Independent Presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr, who often raises conspiracy theories, has now taken a position on the January 6 insurrection and those who were arrested that almost totally mirrors Donald Trump’s. Does this mean he’ll be more of a threat to former President Donald Trump or President Joe Biden in the 2024 Presidential election?
Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Friday raised the possibility that the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol was not a “true insurrection” and expressed concern about the “weaponization of government” against those charged with crimes in connection to the riot.
“It is quite clear that many of the January 6 protestors broke the law in what may have started as a protest but turned into a riot. Because it happened with the encouragement of President Trump, and in the context of his delusion that the election was stolen from him, many people see it not as a riot but as an insurrection,” he said in a statement.
He continued, “I have not examined the evidence in detail, but reasonable people, including Trump opponents, tell me there is little evidence of a true insurrection.”
The statement inaccurately says that none of the protesters had plans to overthrow the government, even though some of the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers were convicted of sedition. It also repeated the long-debunked claim that the rioters “carried no weapons” while attacking the Capitol, which Kennedy later said he was retracting when reached by CNN for comment.
“My understanding that none of the January 6 rioters who invaded the capitol were carrying firearms was incorrect,” he said in response to CNN’s inquiry.
In the statement, Kennedy called the January 6 attack “one of the most polarizing topics on the political landscape” and said he wants “to hear every side” of the issue in the lengthy statement. He condemned protesters who broke the law and Trump’s “delusion that the election was stolen” while questioning whether “political objectives” led to the prosecution of January 6 protestors.
“Like many reasonable Americans, I am concerned about the possibility that political objectives motivated the vigor of the prosecution of the J6 defendants, their long sentences, and their harsh treatment,” Kennedy said in the statement. “That would fit a disturbing pattern of the weaponization of government agencies — the DoJ, the IRS, the SEC, the FBI, etc. — against political opponents.”
“One can, as I do, oppose Donald Trump and all he stands for, and still be disturbed by the weaponization of government against him,” he continued.
His rhetoric, whitewashing the January 6 attack, mirrors some of the commentary coming from Trump and other right-wing figures.
Washington Post columnist Philip Bump obliterates Kennedy’s critique and adds this:
Kennedy doesn’t oppose all that Trump stands for, not by any measure. He, like Trump, rejects conventional wisdom (no matter how wise) and authority (however authorized). It’s just the motive that’s different. Trump does it opportunistically to accrue confidence in himself by eroding his base’s confidence in everything else. Kennedy does it because it is what he does and it is what has earned him his following.
The statement concludes by attempting again to equate Biden and Trump, to position Kennedy in the middle between the two candidates. The problem is that the middle point between reality and surreality is still surreality.
