The Media Research Center spent the 2024 presidential campaign flip-flopping over Robert Kennedy Jr., cheering him when ran as a Democrat and might have hurt President Biden’s re-election prospects then booing him when he switched to running as an independent and might hurt Donald Trump’s prospects. Its flip-flopping continued throughout much of 2024 until he became largely irrelevant as a viable candidate. But despite his being an anti-vaxxer and whale carcass mutilator, Kennedy stayed useful to the MRC as a “victim” because his lies about vaccines and other medical issues fed into its so-called “censorship” agenda (even though correcting lies and misinformation is not “censorship”). Luis Cornelio wrote in an Aug. 23 post:
Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. rebuked the Biden-Harris administration for exploiting government power to censor their political opposition.
During an announcement speech suspending his presidential campaign and endorsing former President Donald Trump, RFK. Jr. addressed reporters in Arizona and directly cited Big Tech censorship as a main reason for not winning the Democratic presidential nomination for the 2024 election. Mincing no words, he blasted the federal government and the Democratic National Committee for their involvement.
“What most alarms me isn’t how the Democratic Party conducts its internal affairs or runs its candidates; what alarms me is the resort to censorship and media control, and the weaponization of the federal agencies,” RFK Jr. said while standing before a podium with two American flags behind him.
During his speech, RFK Jr. highlighted the damning consequences of the censorship collusion between Biden officials and social media platforms to censor constitutionally-protected, yet inconvenient free speech.
Cornelio didn’t explain why the lies and misinformation Kennedy repeatedly spreads should be treated as “free speech” — let alone that they are constitutionally protected — and should apparently never be corrected by anyone.
Cornelio gushed some more over Kennedy spouting those “censorship” talking points again in an Aug. 26 post:
The battle against censorship could soon be at the forefront of a potential Trump administration, according to former independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Republican vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance.
RFK Jr., speaking on the Sunday edition of Fox News Sunday, and Vance, speaking on NBC News’s Meet the Press also on Sunday, hinted at what could be a significant offensive against the dystopian government censorship regime if Trump emerges victorious in 2024 and if RFK Jr. is called to serve in some capacity.
Speaking with Fox News anchor Shannon Bream, RFK Jr. said that Trump’s eagerness to dismantle censorship was one of the primary issues that led him to endorse the Trump-Vance ticket ahead of the upcoming election.
“The broad issues that were most important to me, the ones that brought me into the campaign, which was ending the Ukraine war, ending the censorship and protecting children’s health were all, reforming our food supply — all the things that we need to do to make our children healthy again — those are all things that President Trump also wanted to work on,” RFK Jr. said.
RFK Jr. then affirmed that Trump had invited him to “form a unity government,” and that while the two may disagree on other policies, the fight against censorship is among those issues most “important for unifying our country.”
Again, no explanation was offered for portraying correction of lies and misinformation as “censorship.”
As Kennedy moved toward throwing his support to Trump, Catherine Salgado helped him boost those dubious talking points again in a Sept. 19 post:
It appears Democrat [sic] vice presidential nominee Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN) has taken the Big Tech bait in calling for censorship of so-called “hate speech” and “misinformation.” But former Independent candidate for president Robert F. Kennedy Jr. corrected Walz for his outrageous take on America’s first principles.
Walz claimed in Dec. 2022 on MSNBC’s The ReidOut that U.S. law does not protect supposed “misinformation” or “hate speech.” RFK Jr. slammed Walz’s argument in a Sept. 18 post on X, pointing out that there is, in fact, a protection for speech that leftists consider “hateful”: “It is called the U.S. Constitution.” As for the leftist buzzword “misinformation,” Kennedy retorted, “who decides what is true and what is false? The government? In authoritarian countries, yes, the government. That is why freedom of speech lies at the very heart of democracy.” Walz’s running mate Kamala Harris has called five times for her now-presidential opponent Donald Trump to be censored by Big Tech, including in a 2019 CNN interview.
Big Tech platforms, including X, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and YouTube, have policies penalizing or banning alleged “hateful conduct,” “hate speech,” and/or “misinformation.” These platforms also use so-called fact checking to censor speech that, according to the left, is “misinformation” or “false information.”
Is Salgado arguing that is no objective definition of lies or misinformation? That seems like sloppiness designed to obscure such lies and misinformation when they come from the right. She continued:
Kennedy, who was running for president as an Independent before dropping out and endorsing GOP nominee Donald Trump, continued, “Yes, I understand, some forms of speech are repugnant, such as expressions of racial bigotry. Problem is, the category of hate speech expands to include everything the censors ‘hate.’”
Kennedy correctly points out the subjective nature of defining “hate” and discerning what should or should not be censored as misinformation online.
What, exactly, about obvious misinformation should be considered subjective? Salgado doesn’t explain.
Nicholas Fondacaro spent a Sept. 23 post being mad that the co-hosts of “The View” were holding Kennedy responsible for his part in a non-physical affair with reporter Olivia Nuzzi:
Last week, news broke that New York magazine Washington correspondent Olivia Nuzzi was in a sexting relationship with her source, former presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. while writing about him, and aggressively sending him nude pictures of herself. But instead of decrying Nuzzi for doing a disservice to female reporters everywhere by engaging in the type of unethical actively she once insisted didn’t really happen, most of the liberal ladies of ABC’s The View defended her on Monday’s show and blamed all men for the scandal.
The ridiculous spin started with the show’s opening tease for the segment, where the announcer huffed: “Breaking nudes? RFK Jr. ignites a scandal for reportedly bragging about being sent nude photos from a prominent journalist Olivia Nuzzi. But is most of the fallout landing on her?”
Coming back from their first commercial break, moderator Whoopi Goldberg suggested that Kennedy should be getting all the flack because he cheated on his wife, while ignoring the fact that Nuzzi was cheating on her fiancé, Ryan Lizza of Politico (who left his family to be with Nuzzi). She didn’t understand why Nuzzi had to live up to journalistic ethics:
[…]Farah Griffin tried to downplay what happened by suggested Nuzzi simply “blurred ethical lines.” She had a meltdown over people calling it an “Olivia Nuzzi Scandal” and demanded people call it an “RFK scandal.”
She proceeded to cry “sexism” about the whole incident – which Nuzzi willing took an aggressive part in – and demanded that all men be blamed for it:
[…]Surprisingly, the only cast member to bring any semblance of sense to the table was Ana Navarro. After taking some shots at Kennedy, by calling him “a dog and a ho,” she pointed out that the scandal boiled down to it being a major conflict of interest for Nuzzi, who “had more to lose”:
Fondacaro didn’t explain why he and his employer wouldn’t hold Kennedy to the same standards they held Bill Clinton over his affair (though decades later, Tim Graham was still trying to slut-shame Lewinsky over it).
Christian Toto bestowed victimhood on Kennedy via his wife in his Oct. 5 column: “The Hollywood Reporter just suggested liberal actress Cheryl Hines could be “shunned” by Hollywood. Why? She supports her husband, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who now supports Trump.” Toto didn’t mention the emotional affair Kennedy had with a reporter — apparently that’s OK at the MRC these days.