Last night, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was in town for a rally at Fox Theater in downtown Tucson. I figured this was the perfect chance to engage in some Pavement Journalism, so I decided to check it out.
Because RFK Jr. is running an independent campaign with a very interesting cross-section of supporters, I didn’t really know what to expect with regards to crowd size and enthusiasm. Would the place be packed full of rowdy college kids, or boomers longing for the return of the Kennedy years? (Ironically, the answer was “not much of either”, though more of the latter than the former — even in this college town.)
Arriving on the scene, the line to get into the theater wrapped halfway around the block (though some of the delay was due to security measures getting into the building) — impressive! While waiting in line, I overheard numerous people discussing the covid vaccines and mandates, which wasn’t much of a surprise considering the last few years. (No, that’s not eavesdropping — it’s INVESTIGATING!) Numerous campaign volunteers worked their way up and down the line collecting signatures to get Kennedy on the ballot in Arizona, while a very…….enthusiastic……volunteer handed out “Kennedy for President 2024” stickers.
Funny side note: also while in line, an (attractive) woman asked me about writing this Substack and suggested that she could help by sending me stories I might overlook — even asking for my contact information. Obviously, this could only mean one of two things….and after I determined she wasn’t James O’Keefe in glasses, I figured she must be a CIA honeypot — maybe tasked with assassinating me! (Just kidding, Stacy!)
After making my way inside, I began talking with attendees about their backgrounds and why they were there. Jesse, a 40-something former (?) Democrat who works in the medical marijuana industry, was looking for more information about Kennedy and his plans to reign in Big Pharma. He’s worried that resources are being allocated to the top of the pharma pyramid and not at the ‘street level’, where they could help the people who need it most. Jesse was still undecided about his vote, and had only decided to attend the rally a couple days ago.
People like Jesse were a surprisingly large part of last night’s audience (or at least the people I talked to before the speech) — undecided voters who were looking for more information because they don’t like the idea of voting for Trump OR Biden.
Once the last of the attendees were inside (by my count, roughly 500-600 people, not including media/volunteers), the rally kicked off with a film highlighting RFK Jr.’s October 9th announcement to run as an Independent.
After a few quick words from Dick Russell (hawking his RFK Jr. book) and Jesse Ventura (who has some experience winning as a third-party candidate), Kennedy took the stage to “Bobby!” and “USA!” chants.
Kennedy began his speech touting a ‘new poll’ declaring that 34% of Americans would vote for him. (The closest thing to this I could find was this article stating 34% of Americans 18-29 would vote for him. Upon re-watch, he does NOT qualify his statement.) He also mentioned that NBC News declared this a “three-man race” — which immediately made me think Kennedy has no chance. (That’s much more a rip on NBC than Kennedy.)
Switching gears, Kennedy surprised me by bringing up Tucker Carlson and his 40-minute interview with Calley Means, during which the pair discussed Big Pharma’s stranglehold on Americans and the media. Kennedy claimed that this ‘poisoning of America’ has led to a massive increase in chronic illness in the country — chronic illness that means big money for Big Pharma. (Example: RFK Jr. states that in his generation, 1 in 10,000 people had severe autism, a number that’s 1 in 34 today.)
In what would be a continuing theme of his speech, Kennedy mentioned that none of the other candidates are talking about this massive spike in physical and mental health issue. (Fact check: True.)
Shifting to the polarization of the country, Kennedy claimed much of the division in America is simply a distraction technique used to keep ordinary citizens mad at one another while the ‘elites’ continue to loot the wealth out from under us. (This may sound familiar to long-time readers.) Kennedy promised that as President he would tone down the rhetoric and division — instead focusing on our similarities rather than our differences. (These similarities include taking care of veterans, the importance of good schools and teachers (including charter schools), and protecting the border.)
Speaking of the border (which is obviously a big issue in Arizona), Kennedy mentioned that kids in New York are unable to play sports because their fields are being used to house illegal immigrants. He declared that “Every city in the country is a border town” and that we need orderly, legal, migration.
Kennedy also promised to unravel the ‘war machine’ and rebuild the middle class — ripping into Blackrock for buying up homes and pushing prices out of the range of most Americans. (I was disappointed but not surprised that Kennedy didn’t mention the Federal Reserve as the key here.) One of Kennedy’s plans to fix this issue is to promise homeowners a 3% mortgage (presumably from government) so they can build equity and have capitol to ‘follow their dreams’.
