RFK Jr. Trashes New York Times After Interview Turns to Election ‘Spoiler’ Talk: ‘You’re an Instrument of the DNC’
AP Photo/Matt Rourke
Robert F. Kennedy accused The New York Times of being an “instrument of the Democratic Party” in a tense podcast interview where the independent presidential candidate repeatedly denied accusations he will act as a “spoiler” candidate in November.
“My wife would have never let me run if I couldn’t win,” Kennedy said, referring to Cheryl Hines, early in the latest episode of The Run-Up podcast from The New York Times. The comment came early as Kennedy insisted he would not be “spoiler” benefitting either President Joe Biden or Donald Trump.
Host Astead Herndon pushed Kennedy on whether he feels he’s “too insulated from the consequences of elections” to fully grasp his influence on the race. Kennedy told Herndon he did not do polling on whether he was pulling votes from either candidate and he would not drop out if someone presented him with evidence that he was.
“I’m offering a vision to Americans that they’re not getting. 70% of people in this country do not want a contest between Trump and Biden. Don’t you feel that those people should have an option?” Kennedy said.
The candidate argued voters should have options, especially in a “rerun” election of 2020 that is not exciting to independents.
After Herndon repeated the point of whether the candidate’s “privilege” was blinding him to the consequences of his candidacy, Kennedy pushed back calling the position he should drop out to favor one of the major two parties was a “privileged position.”
“Isn’t that kind of a privileged position that you have, of taking the position that The New York Times is not going to allow those people, those Americans, who don’t want to see a rerun of this contest?” he asked. Don’t you think they deserve something or are you going to sit there and say nobody should do that because I’m scared of this guy or I’m scared of that guy?”
Herndon argued the paper has “pressured” both Democrats and Republicans into “setting up” Biden and Trump as their candidates in light of the public being generally disinterested in the matchup.
“Listen, The New York Times is essentially an instrument of the Democratic Party,” Kennedy said.
“I understand you’re making an institutional argument,” Herndon said.
“You’ve been making institutional arguments against me since this started,” Kennedy said. “You’re an instrument of the DNC and of course you’re going to try to get people — your job, doing what you’re doing, is to try to spin this some way that is going to help Biden and hurt Trump and get rid of any threat to that.”
Someone working for Kennedy soon ended the interview (she noted earlier it was going over the allotted time), and Herndon capped off the talk by saying he didn’t understand the “spoiler” question he was asking.
“I appreciate your time. And just so you know, that’s not what I’m here to do nor was that the question I was asking,” he said.
Listen to the entire episode of The Run-Up here.
