The urgency to protect Robert F. Kennedy Jr. shifted into high gear after Donald Trump survived an assassin’s bullet to the side of his face at a Pennsylvania rally on Saturday.
After the shooting, reports quickly indicated that the Secret Service was taking extra precautions to protect President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.
Independent candidate Kennedy, though, has been trying unsuccessfully for more than a year to convince U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas to grant him Secret Service protection.
Among the criteria for granting a candidate security are known threats against him or her, and Newsweek exclusively reviewed a 775-page document that laid out 34 “behaviors of interest” collected by the DOJ.
One, for example, involves a man who claimed in an email sent to Kennedy that he was offered money to assassinate him, but if Kennedy paid him half that sum he would not. “Do not involve police or else you die !!!,” the person wrote.
The 1968 assassination of Kennedy’s father, Robert F. Kennedy changed the way presidential candidates are protected, giving the task to the Secret Service.
After the attempt to kill Trump on Saturday, “Bobby Kennedy” was a top-trending term on X, previously Twitter, as users reviewed the history of U.S. political assassinations and of the Secret Service.
Kennedy’s uncle, President John F. Kennedy, was also assassinated, and the Kennedy camp has been noting in documents sent to Mayorkas that his family history needs to be taken into account.
After the attempt on Trump’s life, social media users called on Mayorkas to change course. Many also cited a report from The Federalist saying that Trump has been asking for weeks for additional Secret Service protection that Mayorkas has also denied.
“Mayorkas must resign immediately or terminate him. Failure to protect Trump and failure to give Kennedy Secret Service protection are inexcusable,” one X user wrote in post that was similar to many others.
“Secret Service protection must be given to @RobertKennedyJr NOW!! What happened to Trump will be repeated at RFK…they know this & as such are conspirators in these assassination attempts…pure criminals!” another X user wrote.
Kennedy, meanwhile, posted a statement to X about Trump without noting his ongoing battle with Mayorkas.
“Now is the time for every American who loves our country to step back from the division, renounce all violence, and unite in prayer for President Trump and his family,” Kennedy wrote.
During a Saturday night appearance on Fox News, host Sean Hannity asked him about his lack of Secret service protection.
“I don’t want to make this evening about me; it’s about something bigger” Kennedy said while praising the Secret Service for putting themselves between Trump and the source of the shots, apparently a sniper on a nearby rooftop.
“We need to have little bit of that courage in our own lives now, and it might be, not running into a bullet, but maybe biting our tongue when we have a really withering reply on subject. Maybe not amplifying an angry post from somebody else. Maybe doing something kind for somebody we don’t like, somebody on the other side of the aisle.”
“Your family has been through too much. You deserve that protection, and I’ll continue to advocate for it, whether you want me to or not,” Hannity told Kennedy, stressing that he disagrees with him on multiple political issues.
Mayorkas initially declined Kennedy’s request because it came outside the one-year window that is typical for protection, though dozens of exceptions to that rule have been made. In the latest of at least six denial letters, Mayorkas cites no reason for declining to provide Secret Service protection for Kennedy.
The candidate has maintained that Mayorkas is acting on behalf of Biden, who prefers that Kennedy spend the estimated $1 million or more per month for personal bodyguards rather than using that money to promote his candidacy.
The White House and Mayorkas have not responded to Newsweek’s numerous requests for comment.
While Mayorkas has never cited polling data, the Secret Service website says that an independent candidate should be afforded Secret Service protection after 30 days of polling at 20 percent. A HarrisX poll conducted two weeks ago had Kennedy polling at 19 percent in a three-way race while Trump and Biden were at 43 percent and 38 percent, respectively.
The shooting of Trump comes two weeks after Newsweek reviewed the massive document from the DHS that Kennedy’s attorney, Aaron Siri, obtained via the Freedom of Information Act.
While Kennedy was already aware of many of the threats laid out in the 775 pages, given they were sent to him by text or email or posted to his campaign’s website, Siri requested the document so that he’d have the names of those who might pose a threat to his client.
The FOIA document, though, redacted the names, citing several reasons for doing so, the most popular being: privacy; the information was provided by a confidential source; and providing such information would reveal investigative techniques and procedures.
One “known subject” posted on Kennedy’s website that he is a “menace” and a “sh*t stain on this country” and that he hopes the candidate will “die a slow painful death.”
Another “known subject” emailed Kennedy to call him “a Nazi sympathizing piece of sh*t” while another made a social media comment saying: “(Y)ou are trying to kill me in the streets like a dog? You are going to die.”
Another “known subject” emailed the Maryland state court system with “threats and nonsensical statements” directed at Biden, Harris and others and “ordered” Biden to terminate both Trump’s and Kennedy’s campaign so that she could be “declared monarch of the U.S.”
Another “known subject” regularly sent Kennedy emails stating he will “bury” him, “everybody will die” and he will make Kennedy “suffer.”
Still another promised on social media to “kill rfk jr lawfully on USA soil. Bullets right into the head,” while another wrote, “RFK is not immune from a 7.62x54r bullet.”
Someone called HolodomorVictim on X wrote: “inshallah we will execute zionist pedophile robert f kennedy jr like his bitch dad.” A different person said on social media, “(L)et’s kill Bobby Kennedy Jr. now.”
Also unidentified is the name of a woman who sent numerous packages to Kennedy, including one containing a wedding band. “The subject stated she loves Kennedy and expressed anger about being kept away from him,” says the document.
One person who obtained Kennedy’s phone number texted him multiple times. “How about you fuck off or I’ll come to your event and shoot every single person who attends.” A follow-up text read: “Execution style and I’ll broadcast the entire shooting on live TV.”
Tom Balcerski, a presidential historian at Eastern Connecticut State University, told Newsweek that Kennedy’s is “the most high-profile request” for Secret Service “to ever be denied.”
He added that “the ironies here are multitudinous, given it was the assassination of his father that changed the way candidates are protected.”
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
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