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A recent poll with good news for Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. raises questions about whether President Joe Biden should be worried about his reelection chances.
Last Wednesday, The Economist and YouGov released a survey that showed Kennedy with the highest favorability rating of all the current 2024 presidential candidates. Forty-nine percent of respondents said they saw him favorably, and 30 percent viewed him unfavorably.
Biden and former President Donald Trump had the second-highest favorability rating, with 44 percent of respondents saying they viewed the two candidates favorably.
Kennedy, an anti-vaccine activist, environmental lawyer and member of a famous political dynasty, has been viewed as a long-shot challenger to Biden, who is expected to benefit from an easy series of primaries as the sitting president.
Some have interpreted the latest survey as suggesting that Kennedy is leading Biden in the polls. But favorability ratings don’t necessarily forecast who will get the party’s nomination.
Lisa Lake/Getty Images for SiriusXM
One of the reasons that Kennedy may be seen more favorably is his name, political scientist John Pitney told Newsweek.
“At this point, most voters aren’t even thinking much about the next presidential election. If you’re a Democrat and you hear the name Kennedy, you say I’m for that,” Pitney said. “As the election gets closer, people will think a little more about the actual choices before them.”
Kennedy has made some controversial statements in recent years, including one remark comparing U.S. vaccine policies to the Holocaust that was condemned by members of his own family and his wife, Cheryl Hines.
“If [Democratic] voters knew more about RFK Jr.’s actual record, that support would drop,” Pitney said.
At the same time, Biden has a disadvantage as the current president. Pitney said presidents often face broad public dissatisfaction in the middle of their terms. As voters think about the things that are going wrong, the president can be an easy target for their dissatisfaction with the state of the country.
“We’ve gone through a period of high inflation and other problems,” Pitney said. “A lot of people tend to attribute that to the incumbent [president].”
He continued: “But next year the choices become clearer. I suspect Democrats will be more likely to support Biden.”
While polls have shown Kennedy with sizable double-digit support among Democrats, he still trails Biden by a significant amount.
Two surveys released last week by the Harvard University Center for American Political Studies and The Messenger showed Biden with 62 percent support to Kennedy’s 15 percent and 54 percent to 14 percent, respectively.
Biden also has a Real Clear Politics average of 62 percentage points, as of Monday. Comparably, the polling data aggregator shows Kennedy with a 15.6-point average.
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