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RFK Jr. Interview: Trump and Biden ‘both ravaged American democracy and the republic’

RFK Jr. Interview: Trump and Biden ‘both ravaged American democracy and the republic’

Fox News Digital recently sat down with independent presidential candidate RFK Jr. at FreedomFest in Las Vegas, for a wide-ranging interview in which he discussed his campaign viability, the COVID pandemic, immigration policy, and castigated both the Trump and Biden administrations on civil liberties and weaponization of the Justice Department. While polls show Kennedy lagging far behind Trump and Biden, he believes that momentum is with his campaign. RFK JR. TO GET SECRET SERVICE PROTECTION AFTER FAILED TRUMP ASSASSINATION, MAYORKAS SAYS “Well, this week we had two national polls come out, the HarrisX poll that had me at 19%, and the Pew poll that had me at 15%, and so we’re watching my numbers grow all the time. I’m now beating President Biden and President Trump among independents, I’m beating them among all Americans under 35. I have better approval ratings and favorability ratings than both of them. I’m doing well with black voters and Hispanic voters, and the one group that I don’t do well with is Baby Boomers, because they’re watching the mainstream networks CNN, ABC, NBC, MSNBC and they’re reading the New York Times and the Washington Post.” Kennedy came to the forefront as a staunch critic of both the Trump and Biden administrations’ approach to the pandemic, and believes the Republican and Democratic establishments are both responsible for an assault on civil liberties. “The Constitution is a piece of paper, and the only thing that makes it work is if people believe in it, and one of the things that we need to do is to start teaching civics lessons again in American schools. We abandoned that, and I think that’s one of the reasons that our civil rights were taken away from us so easily.” “Both of them ravaged American democracy and the republic. You know, we saw it during COVID, they shut down, it was an assault on the Constitution by both men, and, you know, we saw all of our property rights suspended, the Fifth Amendment, 3.3 million businesses shut down. We saw free speech censored, and violations of the First Amendment, all the churches closed in this country with no scientific citation, no due process, violation of the First Amendment, the rights of assembly and petition obliterated by social distancing rules…it was both the Biden and the Trump administrations, so I don’t I don’t think either of those presidents could be trusted to safeguard our Constitution.” CNN FINALIZES RULES FOR FIRST BIDEN VS. TRUMP DEBATE, RFK JR. COULD STILL QUALIFY Kennedy believes strongly in securing the southern border, and supports a return to some Trump-era policies, arguing that the Biden policies have been ineffective. “I’m absolutely going to secure the border. I’ve spent a lot of time on the border talking with law enforcement, with Border Patrol, and one of the optimistic things for me is everybody says this can be stopped…we need to complete the 27 missing gaps in the wall…we need to do personnel changes and we need to bring in asylum court judges, and more Border Patrol and we need to do some regulatory changes… including changing the catch and release policy to catch and return policy, which it was during the Trump administration.” While a strong supporter of legal migration, he believes that current policies have abandoned border policy to dangerous criminal elements: “I want wide gates for people who come in legally so that there’s a fast track to citizenship, so that we can get the workers we need in this country right now, but I also will make sure nobody’s coming in illegally. Right now the Sinaloan drug cartel is running US immigration policy and nobody thinks that’s a good idea.” Kennedy pledges to bring Russia and Ukraine to the negotiating table for a speedy resolution to the conflict: “I’ll end the Ukraine War immediately, and I will negotiate a peace with Putin. Putin has tried repeatedly to negotiate peace agreements with us. He negotiated a very, very favorable agreement in April of 2022; he signed it, the Zelenskyy government signed it, and the Biden administration made Zelenskyy tear it up.” He would not elaborate on what territory he might require Ukraine to cede, but argues that the Biden administration has prolonged the conflict: “I’m not going to tell you what my end point of negotiation…because that’s not what you do, but I will say that we’re in a much worse negotiating position than we were in April of 2022 when the Biden administration destroyed the peace process.” According to a 2022 study by the Commonwealth Fund, while the United States spends far more than its peers on healthcare, it generally experiences worse outcomes. Kennedy pledges to take on the healthcare bureaucracies and the pharmaceutical industry. “My solution is to end the chronic disease epidemic and that’s what’s driving our healthcare crisis. We spend $4.3 trillion on healthcare, almost all of that that goes now to chronic disease, and we have the worst health outcomes of any country in the top 79 countries in the world…I know how to do this, I know how to change the mission of NIH so that it’s no longer an incubator for new pharmaceutical products in league with the pharmaceutical industry.” Kennedy faults both administrations for politically-motived lawfare via the judicial system. “The weaponization of the Justice Department is the fault of both Democrats and Republicans. You remember in 2016, 2020, President Trump promising that he was going to create a special prosecutor and lock Hillary Clinton up. That sort of gave permission, both sides of the political process began weaponizing government…We are going to make sure the American people know that justice is blind, that justice is neutral, and that mandate has been abandoned by both these administrations.” Kennedy has long been actively involved in Latin America, spending considerable time in South America. He credits his father and uncle’s policies for appealing to the poor of the region, and believes interventionism is an ineffective strategy to promote American

