Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will speak Friday “about the current historical moment and his path forward,” his campaign said Wednesday, fueling growing speculation that Kennedy might drop out and support Republican nominee Donald Trump.
Mr. Kennedy’s running mate openly raised the possibility in a podcast this week, saying the campaign was considering a move to “join forces” with Mr. Trump to limit the election chances of Kamala Harris, whose Democratic convention ends Thursday night in Chicago.
The move would once have seemed unthinkable to Mr. Kennedy, a Democrat for most of his life and — as the nephew of President John F. Kennedy and son of Robert F. Kennedy — a member of a beloved Democratic dynasty.
Last month, at the Republican National Convention, Mr. Kennedy’s son posted and quickly deleted a video showing a phone call between candidates Kennedy and Trump, in which the former president appeared to be trying to convince his rival to side with him. Mr. Kennedy will speak in Phoenix, hours before Trump holds a rally in nearby Glendale.
A spokeswoman for Mr. Kennedy, Stefanie Spear, declined to say whether he planned to drop out or why he chose Arizona for his speech.
After leaving the Democratic primary to run as an independent, Mr. Kennedy built an unusually strong base of support for someone running without the backing of a major party. It was unclear where that support was coming from, which worried Republicans and Democrats alike.
But since President Joe Biden ended his re-election campaign and Democrats coalesced around Vice President Kamala Harris as their nominee, Mr. Kennedy’s rise has been stunted.
It seems increasingly unlikely that he will be able to take part in the debate when Mr Trump and Mrme Harris will face off next month, a moment that Kennedy has been counting on for momentum and legitimacy. His campaign finances have also been strained.
The news comes just over a week after a New York judge ruled that Kennedy should not appear on the ballot in the state because he listed a “fictitious” address on nominating petitions. Kennedy appealed the decision, but has faced similar challenges across the country.
On Wednesday, he was in a courtroom in suburban New York, waiting to testify in response to another election lawsuit in the state, this time backed by the Democratic National Committee, which is challenging the signatures collected by his campaign.
He also faces a likely legal challenge in Arizona, where last week he submitted signatures that may have been collected by a super PAC that supports him, in what Kennedy critics say constitutes illegal coordination between a candidate and an independent political group.