Robert F Kennedy Jr has filed election paperwork to run for US president in 2024 as a Democrat.
The 69-year-old is the son of assassinated Senator Robert F Kennedy and nephew of President John F Kennedy.
The environmental lawyer’s marketing campaign treasurer, John E Sullivan, confirmed the submitting on Wednesday.
Mr Kennedy is an outspoken anti-vaccine campaigner. Instagram eliminated his account in 2021 for “repeatedly sharing debunked claims”, the corporate stated.
Each Democratic and Republican events maintain their very own contests – known as primaries – to search out their presidential nominee. Mr Kennedy might be a rank outsider for the Democratic nomination.
President Joe Biden has indicated he’ll run for re-election, although he has not but formally declared his candidacy.
He was beforehand anticipated to launch his marketing campaign in early April, however aides say his timeline has shifted.
CBS Information, the BBC’s US companion, has reported that he’s anticipated to formally announce a run in early summer season.
Final month, one other Democrat, Marianne Williamson, joined the presidential race.
On the Republican facet, Donald Trump was first to declare his candidacy and he has been joined by others together with former US ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley.
In March, Mr Kennedy stated on Twitter he was contemplating a run for president
On the time, he stated: “If I run, my high precedence might be to finish the corrupt merger between state and company energy that has ruined our financial system, shattered the center class, polluted our landscapes and waters, poisoned our youngsters, and robbed us of our values and freedoms.”
Extra on the 2024 election
- Democrats eye adjustments to 2024 presidential primaries
- Who’re the Republican hopefuls not named Trump?
- Six methods it is more durable for Trump to run this time
Mr Kennedy instructed a New Hampshire crowd in March that he had “handed the most important hurdle” – his spouse greenlighting the run.
Because the co-founder of an environmental legislation agency, Mr Kennedy gained plaudits for campaigning on points reminiscent of clear water, together with working to scrub up the Hudson River in New York.
However his anti-vaccine views return years and have provoked a powerful backlash, together with from his circle of relatives. In 2021 his sister, Kerry Kennedy, known as him “very harmful” on the difficulty.
In 2019, three different relations penned an op-ed within the information outlet Politico, denouncing Mr Kennedy’s anti-vaccine views.
His sister Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, brother Joseph P Kennedy II and niece Maeve Kennedy McKean stated his views have been “tragically unsuitable” and have “lethal penalties”.
In 2022, Fb and Instagram eliminated accounts for an anti-vaccine group based by Mr Kennedy, Youngsters’s Well being Protection, for “repeatedly” violating firm insurance policies on medical misinformation.
Though Mr Kennedy’s vaccine scepticism lengthy predates Covid, he discovered a brand new viewers in the course of the pandemic, when revenues to Youngsters’s Well being Protection doubled to $6.8m (£5.5m).
- Anti-vaccine views unsuitable – physician
Mr Kennedy additionally revealed a ebook, The Actual Anthony Fauci, through which he accused the previous US infectious illness chief of “a historic coup d’etat in opposition to Western democracy”.
He additionally invoked Nazi Germany throughout an anti-vaccine speech in Washington, DC final 12 months.
Mr Kennedy has a voice dysfunction, spasmodic dysphonia, which impacts the muscle mass in his voice field.
He married actress Cheryl Hines in 2014 and lives in Los Angeles, California.