<\/p>\n
Jack Schlossberg thinks his grandfather would have been great at social media. He\u2019s less sure JFK would recognize the country he once led.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think he would be shocked at how far we have fallen in terms of setting the standard for the rest of the world to follow on human rights, democracy, and freedom,\u201d the 33-year-old Democratic congressional candidate told Fortune<\/em> on the sidelines of a CEO Initiative dinner in New York City on Wednesday night.<\/p>\n But Schlossberg<\/a> quickly added that former President John F. Kennedy would marvel at what America has built, citing a powerful economy, an innovative private sector, and breakthroughs in technology and science.<\/p>\n \u201cI think my grandfather would be proud of how much our society has accomplished together,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Schlossberg is the only grandson of President John F. Kennedy, the son of Caroline Kennedy, and is widely seen as the next standard-bearer of the Kennedy political legacy. His comments tap into a broader anxiety about America\u2019s global standing\u2014and highlight the central tension in Schlossberg\u2019s political message: pride in the country\u2019s achievements, paired with concern about its direction.<\/p>\n He argued that Kennedy, the man who solved the Cuban Missile Crisis in the 1960s, \u201cwithout firing a shot and stared down the Soviet Union without blinking,\u201d would be unsettled by the same problems the country is still facing six decades later, from healthcare to education to immigration. \u201cWe need to do better.\u201d<\/p>\n Schlossberg is running in a hotly contested race to fill New York\u2019s 12th District seat currently held by retiring<\/a> Democratic Rep. Jerry Nadler, who has served in Congress since 1992.<\/p>\n He\u2019s facing off against Assembly Members Alex Bores and Micah Lasher, Trump critic George Conway, public health researcher Nina Schwalbe, and others in a district that covers Manhattan\u2019s Upper West Side, Hell\u2019s Kitchen, and parts of the East Side. But in February, Schlossberg landed a powerful backer in his first foray into politics and shared<\/a> an endorsement<\/a> letter he received from former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is a consequential moment for the country \u2014 faith in our politics is fractured, and trust in government is tenuous,\u201d Pelosi said in the statement<\/a>. \u201cThis moment calls for leaders who understand the stakes and how to deliver for the people they serve.\u201d<\/p>\n The backbone of his campaign is built around a slogan he acknowledges is \u201ca little cheesy\u201d: believe in something again.<\/p>\n Speaking to Fortune\u2019s<\/em> Diane Brady, Schlossberg connected his grandfather\u2019s legacy to what he sees as the Democratic Party\u2019s defining failure of this moment: not a collapse in policy, but a collapse in conviction. \u201cI want a party that has the courage again and gives people something to believe in again, because we are right now at an all-time low for people who believe in government.\u201d<\/p>\n The data backs him up. According to a Pew Research Center survey<\/a>, just 17% of Americans say they trust the federal government to do what is right \u201cjust about always\u201d or \u201cmost of the time,\u201d ranking among the lowest readings in nearly seven decades of tracking.<\/p>\n While the Democratic National Committee\u2019s postmortem of what went wrong during the 2024 election still remains under wraps despite Chair Ken Martin\u2019s public pledge<\/a> to release it, Schlossberg offered his own read on what Democrats keep getting wrong with young voters.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t think that people are as disillusioned as you might expect, and I don\u2019t think that they are as far left as some of the rhetoric would have you believe,\u201d he said. The real problem is a market failure. \u201cThere hasn\u2019t been people serving the market of young people who are interested in politics and what they want to hear about. Young people are not a monolith, and young people are really smart. They [are] really able to tell authenticity from someone who\u2019s not telling the truth.\u201d<\/p>\n Voters \u201caren\u2019t looking for a superhero,\u201d he said. \u201cThey just want someone who kind of knows how to speak their language, meet them where they are, and give them something of value.\u201d<\/p>\nInside Schlossberg\u2019s first run for Congress<\/strong><\/h2>\n
Why Schlossberg says voters have lost faith<\/strong><\/h2>\n