(NewsNation) — Democrats are intensifying their efforts to block independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. from appearing on ballots in November as the long-shot candidate reports his weakest month of fundraising this year.
RFK Jr.’s campaign claims it has met the requirements to appear on the ballot in 21 states, but only a handful of those petitions have been certified, so it does not qualify to participate in the first presidential debate of 2024.
According to the criteria set out by CNN, candidates would be invited to participate in the debate if they had secured a place on the ballot in states totaling at least 270 votes in the Electoral College, the minimum needed to win the presidency.
In a statement Thursday, Kennedy called his exclusion from the debate “undemocratic, un-American, and cowardly.”
Both the Biden and Trump campaigns fear that Kennedy could play spoiler in what’s anticipated to be a close general election.
The Democratic National Committee has filed lawsuits meant to block Kennedy’s ballot access in four states in the past month. Some of these challenges have been filed in key battleground states like North Carolina and Nevada, while others are focused on Kennedy’s petitions in typically Democratic strongholds.
DNC officials tell NewsNation there are some states where Kennedy’s campaign is not following the rules. Meanwhile, RFK Jr. says this is a petty and politically driven effort to keep him off the ballot in certain states because he says he is a threat to President Biden’s reelection.
“We’re not filing our signatures immediately for strategic reasons. We’re going to hold them to the end because the DNC calls up everybody on the signature lists and tries to you know, get them to cancel their signatures, we have to get three or four times what the state requires in order to protect ourselves,” Kennedy told NewsNation last week.
Kennedy’s campaign has not responded to NewsNation’s request for comment on his campaign’s latest status.
So far, RFK Jr. has been certified to be on the ballot in seven states. While he says he has enough signatures to qualify in 21 states, these signatures are yet to be certified.
If he were to qualify in states like Pennsylvania, Wisconsin or Georgia, Kennedy could potentially play spoiler for either Biden or Trump, whose campaigns could be made or broken by those states.
In a statement, the DNC said Kennedy’s campaign was using deception for the sole purpose of weakening support for Biden.
“RFK Jr. was recruited to run by MAGA Republicans; is being propped up by Trump’s largest donor; and his own campaign staff has said their goal is to hurt President Biden. He has no real grassroots support and no pathway to 270,” Matt Corridoni, spokesperson for the DNC, said in a statement.
“RFK Jr.’s campaign is resorting to a pattern of deception and shortcuts to circumvent state rules for independent candidate ballot access.”
Kennedy filed an official complaint with the Federal Election Commission, alleging that both the Biden and Trump campaigns colluded with each other and CNN to keep him off the debate stage. He claimed it was illegal and that both campaigns received an illegal financial benefit from CNN.
CNN has said the complaint is without merit, and so far, the complaint has not held water with the FTC.