Republican pollster Frank Luntz signaled that independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s backing of former President Trump could help him win battleground states in 2024.
Luntz said that while Kennedy’s poll numbers have dropped since Vice President Harris ascended to the top of the Democratic Party presidential ticket, his remaining supporters could provide enough backing to tip some swing-state results in Trump’s favor.
“It’s probably worth about 1 percent for Trump and that 1 percent could be everything if it’s in the swing states,” Luntz said during his Friday appearance on NewsNation’s “On Balance” with Leland Vittert.
“In the end, the reason why Kennedy was drawing 10, 12, even as high as 14 percent is because he was taking votes away from Joe Biden,” he continued. “Joe Biden’s gone. Kamala Harris has replaced him, and [Kennedy’s] vote collapsed down to about 4 or 5 percent and what’s left is a Trump vote.”
“Some of them are simply not going to participate in November, roughly two to one, the ones who are remaining will vote for Trump over Harris, and that's worth a single percent, and a single percent can make the difference in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.”
A poll from Cook Political Report Swing State Project released in mid-August found that Harris was leading or was tied with Trump in six of the seven swing-states. The survey found that she had a 1-point lead over Trump in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
Kennedy, who began his White House run as a Democrat, switched his affiliation to run as an independent in October. He garnered double-digit support in the polls. Recently, those numbers dipped to single digits. On Friday, he announced a suspension of his campaign and that he would endorse Trump. He said he would remove his name from ballots in battleground states to avoid being a spoiler, but would still be on the ballot in the majority of red and blue states.
Luntz also dinged the media, saying that Kennedy would have been portrayed differently had he endorsed Harris, not Trump.
“If he had endorsed Harris, I do think he would be regarded as a hero but because he endorsed Trump, the people who are communicating that are not giving him the credit that he deserves, and I think we have to be careful in the last 73 days of this election campaign to understand the motivations of the people providing us information like what I'm doing right now, because I am dedicated to getting this election correct,” he said.
The pollster argued later that if Trump would campaign on issues like immigration and inflation, he would have an advantage, but if the 2024 election is about character traits, the vice president has the upper hand.
“If it is about attributes, if he continues to attack Harris and the way that he is done, and he gets away from inflation, which is really affordability, stops talking about paycheck-to-paycheck voters, which is better than working class or middle class, the language does matter here, if he does that, he is in the driver’s seat.”
