A top ballot access adviser to Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s independent presidential campaign was arrested on assault charges early Saturday morning at a luxury Manhattan hotel, New York police said.
The consultant, Trent Pool, 37, was taken into custody at the Soho Grand Hotel and charged with obstruction of breathing and assault, police said. An unidentified 25-year-old woman said he “put his hand around her neck, making it difficult for her to breathe, and then hit her in the face with his clenched fist,” according to a police representative. The woman refused medical attention on site.
The arrest was previously reported by Mediaite.
Stefanie Spear, a spokeswoman for the Kennedy campaign, said Friday: “Trent is a contractor. He tells us the alleged incident never happened.”
Mr. Pool did not immediately respond to a request for comment, and a lawyer representing him did not immediately provide comment.
Mr. Pool, a Texas-based petition facilitator, played a central role in Mr. Kennedy’s ballot access efforts, according to court filings and three people familiar with the campaign who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss its internal operations. As an independent candidate, Mr. Kennedy faces an uphill battle to get on the ballot in all 50 states, a task that could cost tens of millions of dollars.
The Kennedy campaign paid one of Mr. Pool’s companies, Accelevate 2020, nearly $390,000 for election consulting. (Accelevate also worked for the presidential campaigns of Marianne Williamson, a Democrat, and Nikki Haley, a Republican, this election cycle, records show.)
Mr. Pool was instrumental in promoting an aggressive legal strategy to challenge the state’s signature-gathering rules, people familiar with the campaign said. Accelevate and Mr. Pool this year joined a federal lawsuit in Utah filed by the Kennedy campaign seeking to extend the state’s voting deadline and loosen its rules about who can collect signatures. Paul A. Rossi, a lawyer who has represented Mr. Pool in similar lawsuits over the years, is the Kennedy campaign’s lead ballot access lawyer.
A super PAC supporting Mr. Kennedy, American Values 2024, has also worked with Mr. Pool, according to public records and two people familiar with Mr. Kennedy’s campaign.
From December through the end of March — the latest date for which campaign expense reports are available — American Values paid $2.4 million to companies for ballot access, including $1.2 million to a newly formed company called Public Appeal LLC, which was formed last year and whose leadership includes Mr. Pool and his brother, public records show.
Tony Lyons, one of the leaders of the super PAC, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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2024-05-03 23:49:31
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