A month after the announcement, RFK Jr.’s running mate, Nicole Shanahan, remains in the shadows

When Robert F. Kennedy Jr. nominated California lawyer Nicole Shanahan as his vice presidential candidate in late March, it seemed to spark the start of a new and exciting phase of his long-running independent presidential bid: the “signs” Kennedy ’24” suddenly gave way to a second name, whose water bottles and teddy bears were sold on the campaign website within minutes of Oakland’s announcement.

Yet a few weeks later, the pace of Kennedy’s campaign resembles that of pre-Shanahan, largely because his running mate – the largely unknown young acolyte who might have helped shape the image of a presidential candidate presidential election prone to a damaging loop of conspiratorial rhetoric – has been almost completely absent from the election campaign.

That will change somewhat with the launch of a podcast that Shanahan recorded, which will “spotlight everyday Americans and their stories and cover issues important to (Shanahan) and (Kennedy),” according to a person familiar with the activities by Shanahan. The podcast, details of which were first obtained by ABC News, is expected to launch in the coming days.

Yet she has not appeared at any of the public, in-person, open-to-the-press events, instead appearing on several podcasts discussing issues such as coronavirus lockdowns, free speech, fertility and healing from the body.

She is scheduled to appear at a “Night of Laughter” in Nashville on May 15, an open press event where she and Kennedy will be joined by several comedians to raise money for the campaign.

“Right now, I think she’s getting into the race the same way I’m getting into it — doing a lot of podcasts and doing emergence events,” Kennedy told reporters in Dallas on Wednesday.

“She spent three or four days at the border learning about this problem,” he added, referring to his trip to Yuma, Arizona, earlier this month, which was closed to the press.

Yet his exact role in the campaign remains somewhat mysterious. In a podcast interview with Stanford professor Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, Shanahan claimed his days have “definitely evolved” since the announcement. But she didn’t say exactly how, leading critics to question what exactly Shanahan’s role in the campaign was.

Opponents portrayed Shanahan, a wealthy Silicon Valley lawyer and longtime Democratic donor, as little more than an open checkbook for Kennedy’s campaign, which spent almost as much as it raised — $33 million raised compared to $27 million. millions of dollars spent — in recent months. according to federal financial information.

Unlike regular donors, candidates can contribute as much as they want to their own campaigns.

A significant portion of Kennedy’s spending goes toward funding security and the unique challenge of gaining voting access in each state, according to federal financial disclosures. In fact, the campaign’s top two expenditures in March went to a private security company and a petition collection vendor, according to federal financial disclosures.

“It’s clear she was chosen for two reasons: She was the last woman standing after a litany of unqualified candidates said no. And she has the money to pump into his campaign the money he sorely needed as he continues to work to be a spoiler for Donald Trump,” Matt Corridoni, a spokesperson for the Democratic National Committee, told ABC News.

Many Democrats have spoken out against the Kennedy-Shanahan ticket, saying it is intended to siphon off votes from President Joe Biden and deliver the White House to former President Donald Trump.

Kennedy effectively denied those claims in an interview with NewsNation in March — when Shanahan’s name was floated in the media as the possible choice. At the time, Shanahan contributed the maximum amount to the campaign and millions more to a pro-Kennedy super PAC.

“I would never choose a vice presidential candidate based on how much money they have,” Kennedy told NewsNation.

Nonetheless, one of Shanahan’s first acts as a candidate appears to have been to inject $2 million into the campaign, according to his latest financial filing. Her donation was dated one day after the announcement that she would be Kennedy’s running mate.

Shanahan, 38, a Stanford University law graduate, helped found several organizations focused on “human and planetary health,” as she explained to ABC News in a March interview.

At the event announcing her vice presidential candidacy, Shanahan said she began supporting Kennedy after a friend encouraged her to listen to an interview with him.

“And then I listened to another, and another, and I recognized that the person I was seeing in these interviews was the exact opposite of the media smears about his personality,” she said.

