Is a Biden-Trump-RFK debate in the cards?
Robert F. Kennedy Jr.âs rising profile is raising the question of whether he could appear on a debate stage with President Biden and Donald Trump â and what impact that could have on the presidential race.
Itâs not yet clear if Kennedy, who has seen scattered polling throughout his candidacy, will even be able to qualify for a televised forum, as the independent candidate has also yet to collect enough signatures for most state ballots.
But discontent with the two partiesâ standard-bearers has opened up a potential third choice, especially one with access to considerable money, making a square-off among the three polarizing figures a possibility.
âIf Bobby can consistently poll at 15 percent and better from now [until] fall, coupled with increasing ballot access, he has a legit shot at making the debate stage,â a Kennedy ally familiar with the campaignâs messaging strategy told The Hill.
The first presidential debate on the commissionâs calendar is slated for Sept. 16 in Texas, followed by a vice presidential showing on Sept. 25 in Pennsylvania. Two more productions are slated for October in Virginia and Utah.
Kennedy has made it known that he wants to get in on the debate action. Heâs angling to go head-to-head with Biden and Trump, and has called for an open exchange of ideas and critique of existing policy in front of the American public. He wants voters to envision a November election that looks beyond a dismal two-party rematch.
âI should have a spot in those debates,â Kennedy said in an appearance on Fox News this week. âThereâs all these really existential issues and neither of them can really deal with them.â
âWe are in a more toxic polarization and division than any time since the American Civil War,â he said.
As the drama builds, Biden and Trump have not been enthusiastic about the idea of getting into it with Kennedy, whom they both view as a menace, regardless of the host or timeline of the debate.
For one, it could simply elevate the third-party contender as Trump and Biden poll neck-and-neck. Kennedy has family name recognition but is not as widely known as the current or former president, who enjoy the benefits of each having held the White House.
At this point in the race, itâs also unclear whose campaign he could rattle more drastically. Biden and Trump are each vying for support among covered voters who feel frustrated with Washington politics. That includes independents, who famously swing either way and with whom Kennedy has sought to identify this cycle.
Aaron Kall, who serves as director of debate at the University of Michigan, said Kennedy could also throw another âwild cardâ onto the stage as Biden and Trump each want to grab the spotlight and avoid miscues amid questions about their age and mental fitness.
For now, Democrats and Republicans still see Kennedy as an unlikely candidate, though theyâre each paying closer attention to his campaign than in the past. His media circuit has mostly consisted of podcasts and alternative shows with select cable news appearances. Showing up in front of a national audience as a contrast to his two competitors could showcase him in front of a much wider audience.
Still, thereâs a fundamental question of whether Biden and Trump will even debate each other. Though Trump has said heâd debate Biden âanytime, anywhere, any place,â the former president skipped out on all of the Republican primary debates held this cycle, a move decried by many of his ex-competitors and by the Biden campaign. Thereâs no guarantee he wonât do that again.
Team Biden, meanwhile, has said heâs âhappyâ to debate Trump, going perhaps further than some of his more hesitant comments on the prospect in recent months.
Trump, while in New York this week for his hush money trial, claimed he doesnât âknow anythingâ about Kennedy, the candidate he called in a recent Truth Social post âa Radical Left Liberal whoâs been put in place in order to help Crooked Joe Biden.â
âLook, RFK is polling very low. Heâs not a serious candidate,â Trump said in Manhattan, when asked whether or not heâd debate the independent.
âThey say he hurts Biden â I donât know who he hurts, he might hurt me, I donât know. But he has very low numbers, certainly not numbers that he can debate with. And heâs gotta get his numbers up a lot higher before heâs credible,â Trump added.
Some strategists believe Biden has the edge over his two rivals, given Trumpâs ongoing legal strife and questions about Kennedyâs viability.
âI do think that President Biden will come out a clear winner if all three of them get up on that stage,â said Democratic strategist Kristen Hawn, as new polling suggests Kennedyâs bid could do more harm to Trump.
Hawn also noted that the timeline of Trumpâs criminal trials is still up in the air, and legal obligations could complicate plans for a debate â or simply draw more attention to them.
Some of Kennedyâs allies have said that regardless of his troubles with the law, Trump could still want to engage on stage if given the chance. âHeâs open to mixing things up,â said the source familiar with Kennedyâs campaign. âHeâs more than willing to debate Bobby.â
Bidenâs boosters, including within the Democratic National Committee, however, may be much less willing to advise the incumbent president to debate Kennedy. Democrats have made it clear that they see him as someone who spouts conspiracy theories about vaccines and whose aligned super PAC takes money from Trump donors.
âThe DNC will do everything they can to deny Bobby a podium,â the pro-Kennedy source speculated.
Kennedy and the Democratic Party apparatus have been at odds much of this year, with Kennedy picking them apart for being biased toward Biden and committee officials criticizing his bid as a way to elevate Trump and building a narrative that heâs a âspoiler.â
âThe DNC orchestrated a notably skewed democratic primary, resulting in Biden emerging as their nominee. Now, their stuck with Biden, who canât beat Trump,â Kennedy wrote on X on Friday. âCan someone make this make sense?â
Kennedy convened a press conference on Wednesday in New York City attempting to flip the script on Biden, claiming that the president cannot beat Trump in a three-way contest and that he is, in his own estimation, the true âspoilerâ â a point he would likely address in a debate setting.
Democrats were quick to call out Kennedyâs briefing as merely a gimmick to divert the focus away from his own long-shot effort.
âNothing but a media stunt meant to distract from the fact that he has no path to getting the 270 electoral college votes needed to win,â said Doug Gordon, a Democratic strategist.
âSince he canât win, his candidacy will only serve to take votes away from other candidates. And no stunt will change that,â Gordon said. âStaying in a race you have no path to winning is the definition of a spoiler.â
Kall, the presidential debate scholar, expressed skepticism about Kennedy qualifying through the Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD), the body thatâs sponsored all general election presidential debates for decades. One of the CPD requirements, along with a 15 percent threshold in qualified polls, is that a given candidateâs name must appear on enough state ballots to have âat least a mathematical chance of securing an Electoral College majorityâ in 2024. Critics say that could be tough for Kennedy.
The Trump campaign has its own concerns with the process. Frustrated with the CPDâs September start date, it called this week for other networks to go around the system and host debates outside of that schedule.
âIf we go back to the really old setup where itâs just different networks [hosting debates] and they would have the ability to have their own criteria,â Kall said, then Kennedyâs participation might be more likely â though Trump and Biden may have to negotiate.
Whether or not Kennedy qualifies for the stage, the current and former president have âa lot more to gain from debatingâ than not, said Tammy Vigil, a Boston University professor of media science with a focus on political campaigns.
âHeâd have to really make a surge in support,â Vigil said of Kennedy. âI donât think itâs very likely, although it would be really interesting to see that debate.â
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