Ahead of speech, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. says in a Pennsylvania court filing that he’s endorsing Donald Trump

Image via AP.

Earlier Friday, Shanahan posted on X that she isn’t a Kamala Democrat or a Trump Republican.

“I’m an INDEPENDENT American who is endorsing ideas, not a person or a party,” she wrote. “I will continue working to give a voice to the voiceless and bring power back to the people.”

At Kennedy’s Phoenix event, 38-year-old Casey Westerman, a Chandler, Arizona, resident who works in software sales, said she trusted Kennedy’s judgment and had planned to vote for him, but would support Trump if Kennedy said that was who he was endorsing.

“My decision would really be based on who he thinks is best suited to run this country,” said Westerman, who wore a “Kennedy 2024” trucker hat and voted for Trump in the last two presidential elections.

The scheduled remarks by Kennedy, a son of former Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy and a nephew of former President John F. Kennedy, come as his campaign’s momentum has slipped.

Kennedy Jr. first entered the 2024 presidential race as a Democrat but left the party last fall to run as an independent. He built an unusually strong base for a third-party bid, fueled in part by anti-establishment voters and vaccine skeptics who have followed his anti-vaccine work since the COVID-19 pandemic. But he has since faced strained campaign finances and mounting legal challenges, including a recent ruling from a New York judge that he should not appear on the ballot in the state because he listed a “sham” address on nominating petitions.

Many members of Kennedy’s extended family have been vocal that they don’t see eye to eye politically with Kennedy Jr., and some came out publicly to endorse Biden before he dropped out of the race.

Recent polls put his support in the mid-single digits. And it’s unclear if he’d get even that in a General Election, since third-party candidates frequently don’t live up to their early poll numbers when voters actually cast their ballots.

There’s some evidence that Kennedy’s staying in the race would hurt Trump more than Harris. According to a July AP-NORC poll, Republicans were significantly more likely than Democrats to have a favorable view of Kennedy. And those with a positive impression of Kennedy were significantly more likely to also have a favorable view of Trump (52%) than Harris (37%).

In an interview with MSNBC at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago on Thursday, Harris communications director Michael Tyler said her campaign welcomes Kennedy voters should the independent candidate drop out.

For voters who see Trump as a threat, who are looking for a new way forward, or who want “government to get the hell out of the way of their own personal decisions, there’s a home for you in Kamala Harris’ campaign,” Tyler said.

For Trump, Friday will mark the end of a week’s worth of battleground state visits in which he has sought to draw attention away from Democrats’ celebration of Harris’ presidential nomination in Chicago.

He traveled to Pennsylvania, Michigan, North Carolina and Arizona’s U.S.-Mexico border for events focused on his policy proposals on the economy, crime and safety, national security and the border. He will close out the week Friday with stops in Las Vegas and Glendale.

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Republished with permission from The Associated Press.