RFK Jr. went on to extol the virtues of small businesses, and touched on the fact that the covid years were a huge transfer of wealth from the middle class to the rich — and this happened under the watch of the two men who remain the frontrunners in 2024.
Kennedy then promised to bring back pride to America (no, not that kind) by restoring the country as a place of moral authority. During a section that could have been lifted from a Ron Paul speech, RFK Jr. explained that terrorists don’t hate us ‘for our freedoms’, but because we’ve been exporting death and destruction since the end of WWII. Ending the forever wars are the first step in reclaiming America’s moral authority, Kennedy suggested.
Turning to climate change, Kennedy attempted to split the difference on the issue by reframing it — noting that we can all agree on clean air and water, as well as protecting sacred spaces. (Personally, I’d much rather that our resources actually go to clean air and water rather than trying to control the weather.)
In another section of speech that could have been lifted from Ron Paul, RFK Jr. explained how corporate capture of agencies (CDC, FDA, USDA, etc.) has inverted their entire existence. Instead of the USDA protecting farmers and our food supply as it was created to do, Kennedy suggested it now does the opposite. The NIH getting kickbacks for the Moderna vaccine was another example of corporate capture used by Kennedy.
RFK Jr. finished his speech by stressing the need for volunteers to help gather signatures to get him on the ballot in Arizona. (He needs 43,000 signatures to qualify, but the campaign wants to collect 70,000, knowing the DNC/RNC will challenge as many as possible.) Kennedy noted that while he’s doing very well among young people, the Baby Boomers who still get their news from media are slow to get on board. His solution?
“If you’re a kid, what you need to do is tie your parents down and make them listen to a Joe Rogan interview.”
Tied up or not, that sure beats listening to Rachel Maddow.
After the speech, most people started heading for the exit, but a fairly sizeable portion of them formed a ‘selfie line’ to get pictures with RFK Jr. Seeing another chance for some interviews, I chatted with the people waiting in line. Unsurprisingly, this subset of rallygoers were more firm in their support for Kennedy. Many were long-time independents who think the two parties are too extreme — especially when it comes to censorship.
My last task of the night was tracking down the guy enthusiastically handing out stickers while the crowd was waiting in line — this was a guy who was pretty clearly high up in the volunteer chain. (From my experience in the Ron Paul days, these were some of the best people to talk to because they could discuss all aspects of the campaign.)
Upon actually meeting Kyle Kemper, I was not disappointed. It turns out he’s “Lead Activator” for the Kennedy campaign, and sometimes rolls with the Kennedy Bus. Kemper explained that after seeing RFK Jr. speak last year, he was impressed with Kennedy’s characteristics and qualifications. Kemper has long been an independent who’s against centralization, and believes the current two-party system is the result of centralization of power. (Unsurprisingly, Kemper is a Ron Paul fan.)
Kemper acknowledges that ballot access is the main hurdle for the Kennedy campaign, but believes they will overcome that obstacle with the energy of the volunteers (Kemper is a pretty good start in that area!) and the candidate himself — along with maybe by leaning into the Kennedy name and its history.
When asked for some final words, Kemper thought for a moment.
“Everybody’s invited to be involved — no permission needed.”
This seems like a pretty good slogan for a candidate trying to — without permission — upend the two-party system.
As always, here’s the full video from last night’s event (Kennedy takes the stage about 15:45) so you can see the speech (and fact check me) for yourself. Enjoy!
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Great report. So nice to read real journalism. Give us the facts, tell us what you observed and let the reader make up their mind about what to think about it all - well done!
RFKJ is intriguing. His appeal is that he appears to be an honest, decent human being, even if you disagree with him. He's not a reptile person like Haley or Newsom, and not a corrupt pol like Pelosi or McConnell, doesn't have dementia and isn't a loud mouthed braggart. The bar is that low, folks.
I donated to him early in the hope he could bring the Democrats back to the old conscientious left, but I should have known better after what they did to Bernie.
IMO he hurts Trump by running, but he's an honest vibrant voice that needs to be in the mix.