Democrats are expressing increased apprehension and undertaking efforts to counter the threat of third-party candidates to President Joe Biden’s reelection chances, The Washington Post reported on Thursday.
They are particularly concerned about prominent third-party presidential candidates like independents Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Cornel West, the Post reported. The Democratic National Committee (DNC) and others are ramping up their efforts to combat them by hiring communications professionals and considering the establishment of a new organization to collaborate on countering potential threats.
“It’s clear that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is being propped up and funded by Donald Trump and his allies because they believe that he is a useful stalking horse who could throw the election Trump’s way,” Lis Smith, former adviser to Commerce Secretary Pete Buttigieg’s 2020 presidential campaign, whom the DNC enlisted in January to counter third parties, told the Post. “We need to sound that alarm every day between now and the election.”
The Middle East crisis under Biden is contributing to the concerns, a Democrat who is familiar with the effort to counter third party candidates, told the Post on condition of anonymity. Israel and terrorist group Hamas are engaged in a conflict and the president has been losing support among young and Muslim voters over his support for Israel.
“A lot of Democrats have come to the realization over the last month that RFK and West are real electoral threats and not just curiosities, and the Middle East crisis is partially driving that, especially in West’s case,” the individual asserted. “The RFK problem is not that he gets 18 percent. It is that he gets 3 percent or 2 percent or 1 percent.”
West has taken a particularly strong stand against Israel’s actions in Gaza, and criticized Biden’s support of them in an interview with the Post.
