What an RFK Jr-Trump Conspiracy Would Look Like

I’m not a conspiracy theorist. In fact, having spent so much time working in and around government, I’m probably an anti-conspiracy theorist — most complex conspiracies require far more talent and discretion than people in government (or people in general) actually have. The theory below is not something that’s actually happening as far as I know. I haven’t read it on a message board or heard it whispered in the secret political consultant hideaway we all hang out in. It’s just what I would do if I were them. 

Here’s how it unfolds:

(1). Trump and RFK Jr. quietly cut a deal. Kennedy will get some sort of cabinet role in a Trump administration. It almost doesn’t matter what — RFK won’t be any more crazy than whoever else Trump brings in. Given his anti-vaccine stance or his past work at the Riverkeepers, let’s say Kennedy is promised HHS or EPA or the FDA. Nicole Shanahan, RFK’s vice presidential pick, gets a cabinet position too (she’d probably end up being among the more competent people there). Given that RFK-Shanahan isn’t going to win the election itself, this is the best deal they’re going to get. 

(2). The main product of the deal is that Shanahan becomes a weapon for Trump from the far left. She goes super young, super woke, super anti-Israel with the sole purpose of taking young voters on the left away from Biden in swing states. 

(3). Shanahan spends all of her time in 6-8 states (AZ, NV, NC, GA, MI, PA, MN, WI) and doing national media attacking Biden as too conservative and too old. She goes on every podcast imaginable, talks to every reporter, just a constant stream of media, which she’ll love (and while they’ll try to trip her up on various issues, she is smart and can prepare herself, they’re all in on the joke, plus she can just say it’s the mainstream media trying to protect Biden whenever things do go wrong). 

(4). She hits college campus after college campus. Event after event. They’ll build on themselves and the more attention each one gets, the more it drives attention to the next, the more that drives coverage and social, and the more that drives team Biden crazy. The goal is in part to get younger voters on campuses to defect from Biden, but the types of schools and students that will like Shanahan are likely not to be commuter schools, so the kids there probably aren’t actually registered to vote where the campus is. That doesn’t matter. The perception of the risk is enough to generate the coverage and attention to then turn the risk into reality. 

(5). Kennedy does his thing to appeal to his crazies because no one will vote for just the VP pick and maybe he joins Shanahan for events sometimes too. All of it only gets them more attention (one risk is she gets more attention than he does, he gets jealous and blows it all up; I don’t know RFK personally so am not sure how insecure he is, but it’s a safe bet that if he were really secure, he wouldn’t be running for office in the first place). 

(6). The press will eat this all up — she’s young, rich,  attractive, was married to one famous guy (Sergey Brin) and allegedly had an affair with an even more famous one (Elon Musk). They’ll love the attacks from the left angle and it’ll dominate their Twitter feeds.

At the risk of spelling out the obvious, the intent of this plan is to get younger voters to either stay at home or vote for someone other than Biden. Given that we’re talking about margins as little as ten to twenty thousand votes in the swing states, every bit matters. Looking at the 2020 results, if Biden’s vote share among voters under age 30 fell even 25%, Pennsylvania, Georgia, and Arizona all would have flipped to Trump.

So what could prevent this from working?

First, everyone needs to maintain the pretense that RFK and Shanahan are not working for Trump. Otherwise the whole thing immediately loses credibility, the press can’t pretend it’s real, and the concept doesn’t work. Whether Trump is capable of cutting this deal and keeping it quiet is questionable at best.

Second, maybe RFK and Shanahan don’t want Trump to win and are too principled to agree to something like this. Nah.

Third, Biden could theoretically offer them his own deal. It’d be hard for Biden to give RFK and Shanahan the same types of positions, but they could figure something out (ambassadors to somewhere warm and not that relevant). But this deal would only be to prevent Shanahan from going after Biden. The narrative only works one way, so while she can hurt him, she can’t help him. 

I have no clue if these conversations have actually happened. I’m sure they’ve occurred to people in all three camps. And given that I very, very much hope that Biden wins, I would not like to see this happen. But if I were the Trump and Kennedy campaigns, it’s what I’d do.