Q&A of the Day – What Would the Impact of RFK Jr. Dropping Out of the Presidential Race Be?
Each day I feature a listener question sent by one of these methods.
Email: brianmudd@iheartmedia.com
Social: @brianmuddradio
iHeartRadio: Use the Talkback feature – the microphone button on our station’s page in the iHeart app.
Today’s Entry: @brianmuddradio Republicans seem excited about the possibility of RFK Jr dropping out of the race but how big of a deal do you think it would really be? Even if he did endorse Trump, it wouldn’t mean his supporters would vote for him.
Bottom Line: Yes, and true. Yes, to your point that many on the right are seemingly excited about the potential of RFK Jr. dropping out and endorsing Trump (and/or are suggesting the implications would be game changing). Take for example this Fox News headline yesterday: RFK Jr’s running mate pitches move that could completely change the presidential race. Also, it’s true that it’s unclear whether RFK Jr. endorsing Trump would swing those voters over to him. First, let’s set up where we are with this story.
On Tuesday, RFK’s running mate, Nicole Shanahan fueled speculation that this may take place when she appeared on the Impact Theory podcast and said: There’s two options that we’re looking at and one is staying in, forming that new party, but we run the risk of a Kamala Harris and Walz presidency because we draw votes from Trump, we draw somehow more votes from Trump. Or we walk away right now and join forces with Donald Trump and, you know, we walk away from that and explain to our base why we’re making this decision. She also spoke to why it is that the two former Democrats would be inclined to endorse Trump and why they’re so concerned about Harris winning. As she said (in referring to the Democrat Party) We are taking a very serious look at making sure that the people that have corrupted our fair and free democracy do not end up in office. They have banned us, shadow-banned us, kept us off stages, manipulated polls, used lawfare against us, sued us in every possible state, they’ve even planted insiders into our campaign to disrupt it and to create actual legal issues for us. On Wednesday, RFK Jr. announced he’d address the nation on Friday about the future of his campaign with numerous outlets reporting that the plan is to drop out of the race and endorse Donald Trump for president. Notably, his announcement is scheduled to take place only 20 miles from a Trump rally spot in Arizona.
It’s interesting to note that the Democrat Party obviously feels as though RFK’s inclusion in the race is a negative for Kamala Harris. Therefore, is it possible that if RFK were to drop out of the race, he might be playing into the hand the Democrats would like to see him play? It’s all speculation to a large degree right now for two reasons. First, we’re over ten weeks away from Election Day and no one is currently casting ballots anywhere in the country, therefore even reliable data today may not be accurate by the time people actually vote. Second, all we have to go on is what the polls say today, and polls have historically oversampled third-party support. But as for those polls what we’ve seen is a shift from when Joe Biden was at the top of the Democrat’s ticket to where we are with Kamala Harris at the top of the ticket.
In the RealClear Politics average of polls at the time that Joe Biden dropped out of the race Trump was shown with an 3.1% advantage nationally in a head-to-head race. That lead grew to an 4.2% advantage with RFK Jr. polled, along with other third-party candidates as an options in the race. Broadly speaking it appeared as though RFK Jr. and other third-party candidates may have helped Trump in an election against Joe Biden. This wasn’t lost on Trump as he said this earlier this year in regard to RFK Jr.’s candidacy: He is Crooked Joe Biden’s Political Opponent, not mine. I love that he is running! However, with Kamala Harris as Trump’s opponent that is no longer the case. Most recently Harris has averaged a 1.5% advantage head-to-head against Trump, with that lead growing to 1.6% with the third-party candidates added in. So, at least as of today in the polls, the script has seemingly flipped. That also hasn’t been lost on Trump as he recently posted this on Truth Social: RFK Jr. is a Democrat ‘Plant,’ a Radical Left Liberal who’s been put in place in order to help Crooked Joe Biden. A Vote for Junior’ would essentially be a WASTED PROTEST VOTE. What’s more is what the polls suggest is the case in the most closely watched swing states.
Harris is performing better with RFK Jr. presented as an option in Arizona, Michigan and North Carolina. Now, it’s not a slam dunk because Trump currently performs better in Pennsylvania and Nevada with RFK in the race. With that said the most recent New York Times/Siena College Poll asked swing state RFK Jr. voters who their “second choice” candidate would be. By a 41% to 27% margin, they said they’d break for Trump without RFK in the race. Two other pollsters found similar results recently as well. Nevertheless, we’re currently in an odd place where both major party presidential candidates view RFK Jr. as a potential threat to their ability to win the race. But about winning the presidential race...
While obviously no one, not even currently pledged RFK Jr. supporters expect that he’ll be the next president of the United States, he’s not on the ballot in even half of the states. RFK has currently only qualified for 24 state ballots representing a total of 279 electoral college votes (though Florida, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin are among them). And this speaks to why RFK is now considering exiting the race. We’re coming up on the final deadlines for ballot qualification in the remaining states. If it’s almost not literally possible for him to have a path to victory, aside from realistic viability, why do it? One reason is what Nicole Shanahan offered up. Many states have a provision where any political party that achieves a certain level of support, often 5%, automatically qualifies for ballot access in future elections. RFK could choose to form a new political party and attempt to gain automatic ballot access for it by picking up support in as many states as possible in this cycle (potentially making it easier for that party to compete in the future by focusing on only the states where they don’t have ballot access). But the other option, as Shanahan outlined, is to attempt to stop the party from winning that has fought to keep her ticket off ballots this cycle. The party that’s the true threat to democracy in their eyes – their former party – the Democrat Party.
On balance it does appear that RFK Jr.’s potential exit from the race may be beneficial to Trump’s candidacy. Though, just as 3rd party support is commonly oversampled, the extent to which it may be beneficial to Trump probably is a bit overstated too.