After failing to make the stage for CNN's presidential debate on Thursday, independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced an event of his own to counterprogram the face-off between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump.
Kennedy, who initially challenged Biden for the Democratic nomination before shifting gears to run as an independent, announced that he will answer debate questions live on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, and on his website.
In a video posted to X, Kennedy accused both candidates of collusion with CNN to bar him from the debate stage, before pledging: "I'm not going to let them silence us."
"I'm going to be on that debate stage with or without their permission," he added.
Kennedy's event will take place on Thursday at 9:00 p.m. ET, the same time that CNN's debate is set to begin.
In order to have qualified for Thursday's debate, candidates needed to meet constitutional requirements to serve as president and to file a formal statement of their candidacy with the Federal Election Commission, as well as be on the ballot in enough states to reach 270 Electoral College votes -- enough to win the White House -- and receive at least 15% in four national polls that meet the network's standards. The network said Kennedy failed to meet those standards; he called his exclusion "undemocratic, un-American, and cowardly" in a statement last week.
According to a polling average from aggregator FiveThirtyEight, Kennedy has roughly 9.4% national support, trailing both Biden and Trump, who are both neck-and-neck at just shy of 41%.
Last month, Kennedy's campaign filed a complaint with the FEC accusing CNN and the Biden and Trump campaigns of colluding to keep other candidates out of the debate.
The Kennedy campaign claims the TV network and campaigns engaged in “flagrant violations” of federal campaign finance law, adding that it believes CNN is illegally demanding Kennedy meet different criteria than Biden and Trump. It also argues FEC law requires broadcasters to use “pre-established” and “objective” criteria to determine debate participants and cannot pre-select candidates.
“By demanding our campaign meet different criteria to participate in the debate than Presidents Biden and Trump, CNN’s debate violates FEC law and is a large prohibited corporate contribution to both the Biden and Trump campaigns,” Kennedy said in a statement at the time.
Officials in both parties have ramped up their attacks on Kennedy, an environmental activist, lawyer and vaccine skeptic, in recent months, concerned that he could draw votes from either -- or both -- of the leading presidential candidates. Biden accepted the endorsement of dozens of members of Kennedy's own family in April.
