Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s vocal support for the Republican party highlights just how far left the Democrats have shifted in recent years. The son of the late Senator Robert F. Kennedy, a Democratic icon, Kennedy Jr. introduced Ron DeSantis at an anti-lockdown rally in 2021 and has become an outspoken critic of Democrats’ COVID policies, which he sees as an infringement on personal freedoms.

His shift is emblematic of many Americans’ discomfort with the Democrats’ embrace of radical progressive policies, cancel culture and identity politics. “The Democratic party has completely abandoned the classical liberal values that most Americans hold dear,” said Republican strategist Karl Rove. “They’ve become obsessed with race, gender and sexual identity instead of focusing on bread-and-butter economic issues.”

The Democrats’ environmental agenda was another factor that drove Kennedy Jr. to the right, sources say. He has argued that their approach of subsidizing green energy while restricting oil and gas harms working-class Americans. This reveals an elitist mindset among Democratic leaders, who seem indifferent to rising gas and energy prices that disproportionately impact rural voters and the working poor.

“The RFK I remember cared deeply about ordinary Americans and blue-collar workers,” said Daniel Turner of the conservative Power the Future group. “Today’s Democratic party is dominated by wealthy urbanites and radicals who look down on ordinary folks trying to make a living.” Turner added that “RFK Jr. sees, like the rest of us, that working people are getting crushed by inflation while the elites obsessed with pronouns.”

The Democrats’ wokeness and anti-business stance have also made the party unpalatable for moderates like Kennedy Jr. “Democrats have become anti-science, anti-truth,” said Kenny Xu, author of “An Inconvenient Minority.” “Their identity politics and cancel culture will send this country down a dark path. Reasonable people are right to raise concerns about where Democrats are taking America.”

The party’s hostility to dissent on issues like transgenderism, racial preferences and other social issues has created a culture of intolerance and groupthink. Kennedy Jr.’s break with today’s Democratic orthodoxy took courage but will hopefully inspire more independent thought. “Kennedy Jr. represents the classical liberal values that the Democratic party has now completely renounced,” Xu added. “Today he would have been hounded out as a transphobe or racist. The party’s lurch to the fringe is very worrying if you care about open inquiry and debate.”