Robert F. Kennedy Jr. sees Vice President Harris as indistinguishable from President Biden.
In a press conference on Sunday evening, the independent candidate reinforced that he is able to beat both former President Trump and Biden — despite Biden announcing hours earlier that he is exiting the race.
In a nearly 30 minute address, Kennedy used critical rhetoric toward the government common in his stump speech, focusing heavily on Biden and Trump, while only occasionally ripping into Harris as an unknown entity.
Democrats on Capitol Hill and party groups started coalescing around Harris after Biden offered her his endorsement just weeks before the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
Harris, Kennedy said, “has never voiced any distinction between herself and President Biden,” when asked why he spoke about Biden as if he were still in the race. “We don’t know what she stands for,” Kennedy said. “According to her, she stands for everything that President Biden stands for.”
The environmental lawyer referred to Harris, who pledged to “earn” what she hopes is millions of Americans’ votes in November, as a “war hawk” on China and Ukraine, and said that she has not made an imprint on U.S. domestic policy as VP. He predicted she wouldn’t meaningfully help lessen the country’s financial deficit, a particular area of focus for Kennedy.
Kennedy also critiqued the process of moving away from Biden. He accused Democrats of embracing Harris as Biden’s successor because, in his estimation, “it’s the easiest way to hold onto the money.”
The third-party candidate, who changed from the Democrat affiliation to run as an Independent, was referring to certain campaign finance rules that make transferring money from the incumbent president to his running mate possible during the election cycle.
He alleged that Democrats are merely attempting to “create the illusion of a Democracy” and likened the move to how Russia selects its presidents. “It is a cabal that’s choosing,” Kennedy said. “The same way that the Soviet Union does.”