Biden aims to shore up Black voter support as Trump tries to make inroads

Biden aims to shore up Black voter support as Trump tries to make inroads

President Biden is focused on maintaining his support from Black voters as the once solid foundational bloc of the Democratic Party begins to waver. Biden will be participating in an interview for BET on Tuesday to pitch himself as the obvious choice for Black voters.  Following the interview, Biden is expected to attend the 115th NAACP National Convention in Las Vegas. He will be delivering remarks during the event.  FORBES DELETES ARTICLE CLAIMING IT IS NOT ‘UNTHINKABLE’ TRUMP MAY USE SHOOTING TO REACH BLACK VOTERS Finally, Biden will meet with Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) Chairman Rep. Steven Horsford for an economic summit, where he will speak to Black voters and meet with Black members of congress to discuss his vision for a second term. Members of the CBC who are expected to meet with Biden include Reps. Jim Clyburn, Jonathan Jackson, Yvette Clarke, Robin Kelly, Gabe Amo, Bennie Thompson, Bobby Scott, Troy Carter and Nikema Williams. The extensive tour focusing on the Black community comes at the same time former President Trump is courting solidly blue areas of the country, seeking to capitalize on Biden’s perceived weakness. ‘INCLUSIVE FOR ALL’: FIRST-TERM BLACK REPUBLICAN TALKS NON-WHITE VOTERS DITCHING DEMS FOR GOP Trump’s decision to target minority voters in places like New York, where Republicans have not carried the state in decades, reflects the Trump campaign’s belief that Biden is showing weakness with key Democratic constituencies. Despite holding a solid majority of Black voters, the Biden campaign has seen a notable drop in enthusiasm in key swing states since 2020. “Our campaign believes that Black voters deserve to hear from Team Biden-Harris, and they deserve to have their vote earned, not assumed,” the Biden campaign previously said about Black voter engagement. “That’s exactly what we are doing through historic investments in Black media and outreach, creative engagement efforts, culturally competent content and innovative organizing initiatives. No campaign has valued Black voters like we have, including through investing earlier and with more money than ever before talking to Black voters.”  A USA Today/Suffolk University poll released last month found that support for Biden among Black voters has dropped roughly 20 percentage points in both Michigan and Pennsylvania since the last election.  In Michigan, the poll found Trump has 15% of Black voters, compared to Biden at 54% of the support from Black voters. Trump received just 9% of the Black vote in Michigan in the 2020 election.  Many pollsters expect Trump to experience a bump in support across all demographics following the assassination attempt that nearly took his life last weekend. Fox News Digital’s Hanna Panreck contributed to this report.

Swing state AG previews VP debate with dire prediction for Harris: ‘Poor Kamala’

Swing state AG previews VP debate with dire prediction for Harris: ‘Poor Kamala’

MILWAUKEE – Ohio Republican Attorney General Dave Yost previewed a potential debate match-up between Sen. JD Vance and Vice President Kamala Harris and predicted it will not go well for the vice president. “Poor Kamala,” Yost told Fox News Digital on Monday when asked about the upcoming debate between Harris and Vance now that the Ohio Republican has been named as Trump’s running mate. Yost agreed with the narrative promoted by many conservatives on social media that the debate clash will be an uneven match-up. “It will be interesting to see what the oddmakers in Vegas put together on this, but he’s going to be a chef’s knife and salad tongs to her word salad.” TRUMP ANNOUNCES OHIO SEN JD VANCE AS HIS 2024 RUNNING MATE A Biden-Harris campaign official told Fox News Digital that Harris reached out to Vance and left a voicemail congratulating him on his selection, and “expressed her hope that the two can meet in the vice presidential debate proposed by CBS News.” Conservatives on social media quickly predicted that Vance would have a good night if the two end up settling on a specific day to debate. “He will be terrific debating Kamala Harris,” Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich posted on X. DONALD TRUMP AND J.D. VANCE CREATE A PRO-CRYPTO PRESIDENTIAL TICKET “The JD Vance vs Kamala Harris debate is going to be a beatdown unlike anything we’ve seen since the Seahawks/Broncos Super Bowl,” State Freedom Caucus Network communications director Greg Price posted on X. “The Vance vs Kamala debate is going to be brutal lol,” conservative commentator Dana Loesch posted on X. Harris’ former communications director said last month that Vance is the one Republican who would be the “greatest threat” to her vice presidency if chosen. “I think JD Vance would pose the greatest threat [to] Kamala Harris, in some respects. I mean he’s an incredible debater,” Ashley Etienne, who served as Harris’ communications director in 2021, told CNN.  “I think he has this quality that makes him seem palpable to that one to two percent that actually might vote or that is undecided, that will actually pay attention to the debates because most people don’t pay attention to the debates.” Fox News Digital reached out to the Biden campaign for comment but did not receive a response. Yost raved about Trump’s selection of Vance while speaking to Fox News Digital. “It was pandemonium in the Ohio delegation,” Yost said about the energy on the convention floor when Vance was introduced as Trump’s running mate. “People were pumped and for good reason, JD is popular and he is going to be a great vice president.” “JD makes a connection with working class voters, the folks that have been left behind by the system, in a way that most politicians don’t and when you talk with him he can certainly hold his own with anybody in an intellectual conversation.” The Biden and Trump campaigns have not yet agreed to a specific time or place for a debate. Typically, vice presidential candidates hold one debate leading up to the November election.  Fox News Digital’s Jamie Joseph contributed to this report.