Asked about his absence from the trail on Meghan McCain’s podcast, Link Lauren, a former senior campaign aide who worked closely with Shanahan, told McCain that Shanahan was “heavily involved” in the campaign’s efforts to counteract the multiple barriers to accessing ballots “behind the scenes.” (Lauren has since withdrawn from the campaign.) Yet when the campaign held an event in Iowa with the goal of appearing on the state’s ballot shortly after the interview, Shanahan did not was nowhere in sight.

Speaking to a group of reporters after that event, Kennedy attributed Shanahan’s absence to a scheduling conflict with child care, and added that he spoke to Shanahan at least twice a day, emphasizing that they formed a “united front”.

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“I’m very proud of her, I’m very proud of what she’s doing,” Kennedy said. “I talk to Nicole probably two, three times a day and I’m very proud of what she does and I can’t wait to appear with her in some places.”

On her trip to Yuma, Shanahan came “prepared” with “pages of questions,” said Shara Whitehead, president of the Yuma Community Food Bank, who hosted Shanahan as part of a roundtable discussion with leaders of several non-profit organizations in the region.

“What resonated most, I think, is the fact that she sees the need to secure the border to control immigration, and that immigration needs to be fixed,” Whitehead told ABC News, adding that Shanahan seemed “emotional” about the difficulties. families who visit the food bank face.

On Monday, Shanahan made his first appearance before the press as part of an online panel about Earth Day – albeit virtually. Reporters were unable to ask questions and Shanahan and Kennedy appeared to be in two different locations.

And it’s unclear where and when the two will next appear in person, before voters.

“I think you’ll be seeing a lot of her soon,” Kennedy offered Dallas.

The campaign’s press office did not respond to a detailed list of questions about Shanahan’s activities and whether she would contribute more to the effort with her own money.

However, she has been very active on social media, frequently posting about X.

Earlier this month, Shanahan took to X to blast Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna, who shared a letter with CBS News calling on him to step down because he said his support for Kennedy would help Trump to win the elections. Khanna had not yet shared this letter with Shanahan.

“.@RoKhanna, you have my phone number and you could have called instead of going to the press. It’s performative.” Shanahan claimed in a post on.

Mixed reception from supporters towards Shanahan

His absence could exacerbate the vulnerability of Kennedy’s diverse base of supporters, who appear divided over Shanahan. In online forums, skeptics seem worried that she is too liberal or that they don’t seem to know where she stands on a host of issues.

Kennedy enjoys a significant following online, with many of his most ardent supporters congregating on the candidate’s Reddit forum. In fact, r/RFKJrForPresident has over 7,000 users, and Reddit ranks the group in the top 8% of its community in terms of size.

A popular Kennedy forum under Reddit illustrates the exchanges about Shanahan in great detail: In one highly charged thread, for example, one supporter wonders whether Shanahan is discouraging Kennedy’s more conservative supporters. On another topic, one supporter said Shanahan’s relatively unknown background and track record poses a major risk and won’t help persuade those hesitant to support Kennedy.

“We don’t know how good a debater she is. We don’t know if she’ll have influence and leverage in Washington to get things done. And God forbid, if anything happens to Bobby, she’ll be president … … I have no doubt that she is an intelligent woman, but that gives no indication of her political future,” the user wrote, adding: “I don’t feel good about the idea of ​​voting for someone I don’t know at all.

Another user said they wished Kennedy had gone in a different direction.

“I wish he’d picked someone more high-profile to elevate the ticket, especially because what the tickets need now more than anything is elevation, as opposed to policy wonks.” , said the user.

Still, all hope is not lost for Shanahan: she also has a bonanza of support in online forums. Between reluctance and outright support, many encourage skeptics to keep an open mind.

“People change,” one user said. “Voters should listen to Shanahan speak to learn her opinions and why she holds them.”

The same user said she shed tears of hope after Shanahan’s first speech.

“I’m a 56 year old man who hates the oligarchy, has voted independent for over 30 years and is grumpy and also cried when he heard Bobby speak,” the user wrote. “It was the first time in my life that I cried while listening to a politician. Today I heard Nicole speak, and now there are two politicians in my life who made me cry.”