RFK Jr. names Silicon Valley attorney Nicole Shanahan as running mate

CNN
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Impartial presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. named lawyer and tech entrepreneur Nicole Shanahan as his operating mate Tuesday at a rally in Oakland, California.

“I’m so proud to introduce to you the following vp america, my fellow lawyer, an excellent scientist, technologist, a fierce warrior mother, Nicole Shanahan,” Kennedy stated.

Shanahan’s choice will speed up Kennedy’s try to achieve poll entry in as many states as potential. Practically half require a vice presidential decide to advance that course of. Shanahan may also be tasked with broadening Kennedy’s enchantment and serving to increase cash to gas his big-spending marketing campaign. There was hypothesis that the rich 38-year-old, who was beforehand married to Google co-founder Sergey Brin, may attain into her personal pockets to help the trigger.

Kennedy stated he chosen Shanahan partly as a result of he needed somebody with whom he shares widespread values on agriculture, well being care and Huge Tech, whereas additionally aligning with Kennedy’s imaginative and prescient on how leaders ought to carry themselves.

“I needed a companion who’s a gifted administrator, but in addition possesses the present of curiosity, an open, inquiring thoughts and the boldness to vary even her strongest opinions within the face of opposite proof. I needed somebody with a non secular dimension and compassion and idealism and, above all, a deep love of america of America,” Kennedy stated.

Whereas major-party presidential candidates usually announce their vice presidential nominees nearer to their occasion’s nominating conventions in the summertime, Kennedy is shifting now so his marketing campaign can transition into the following section of its poll entry efforts.

The son of former US Lawyer Common Robert F. Kennedy and the nephew of former President John F. Kennedy, the impartial candidate has set a aim to qualify for the poll in all 50 states and Washington, DC. He’s up to now on the poll solely in Utah. His marketing campaign has stated it has gathered sufficient signatures to qualify for the poll in New Hampshire, Nevada and Hawaii, whereas a brilliant PAC backing his White Home bid has stated it has collected sufficient signatures to qualify Kennedy in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan and South Carolina.

The Kennedy marketing campaign stated Tuesday it’s “already actively amassing signatures in 17 states and is kicking off its petition gathering this week in 19 extra states which can be open and require a vice presidential candidate.”

In her remarks Tuesday, Shanahan stated she plans to “focus the following seven months of my life” working to assist Kennedy meet his poll entry aim.

Kennedy’s poll entry in Nevada, nevertheless, might be in jeopardy. In a press release to CNN on Monday, a spokesperson for Nevada’s Democratic secretary of state stated that “an error” had been made in speaking poll entry steering to the marketing campaign. The regulation signifies that candidates should “designate a nominee for Vice President” of their petitions.

Paul Rossi, a poll entry lawyer for the Kennedy marketing campaign, instructed Nevada Democrats had been trying to dam the candidate from gaining poll entry within the state – a declare the secretary of state’s workplace rejected. “By no means was the preliminary error or subsequent statutory steering made with intent to learn or hurt any political occasion or candidate for workplace,” spokesperson Cecilia Heston stated within the assertion.

Including to the quite a few poll entry hurdles are challenges from Democrats trying to stifle Kennedy, whom they painting as a spoiler candidate who may assist former President Donald Trump defeat President Joe Biden. The Democratic Nationwide Committee has filed two complaints with the Federal Election Committee prior to now two months, accusing the pro-Kennedy tremendous PAC, American Values 2024, of committing marketing campaign finance violations and of illegally coordinating with the Kennedy marketing campaign to run its personal poll entry initiative. Final week, the Democratic Occasion of Hawaii objected to the Kennedy marketing campaign’s poll entry petition there, briefly blocking it forward of a state elections workplace listening to Thursday.

Each Kennedy and Shanahan, who contributed to Biden’s election effort in 2020, took intention on the Democratic Occasion on Tuesday, with Shanahan accusing Democrats of “dropping their manner.”

“I’m leaving the Democratic Occasion,” Shanahan instructed the gang of a whole bunch in Oakland, including, “I do consider they’ve misplaced their manner and their management.”

Shanahan may play a job in boosting fundraising because the Kennedy marketing campaign navigates the expensive poll qualification course of and a normal election marketing campaign towards Biden and Trump, every of whose campaigns dwarf the Kennedy staff’s fundraising totals.

New FEC studies present the Kennedy marketing campaign raised simply $3.2 million in February, whereas spending about $2.9 million, and it ended the month with about $5.1 million within the financial institution. American Values 2024 spent $8.8 million in February, together with $6.2 million on a TV advert that aired throughout the Tremendous Bowl. Shanahan instructed The New York Occasions final month that she contributed roughly $4 million to assist the PAC run the advert and assisted in coordinating manufacturing of the industrial.

