Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the independent presidential candidate who suspended his campaign last week and endorsed former President Donald Trump, has withdrawn his name from the Maine ballot ahead of the November election.
A spokesperson for Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows said Tuesday that Kennedy, an anti-vaccine activist and environmental lawyer, withdrew ahead of a 5 p.m. deadline.
Kennedy, the son of former U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy and nephew of former President John F. Kennedy, initially entered the presidential race in April 2023 as a Democrat challenging President Joe Biden before switching to an independent bid last fall.
Kennedy said Friday he no longer saw a path to victory and hours later joined Trump for a rally in Arizona. Kennedy also said he would seek to remove his name from ballots in about 10 unspecified battleground states, though varying deadlines and rules may complicate that.
Maine has ranked-choice voting in presidential elections, so Kennedy’s presence on the ballot was expected to have only limited effects on the race between Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris, who replaced Biden atop the ticket after his disastrous June debate. Harris has a slight lead over Trump in most national polls.
Harris has also led Trump in Maine, which splits two of its four electoral votes by congressional district. The latest University of New Hampshire survey showed the race tied in the rural 2nd District that went for Trump in 2016 and 2020. Kennedy drew support from 2 percent of Maine voters in the UNH survey published Wednesday.
Kennedy, 70, was in Portland on Monday and said he visited Maine for an interview with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson, who has a Bryant Pond home in Oxford County and posted later Monday the chat with Kennedy to his channel on X, formerly known as Twitter. Among other comments during the roughly 90-minute interview, Kennedy told Carlson he is helping Trump’s transition team select members to serve in another administration should Trump beat Harris.
