(RepublicanJournal.org) – Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has become the first of this year’s White House hopefuls to announce his running mate. Since mid-March, there’s been speculation that lawyer and entrepreneur Nicole Shanahan would be joining his ticket. Now, Kennedy has confirmed that she will be his vice presidential candidate.
On February 11, RFK Jr’s campaign ran a 30-second ad during the Super Bowl. That was a surprise because Super Bowl ads are notoriously expensive. Then it turned out the ad had been financed by a pro-Kennedy super PAC, American Values 2024 — and that PAC had received a $4 million donation from Nicole Shanahan a week before the ad ran.
Within weeks, there were media reports that Kennedy was likely to pick Shanahan, who hasn’t been involved in politics beyond donating to liberal causes, as his running mate. On March 26, Kennedy ended the speculation and confirmed that the 38-year-old is his pick for VP.
Nicole Ann Shanahan, the daughter of an American father and a Chinese immigrant mother, grew up in Oakland, California, before earning a bachelor’s degree in Asian studies, economics, and Mandarin from the University of Puget Sound, Washington. After graduating, she worked as a paralegal and patent specialist, then went back to college and graduated from Santa Clara University’s law school in 2015. Next, she set up a firm specializing in legal technology, which she sold in 2020. Since then she’s joined the boards of several green and biotech companies and also produced two environmentalist movies.
In her personal life, Shanahan has been married twice, and her second husband, from 2018 to 2023, was Google cofounder Sergei Brin. As part of her divorce settlement from Brin, Shanahan is believed to have received Google stock worth at least $390 million and possibly double that. She might not have a lot of political experience, but she can certainly finance Kennedy’s ads.
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