Robert F. Kennedy Jr.‘s polarizing tenure as health and human services secretary is not scaring away Republicans who see his Make America Healthy Again agenda as an asset in competitive races. On the campaign trail, Kennedy has become a political boogeyman for Democrats highlighting his vaccine skepticism and agency decisions they say…
Page A5From§Eachthe breakfast edition — 2 September 2026
Republicans embrace RFK Jr. and his baggage for MAHA turnout as GOP bench thins in deep blue
Here’s the mechanism: the Republican bench thins in deep blue territory, so the party embraces RFK Jr.—and the baggage he brings—for turnout at MAHA. The rug-pull is the order: the party’s strategy is not to build a bench but to fill chairs with borrowed names. The joke is the musical chairs: the candidate pool shrinks, the baggage grows, and the seats are filled for turnout, not for depth. The reader opens the fold and finds the receipts support the sequence—party dominance by establishment, insurgents fall, and GOP turns to RFK Jr. for numbers. The stakes are measured in seats, not in plans. The punchline is that the political maneuver is less about policy than about filling the room. The outcome is a party defined by who is available and what comes with them.
“When the party embraces RFK Jr. for turnout and runs out of candidates in a blue stronghold, that’s not strategy, that’s musical chairs. The stakes: who gets a seat, and who gets the baggage.”
“It’s savvy politics to bring in RFK Jr.—his baggage is just, um, experience. As for the bench thinning, that’s just, well, making room for new faces. Did I say 'savvy'? Maybe it’s, uh, desperate. No, definitely savvy.”
The receipts
Massachusetts Democrats rewarded Ed Markey, 80, over Seth Moulton in a generational clash after Moulton urged the party to "pass the torch."
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front.