't happy with the bombastic behavior of Trump or RFK Jr., for that matter so you're not appealing to them."
"Quite frankly, Donald Trump doesn't seem to want that portion of the electorate, which he desperately needs to win," Gillespire added, "and I find it to be a huge mistake, and Republicans down ballot should see that happening and veer away from it."
