For months, Donald Trump has viewed Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as a potential problem on the ballot in November, fearing that the independent candidate could pull support from some of his conspiracist-leaning supporters in a tight race. This week, Trump decided to do something about it. In a leaked phone call, Trump urged Kennedy to give him his endorsement. “It would be so good for you and so big for you,” Trump said.
During the clip of the call — reportedly first posted by Kennedy’s son, who said it took place on Sunday — Trump isn’t exactly focused on the topic at hand.
The audio begins with Trump making disproven anti-vaccine small talk with the spoiler candidate, who is notorious for his distrust of the medical Establishment. “When you feed a baby a vaccination that is like 38 different vaccines and it looks like it’s made for a horse, not a 10-pound or a 20-pound baby, it looks like you should be giving a horse this thing,” Trump said. “Have you ever seen the size of it? It’s just massive. And then you see the baby all of a sudden starting to change radically; I’ve seen it too many times. And then you hear that it doesn’t have an impact, right? But you and I talked about that a long time ago.”
“Yeah,” replied Kennedy.
“Anyway, I would love you to do so,” Trump said, getting to the point. “It would be so good for you and so big for you. And we’re gonna win. We’re way ahead of the guy.” He then mentioned that President Joe Biden called him after the failed assassination. “It was interesting; it was very nice, actually,” Trump said. “He called me and said, ‘How did you choose to move to the right?’ Trump then explained his initial reaction to being shot in the ear. “It sounded like the world’s largest mosquito,” he said. “And it was. It was a bullet going — what do they call that, an AR-15 or something. That’s a big gun; that’s a pretty tough gun.” At this point in the video, Kennedy appears to give an impatient look to an aide off-camera.
“When President Trump called me, I was taping with an in-house videographer,” Kennedy wrote on X moments after the video was recirculated by Politico on Tuesday morning. “I should have ordered the videographer to stop recording immediately. I am mortified that this was posted. I apologize to the president.”
Kennedy and Trump met in person on Monday morning, reportedly also to discuss the prospect of an endorsement. Kennedy only said the topic of the conversation was “national unity.”
