Here in eastern Nebraska, we are secondary players when it comes to Presidential politics.

While the Omaha airwaves are packed with political ads, they don’t mean a thing if you live west of the river.

 But when the candidates come to Council Bluffs before the caucus it does give Omaha residents the chance to see the candidates up close and personal.

 I have been to numerous rallies, meet and greets, and town halls in Council Bluffs over the years and while they are all different, they do share one common denominator. The candidates book rooms that are smaller than the crowd they expect to attract. That way when the cameras show the crowd, they are showing a packed house rather a lot of empty seats. 100 people at the Mid America Center looks a lot smaller than 100 people packed into a bar on Broadway.

 So when I heard that RFK Jr was coming to Lincoln and he booked the Royal Grove for his event I was surprised. I thought it was a rookie mistake. I thought that the 100 people that showed up would be dwarfed by the size of the venue. I was wrong. RFK Jr’s people knew what they were doing.

 Last Tuesday night when he brought his long shot campaign to the Cornhusker state, the Royal Grove was full. Some estimating the crowd at over 600. A good-sized crowd for an established candidate a week before the election. A surprisingly big crowd for an independent candidate 11 months before the election.

 Now RFK Jr came to town to get signatures on a petition to get on the ballot next November. And while other independent candidates have come and gone without getting the signatures, I have no doubt that won’t be a problem for the former President’s nephew. And his organization looks like they know what they are doing so I have no doubt they will be able to get on the ballot in all 50 states.

 So now the question is what impact he will have on the election next November … because he will have an impact.

 On the surface it would be easy to dismiss him as just an anti-vaxxer nutjob. But the people that came to hear him speak were not all anti-vaxxers. And his message of trying to bring people together seemed to resonate with a lot in the crowd. His views on the economic divide in this country and how young people can’t afford to buy a house was warmly received.

 Considering that hindsight is 20/20, I’m sure the response to Covid could have been handled differently. I don’t have access to all that the medical experts knew. The virus was pushing our health care system to the brink of collapsing. People were dying left and right. He can criticize the response, but he isn’t saying how he would have handled a situation unlike any the world has seen in my lifetime any differently.

 But there is more to the RFK Jr independent campaign than vaccines and Covid. There is a message where those on the right and left can find something they like and dismiss the things they don’t. As more and more voters register as independents his approach to politics will appeal to many of them.

 The cable news and talk radio talking heads seem to be looking at this through the traditional prism. But what happened at the Royal Grove last Tuesday wasn’t the traditional political rally.

There was no backing from The Republican or Democratic Party to get their party faithful to the rally. It was a grassroots effort to get the people who were looking for something different to come and check out the man with the legendary initials.

 So, I don’t know how this all plays out. I do know that the numbers that showed up at the Royal Grove will continue to grow as the election gets closer. This is going to be very interesting to watch. Even from a secondary Presidential political market.   

Tom Becka is a long time Nebraska broadcaster who for over 30 years has been covering Omaha and Midwest issues on both radio and TV. He has been a guest on numerous national cable and news shows, filled in for nationally syndicated talk radio programs and Talkers Magazine has recognized him as one of the Top 100 talk show hosts in the country 10 times. Never afraid to ruffle some feathers, his ‘Becka’s Beat’ commentaries can be found online on Youtube and other digital platforms.