Robert F. Kennedy Jr. re-announced his candidacy for president on Monday, this time as an independent candidate, rather than a Democrat. That wasn’t overly surprising to Seth Meyers though, who joked that RFK Jr.’s vaccination records already indicated his fate.
Initially, RFK Jr. had declared as a Democrat back in April, hoping to challenge President Joe Biden come primary time, and has been a lifelong Democrat up to this point. But, the odds of a Democrat being chosen as the primary candidate over Biden are quite slim, so RFK Jr. changed course.
“‘Cause like his vax card says, he never had a shot,” Meyers joked.
The NBC host was referring, of course, to the fact that RFK Jr. is very openly against vaccines, to the point that CNN’s Jake Tapper noted in June that he would refuse to host a town hall with Kennedy because of it.
In addition to falsely linking child vaccines to autism, Kennedy Jr. has also spread misinformation about the Covid-19 vaccines. Even Kennedy’s own siblings have denounced his candidacy, calling him “dangerous for our country.”
“Bobby might share the same name as our father, but he does not share the same values, vision or judgment,” the Kennedy children wrote in a statement on Monday. “Today’s announcement is deeply saddening for us. We denounce his candidacy and believe it to be perilous for our country.”
The note was signed by Rory Kennedy, Kerry Kennedy, Joseph P. Kennedy II, and Kathleen Kennedy Townsend.
“The Democrats are frightened that I’m going to spoil the election for President Biden, and the Republicans are frightened that I’m going to spoil it for Trump,” Robert Kennedy himself said at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia. “The truth is, they’re both right. My intention is to spoil it for both of them.”
You can watch Seth Meyers’s full monologue in the video above.