DALLAS
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. the current Secretary of Health and Human Services, delivered a scathing critique of the Democratic Party at the Republican National Committee's midterm convention, arguing the party he abandoned in 2024 has betrayed its founding principles.
Kennedy, 72, who attended his first Democratic convention in 1960 at age six and later became a keynote speaker at multiple conventions, described his defection to Republicans as a natural response to the party's transformation. "I mourn the fact that neither my father nor my uncle would recognize the Democratic Party of today," Kennedy said.
He contrasted the Democrats of the 1960s—when his uncle, President John F. Kennedy, ran on tax cuts, a strong defense, and anti-communism—with what he characterized as the modern party's singular focus. "The party now offers Americans only one policy," Kennedy said: "the unbridled sociopathic and blind hatred of a single man: Donald J. Trump."
Kennedy argued that the Democratic Party of his youth stood with labor, the working class, and the American middle class. Nearly every police officer and firefighter was a Democrat during that era, he said. The party championed the Bill of Rights, particularly free speech protections, and maintained deep skepticism of centralized government power, corporate privilege, and secret intelligence agencies.
These positions, Kennedy suggested, now align more closely with the modern Republican Party. His defection expanded President Donald Trump's coalition ahead of the 2024 election.
The convention also featured tributes to families of 9/11 victims, with a video presentation and a performance by opera singer Christopher Macchio, a Trump-favored performer from Long Island.
Separately, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a Republican candidate for a Senate seat in Texas, faced questioning from Fox News host Bret Baier about a series of corruption accusations spanning a decade. Paxton faced a 2015 indictment on security fraud charges, federal fraud charges filed in 2016, bribery accusations, and an impeachment in 2023 over abuse of office claims. "When you're fighting, they come after you," Paxton said, appearing unmoved by the line of questioning.
