Former Democrat Robert F. Kennedy Jr. endorsed Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump after ending his own presidential campaign. How compatible are their values on key issues many voters care most about?
The following summary highlights are offered to help guide your personal assessments.
Economic Policies
Trump:
Former President Trump promises to add federal revenues by lowering taxes to incentivize businesses and thereby stimulate the economy, create American jobs, put more money in pockets of workers, reduce consumer costs, reverse inflation, and reduce national debt.
He has also committed to enact universal baseline tariffs that "reward domestic production" and tax foreign companies.
Kennedy:
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. pledged to enact economic policies that favor "small and medium businesses" and break up "too-big-to-fail" banks and monopolies.
He said he backs tax-free, government-backed mortgage bonds to lower the interest rate to stimulate an aggressive affordable housing program, and vowed to make healthcare services available to all, including "alternative and holistic therapies that have been marginalized in a pharma-dominated system."
Social Security Future
Trump:
Trump told Republicans in Congress not to cut "a single penny" from Medicare or Social Security, encouraging them to focus their funding cuts on areas of "waste, fraud, and abuse," for example in programs dealing with foreign aid, immigration, climate change, and LGBTQ rights.
He also pledged in a campaign statement to reduce the cost of prescription drugs and health insurance premiums.
Kennedy:
Kennedy promised to cut military spending in half, redirecting that money to Social Security and government-subsidized child care.
Climate and Energy
Trump:
Trump pledges to end government spending for "Green New Deal atrocities" on his first day upon return to the White House; "drill, baby, drill" to free up stores of "liquid gold" to reestablish energy independence; speed up approval of natural gas pipelines into the Marcellus Shale in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and New York; and once again exit the Paris climate agreement that President Joe Biden rejoined after the U.S. left it under Trump.
Kennedy:
Kennedy, who referenced to himself on his campaign site as "the best environmental president in American history," committed to protect the environment from "corporate corruption" through the capture of environmental regulatory agencies.
He said he would also prioritize reducing toxic chemical pollution and plastic waste contamination to protect natural wildlife habitats.
Border Security and Immigration
Trump:
A second Trump presidency would restore his original Remain in Mexico program requiring asylum-seekers to wait in Mexico while their cases are processed, end "catch-and-release," terminate Biden's immigration parole program and temporary protected status designations; institute travel bans to people from countries that pose U.S. security threats, and launch a major effort to deport criminal immigrant populations including violent gangs.
Kennedy:
Following his visit to the southern border, Kennedy referred to it as a "dystopian nightmare," describing a seemingly "hopeless" humanitarian situation "created by the federal government, that local people are being forced to hold the bag on."
He blames much of the crisis on the Biden administration for halting construction of the border wall and other security measures to protect migrants and citizens from criminal cartels.
Fentanyl Crisis and Drug Addiction
Trump:
Trump pledges to impose "a total naval embargo on cartels," threatens China with "a steep price" unless it ends export of chemical fentanyl precursors, says he will order the Department of Defense to "inflict maximum damage" on cartel leadership and operations, and says he will seek death penalty eligibility for cartel members and traffickers.
He will also work to encourage companies to provide job opportunities and skills training to people recovering from addiction along with federal support for faith-based counseling, treatment, and recovery programs.
Kennedy:
Kennedy, who has been open about his 14-year struggle with addiction, said he would end "the failed War on Drugs," grant amnesty to nonviolent drug offenders, and transition prisons to strive for rehabilitation rather than imprisoning people living with substance use disorder in order to "heal our country."
Crime and Policing
Trump:
A second-term President Trump would deliver record funding to hire and retrain police officers and would give them more authority, strengthen their qualified immunity, and increase penalties for assaults on law enforcement.
Kennedy:
Whereas Kennedy has said relatively little about crime, he has said that he believes in gun control, but "won't take people's guns away."
Ukraine and Israel-Hamas Wars
Trump:
Stating that "[e]very day this proxy battle in Ukraine continues, we risk global war," Trump pledges to "solve the conflict in a single day."
Regarding the Israel-Hamas war, Trump has said that "sometimes you just have to let things play out," while nevertheless saying that "[w]e need to protect Israel, there is no choice."
Kennedy:
Making peace a priority, Kennedy promised to "end the proxy wars, bombing campaigns, covert operations, coups, paramilitaries, and everything else that has become so normal most people don't know what's happening."
In Ukraine he would withdraw U.S. troops and missiles from Russia's borders in exchange for having Russia withdraw its troops from Ukraine territory and would support deploying U.N. peacekeepers to Russian-speaking eastern regions.
While he has said that he is "heartbroken" over bloodshed in Gaza, Kennedy defends Israel's right to respond to Hamas' Oct. 7 attack as a moral obligation and an existential battle.
Larry Bell is an endowed professor of space architecture at the University of Houston where he founded the Sasakawa International Center for Space Architecture and the graduate space architecture program. His latest of 12 books is "Architectures Beyond Boxes and Boundaries: My Life By Design" (2022). Read Larry Bell's Reports — More Here.
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