President Joe Biden’s campaign didn’t respond to the Robert F. Kennedy Jr. campaign kick-off because, though there is now a major donor summit on the books for next week, there still technically is no Biden campaign.
What there is instead is an acceptance among most Democratic leaders that they may still have to wait a while for Biden to make it official – and a grudging embrace of that.
To the confident advisers in the Biden orbit and their wider circle of supporters, the Kennedy challenge only serves to reinforce the president’s strength. Kennedy and spiritual author Marianne Williamson – mocked at a daily White House press briefing after her primary campaign launch – are the extent of the challenge Biden has drawn.
The Democratic National Committee has made very clear, meanwhile, that the party apparatus is aligned with Biden. No plans for primary debates are underway. A White House aide did not respond when asked for comment about Kennedy’s kick-off.
The furthest that New Hampshire Democratic Party Chairman Ray Buckley, who has been critical of Biden’s efforts to stop his state from holding its traditional first-in-the-nation primary, would go when asked about Kennedy’s candidacy was to say, “You just never know what catches the fancy of the voters.”
“I think the president’s done a fantastic job. The amount of accomplishments is simply breathtaking,” Buckley said. “I don’t see a singular issue galvanizing opposition to him.”
For at least a few hours on Wednesday, though, it looked like a real challenge. Like the bar across Boston Common that has the iconic “Cheers” sign but doesn’t actually look much like the set of the sitcom inside, Kennedy launch event at the Boston Park Plaza – with the “I’m a Kennedy Democrat” signs waving, the security with earpieces buzzing around – could, with a…
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