Kennedy has denied prioritizing a possible operating mate’s wealth when vetting his choices.

“I’d by no means select a vice presidential candidate primarily based on how a lot cash they’ve,” the candidate stated in a NewsNation interview final week.

Except for the necessity to start gathering signatures in additional than half the remaining states, Kennedy has supplied little perception into the varieties of voters he’s concentrating on forward of his vice presidential announcement. In an interview with CNN earlier this month, Kennedy stated his operating mate could be “someone who was aligned with my values, optimistic about our nation and its potential, and in a position to run the nation at a second’s discover.”

Kennedy instructed supporters on Tuesday he chosen Shanahan partly to supply a voice to youthful voters and to the “working poor,” two teams he hopes upon which to construct a coalition.

“I would like Nicole to be a champion to the rising variety of millennials and Gen Z Individuals who’ve misplaced religion of their future and misplaced their delight in our nation,” Kennedy stated.

“She’s gonna battle for all these Individuals who know what it’s wish to skip meals to pay for gasoline and watch meals costs climb ever greater and marvel how on the planet they’re gonna make it by means of the grocery retailer checkout line,” he added.

Different folks whom Kennedy reportedly thought-about for the operating mate place included former Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura, NFL quarterback Aaron Rodgers, former Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, Republican Sen. Rand Paul, former Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang, former tv host Mike Rowe, motivational speaker Tony Robbins and civil rights lawyer Tricia Lindsay.

Kennedy has by no means held workplace however has impressed a small contingent of supporters drawn to his advocacy towards public well being mandates and the affect of cash on selections made by authorities and personal companies. He based Youngsters’s Well being Protection, a corporation that commonly spreads anti-vaccine misinformation, and he has promoted anti-vaccine conspiracy theories at marketing campaign occasions.

Shanahan echoed a few of Kennedy’s anti-vaccine beliefs in her remarks Tuesday, implicitly making the false suggestion that “pharmaceutical medicines” corresponding to prescriptions and vaccines might be contributing to rising charges of autism diagnoses. She spoke about her expertise in researching kids’s well being after her daughter was identified as being on the autism spectrum.

“Pharmaceutical medication has its place, however no single security examine can assess the cumulative impression of 1 prescription on high of one other prescription, and one shot on high of one other shot on high of one other shot all through the course of childhood. We simply don’t do this examine proper now, and we should,” Shanahan stated.

Kennedy’s presidential bid started as a main problem to Biden in April 2023. He exited the Democratic contest final fall to run as an impartial, saying he needed to battle towards the two-party system, which he stated has failed to offer Individuals with viable choices for the presidency. His determination to problem Biden has drawn criticism from Kennedy members of the family – a handful of them joined the president for a St. Patrick’s Day celebration on the White Home final week.

As Kennedy pursues his impartial presidential bid, he has been in dialogue with the Libertarian Occasion, relationship to final yr. He met once more with occasion chair Angela McArdle in February, in response to a supply conversant in the assembly. Kennedy instructed CNN earlier this yr that he was “very comfy with a lot of the values of the Libertarian Occasion.”

Whereas Democrats proceed to insist that Kennedy could be a spoiler for Trump, it’s unclear which major-party candidate he’d pull extra assist from, whilst polls present him receiving vital backing in key states. CNN polling launched Friday from Michigan and Pennsylvania – two states Trump gained in 2016 that Biden then flipped in 2020 – confirmed Kennedy hitting 16% in Pennsylvania in a hypothetical four-way matchup with Trump (40%), Biden (38%) and impartial candidate Cornel West (4%), and taking 18% in Michigan in the same face-off with Trump (40%), Biden (34%) and West (4%).

Each polls confirmed Kennedy successful a plurality of assist from voters holding an unfavorable view of each Biden and Trump, regardless of giant shares of that group additionally saying they don’t know sufficient about him to have an opinion.

Kennedy stated he hopes his marketing campaign is usually a place for “homeless Democrats and homeless Republicans” to have their voices heard. He responded to the notion he could be a spoiler for both candidate, projecting optimism he can defeat each candidates.

“Our marketing campaign is a spoiler. I agree with that. It’s a spoiler for President Biden and for President Trump,” he stated.

Bernard Tamas, who has researched third events within the US, stated the spectacle round Kennedy’s vice presidential announcement could not do a lot to maneuver the needle since Individuals traditionally have proven little curiosity in operating mates.

“Vice presidential candidates don’t are likely to push elections very far, even for the major-party candidates. And for the minor-party candidates, the place there’s already missing of data, it’s unlikely that they might have some form of main impression,” stated Tamas, who teaches at Valdosta State College in Georgia.

This story and headline have been up to date.

CNN’s Ethan Cohen contributed to this report.