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Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the black sheep of America’s most well-known Catholic household, is urging the trustworthy to help former President Trump in a brand new TV advert.
Kennedy, who first challenged President Biden for the Democrat nomination after which ran as an impartial, discusses his religion within the $250,000 advert spot earlier than giving the explanation why he now helps Trump for the presidency.
“President Trump has promised to take daring motion on our financial system, on the border and on restoring kids’s well being. The Democratic Party has turn into the party of struggle, censorship and corruption,” RFK Jr. says.
“Catholics might disagree on many points, however we should discover a solution to love our kids greater than we hate one another. I hope you will be a part of me in supporting Donald Trump.”
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Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and former President Trump shake fingers throughout a marketing campaign rally at Desert Diamond Arena on August 23, 2024, in Glendale, Ariz. (Rebecca Noble/Getty Images)
The advert, launched by the conservative group CatholicVote, is about to air in Pennsylvania earlier than a wider launch in swing states, Semafor reported. It comes lower than two weeks earlier than a traditionally tight election wherein Catholic voters may very nicely decide who subsequent occupies the White House.
CatholicVote President Brian Burch has criticized Harris’ place on abortion, noting the observe violates Catholic social instructing. In a latest interview with NBC News, the vice chairman stated she doesn’t help any concessions on the abortion difficulty, together with spiritual exemptions for faith-based well being care suppliers who’ve a conscientious objection to the process.
“I feel Kamala Harris is making an enormous gamble. She’s calculating that she will be able to construct a successful coalition with out folks of religion,” Burch advised Fox News Digital in an interview Wednesday. He acknowledged that Trump has additionally “disillusioned” some pro-life voters by opposing a federal ban on abortion however stated, “I feel Trump’s feedback are reflecting the place the general public is and that there isn’t a consensus abortion.”
According to Semafor, the collaboration with Kennedy got here after months of conversations with CatholicVote speaking by their positions on abortion. Burch advised the outlet that Kennedy in the end agreed “we should be spending an equal amount of cash on serving to ladies select to maintain their youngster as we’re on serving to them to get abortions.”
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Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (Rebecca Noble/Getty Images)
The pro-Trump advert comes because the Trump marketing campaign is actively courting Catholic voters. Trump’s working mate, Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, a Catholic convert, penned an op-ed within the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on Thursday that accused Harris of harboring “prejudice towards Catholics.”
“Last week, Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer, certainly one of Vice President Kamala Harris’s high surrogates, mocked the sacrament of the Eucharist in a cringey skit with a podcaster. Last Thursday, Ms. Harris turned the primary presidential candidate since 1984 to skip the annual Al Smith dinner, a fundraising occasion that advantages Catholic Charities,” Vance wrote.
“The first insults Catholics, whereas the latter shows a extra refined disregard for an necessary Catholic cultural occasion, one which raises cash for social companies that help folks in want, together with folks with disabilities and refugees and immigrants. Both present the Harris marketing campaign’s anti-Catholic bigotry.”
A handful of key battleground states this election cycle have enormous Catholic populations. About 24% of the Pennsylvania inhabitants, which has been touted because the state that can possible decide the general end result of the election, identifies as Catholic; about 25% of the inhabitants in Nevada identifies as Catholic; 18% in Michigan; 21% in Arizona; and 25% in Wisconsin. Other notable battleground states have a smaller Catholic inhabitants, together with Georgia and North Carolina, each of which have a roughly 9% inhabitants of Catholics.
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Vice presidential candidate Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, wrote an op-ed accusing Vice President Harris of “prejudice” towards Christians. (New York Times screenshot)
Catholics traditionally voted for Democrats till the Sixties and early Nineteen Seventies, when crime and cultural points got here to the fore alongside financial issues, most notably in 1972 when President Richard Nixon’s marketing campaign slammed Democrat opponent Sen. George McGovern as a candidate who supported “amnesty, abortion and acid.”
Today, Catholic voters are evenly break up between the 2 events, and whichever facet captures the bulk is normally the facet that wins the White House.
President Biden, the second Catholic president within the nation’s historical past (after John F. Kennedy), gained the Catholic vote over Trump in 2020 by about 5 share factors. In 2016, Trump gained the voting bloc at 52% help in comparison with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s 44% Catholic help. Former President Obama gained the Catholic vote in each 2008 and 2012, as did former President George W. Bush in his 2004 election towards John Kerry, Pew Research information reveals.
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The exception to the rule got here in 2000, when former Vice President Al Gore gained the Catholic vote by two factors over Bush regardless of shedding the presidential election total.
The Harris marketing campaign didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.
Fox News Digital’s Emma Colton contributed to this report.
