Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. announced Friday that he has secured a place on the ballot in Hawaii. It is the third state that has granted ballot access to his We the People Party.

What You Need To Know

  • Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. said Friday he has secured a place on the ballot in Hawaii

  • It is the third state that has granted ballot access to Kennedy's We the People Party

  • Kennedy launched his We the People paraty in late January

  • He first filed his candidacy for the Democratic party presidential imination in April 2023 but switched to run as an Independent in October

“The process of securing ballot access as an independent presidential candidate is an uphill battle, unlike the easy path afforded to Democrat and Republican candidates,” the Kennedy 2024 campaign said in an email Friday. “While they breeze through with minimal effort, we must gather over 1,000,000 petition signatures across the nation.”

Kennedy launched We the People in late January to get on the California ballot before the Super Tuesday primary election March 5. To do so requires a new political party to submit 75,000 signatures to the Secretary of State — a threshold his campaign has not yet met.

To get on the ballot in Hawaii, the Kennedy campaign obtained more than three times the required number of signatures, his campaign said. Hawaii will hold its primary on August 10. RFK Jr. is already on the ballot in Utah and New Hampshire as the We the People candidate. Utah is one of more than a dozen states holding its primary election on Super Tuesday.

Kennedy first filed his candidacy for the Democratic party presidential nomination in April 2023 but switched to run as an Independent in October last year saying the two-party political system was “corrupt” and “rigged.”

“When I declared my independence from the two-party Washington establishment and announced my campaign for President, I knew it would be an all-out fight,” Kennedy said in Friday’s email.

His campaign estimates it will cost about $20 million to get on the ballot in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

Kennedy has a 48% favorability rating according to the most recent Harris Poll conducted in late February. In a hypothetical matchup between President Biden, former President Donald Trump and RFK Jr. in November, Kennedy wins 18% of the vote, Biden takes 33% and Trump wins with 41%, according to the Harris Poll.

We the People is not the only third-candidate party to seek ballot access this year. The bipartisan No Labels Initiative announced in January that it had won ballot access in 14 states and planned to win access in another 18 states by Election Day in November.