RFK Jr. may drop out, but he could still alter a tight presidential race. Trump is banking on it

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is on the cusp of exiting the presidential race, and both parties will be closely watching who his followers gravitate toward.

For the better part of the past year, as Robert F. Kennedy Jr. built and maintained a small but significant base of support for his quixotic White House bid, the two major parties wrestled with an increasingly pressing question: Whose presidential aspirations might be most damaged by an independent aligned with the conspiratorial right but bearing a famous Democratic name? Now, with Kennedy on the cusp of exiting the race, both parties will be closely watching who his followers gravitate toward in the closing months before Election Day. Kennedy is expected to formally announce Friday that he is suspending his presidential campaign. Speculation has already turned to whether Kennedy might endorse former President Donald Trump, an outcome that as of Thursday appeared likely though not guaranteed. Both candidates are scheduled to appear in Arizona on Friday, and Trump teased a “special guest” at his event. Though his odds of victory were quickly diminishing – a recent CBS News poll measured his support at just 2% – Kennedy’s decision to bow out 74 days before the election nevertheless presents another twist to a race already unlike any other. And amid a momentum shift that has catapulted the newly installed Democratic nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris, into close contention with Trump, there is hope within the former president’s operation that Kennedy’s exit could prove decisive if certain battlegrounds are decided by thousands of ballots, just as they were in 2020. It’s hardly certain what Kennedy’s backers will do. Whether many of them ever intended to vote for him or at all is difficult to gauge, and some may choose to sit the election out without an alternative on the ballot. Still, the Trump campaign has long worried that Kennedy’s campaign, built on conspiracies and anti-vaccine rhetoric, pulled directly from their side, especially in a handful of key states. Trump’s advisers now see an opening to court some of Kennedy’s voters, particularly those Americans who sit at the overlap between supporters of Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders’ past presidential campaigns and the GOP’s anti-establishment right wing. There is a presumption among Trump’s team and his allies that conservative-leaning mothers – a demographic the Republican nominee has struggled to win over – could also be swayed. Women were more likely to support Kennedy than men, according to a recent Pew Research Center survey, though other polls haven’t shown a meaningful difference.