Associated Press
BOSTON (AP) — Anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. launched his longshot bid to problem President Joe Biden for the Democratic nomination subsequent yr.
Kennedy, a member of one of many nation’s most well-known political households who has in recent times been linked to some far-right figures, kicked off his marketing campaign in Boston on Wednesday and likened his marketing campaign to the American revolution.
“My mission over the next 18 months of this campaign and throughout my presidency will be to end the corrupt merger of state and corporate power that is threatening now to impose a new kind of corporate feudalism in our country,” Kennedy mentioned.
Self-help writer Marianne Williamson can also be operating for the Democratic nomination. Biden has mentioned he’s planning on operating once more however has not formally introduced a marketing campaign. He’s anticipated to have a glide path to the nomination, with a lot of the Democratic institution behind him.
Kennedy, a nephew of President John F. Kennedy and the son of his slain brother Robert F. Kennedy, repeatedly referenced each of them throughout his prolonged speech Wednesday.
Kennedy Jr. was as soon as recognized most as an environmental lawyer who labored on points reminiscent of clear water. But over the previous almost 20 years, he’s develop into one of many main voices of the anti-vaccine motion. His work has been described by members of his circle of relatives and public well being consultants as deceptive and harmful.
His efforts intensified after the pandemic and improvement of the COVID-19 vaccine, and an AP investigation in 2021 confirmed he had linked up with anti-democratic figures and different teams. He has appeared at occasions pushing the lie that the 2020 presidential election was stolen and with individuals who cheered or downplayed the riot on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
A photograph posted on Instagram confirmed Kennedy backstage at a July 2021 Reawaken America occasion with former President Donald Trump’s ally Roger Stone, former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn and anti-vaccine profiteer Charlene Bollinger. All three have promoted the lie concerning the 2020 election being stolen.
Kennedy has been a visitor on Infowars, the channel run by conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, and on the “War Room” podcast hosted by longtime Trump ally Steve Bannon, the place he promoted his bestselling 2021 e-book, “The Real Anthony Fauci,” by which he accused the U.S.’s high infectious illness physician of taking part in “a historic coup d’etat against Western democracy.”
The AP documented how Kennedy and his anti-vaccine group, Children’s Health Defense, had capitalized on the COVID-19 pandemic – raking in funding and followers within the U.S. and overseas, and doubling its income from 2019 to 2020. Researchers have discovered that the group is among the many most influential spreaders of anti-vaccine misinformation, and the AP discovered visitors to its web site had soared.
In the second yr of the pandemic, Children’s Health Defense continued its big progress, in line with a more moderen submitting with charity regulators in California. Revenue greater than doubled from $7 million in 2020 to $16 million in 2021.
Facebook and Instagram eliminated the accounts of Children’s Health Defense for spreading misinformation.
Kennedy has repeatedly invoked Nazis and the Holocaust when speaking about measures geared toward mitigating the unfold of COVID-19, reminiscent of masks necessities and vaccine mandates. He has apologized for a few of these feedback, together with when he instructed that individuals in 2022 had been worse off than Anne Frank, {the teenager} who died in a Nazi focus camp after hiding along with her household in a secret annex in an Amsterdam home for 2 years.
Source: www.bostonherald.com”