Trump leads Biden in blue state following assassination attempt: poll

Trump leads Biden in blue state following assassination attempt: poll

A new poll shows former President Trump leading President Biden in Virginia by three percentage points as Republicans look to flip the state after Biden trounced Trump by 10 points in the Old Dominion State in 2020. Virginia has voted for Democrats in each presidential election since President Barack Obama’s first campaign for the White House in 2008. The new Virginia Commonwealth University-Wilder School poll, reported by the Washington Post, shows Biden dropping from the 42% support he enjoyed in the last VCU-Wilder poll, released in January, to 36%. Trump was unchanged at 39%, with the poll suggesting a dip in support for Biden, rather than any substantial gains for Trump. TRUMP, YOUNGKIN MEET FOR FIRST TIME AS GOP EYES WINNING VIRGINIA IN NOVEMBER Still, the poll bodes well for the Trump campaign and raises more concern for the Biden camp, who have been battling calls from within their own party for the president to drop out of the race following his disastrous debate performance on June 27. The VCU-Wilder poll was conducted between June 24 and July 3, so some of the polling was done in the wake of that debate. Biden’s job approval stood at 36% in the poll, while 58% disapproved. Respondents rated the “rising cost of living” as the top issue in the race, followed by women’s reproductive rights and immigration. The 46th president continues to leak support from the Black community. Forty-six percent said they would vote for Biden, down from 67% in the last VCU-Wilder poll, while 13.7% said they would vote for Trump. The VCU-Wilder poll consisted of telephone interviews with 809 Virginia adults ages 18 and older, with about a third conducted on landlines and the rest on cellphones, the Post reports. It has a 4.8-point margin of error.  Virginia, which is home to many who work in neighboring Washington, D.C., has not been considered a battleground state in the 2024 election, but recent polling indicates that it could play out to be a tighter than anticipated race.  A Fox News poll published in June shows Trump and Biden with 48% support each in a deadlocked match-up in the Old Dominion State. However, a New York Times-Siena College poll conducted in Virginia July 9-12 showed Biden leading Trump by three percentage points — 48 to 45 — among likely voters. FOX NEWS POLL: BIDEN, TRUMP IN A DEAD HEAT IN VIRGINIA Republican Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin has previously said that Virginia “is in play” and could deliver a win to Trump come November.  “I think Virginia is in play. Let’s just remind ourselves – Joe Biden won Virginia by 10 points in 2020. I ended up winning by two the next year. What we’ve demonstrated is commonsense conservative policies work, and Virginians appreciate that,” Youngkin said in an interview with radio host and Fox News contributor Guy Benson in May.  The governor reiterated those comments in a Fox News Digital interview in June. Back in 2020, Biden won the state by 10 points over Trump. During the 2016 election, when former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton faced off against Trump, the Democratic Party also claimed victory over Virginia, with Clinton earning 49.8% of the vote to Trump’s 44.4%.  Youngkin captured the governor’s office in 2021, thanks in part to Trump’s backing. However, the VCU-Wilder poll found Virginians’ approval of Youngkin down from 54% in January to 50% in the new poll, while his disapproval jumped from 36% to 39%. Meanwhile, Virginians support incumbent Sen. Tim Kaine, a Democrat, over Republican challenger Hung Cao, by 49% to 38% respectively. The poll also found that 53% of Virginia voters said they were less likely to vote for Trump because of his conviction in New York with 34 counts of falsifying business records in the first degree. Another 31% said they were more likely to vote for him after the convictions. Among independents, 45% said the convictions made them less likely to support Trump while 25% said they were more likely. Fox News’ Emma Colton, Paul Steinhauser and Matthew Reidy contributed to this report.