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What Shanahan does have is money. She has been one of Kennedy’s most important donors, bankrolling a controversial Super Bowl ad and pouring $4 million into his campaign. Kennedy’s super PAC says he has enough signatures in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, and Nevada, four of the seven swing states that will likely decide the 2024 contest, and Shanahan’s deep pockets could help them get on the ballot in other key states. That alone is scary, given that the race could well come down to a few thousand votes in any one of those states.

And yet, Kennedy’s choice of Shanahan, indeed his entire search for a running mate, suggests an underlying weakness in his campaign. She beat out New York Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers (a virulent anti-vaxxer who thinks that mountains are the remnants of ancient trees, like from the movie Avatar), former Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura (who thinks 9/11 was an inside job), and the rapper Killer Mike (whose name is Killer Mike).* Perhaps Kennedy was seeking someone who would emphasize his outsider status and appeal to young voters, but the inescapable conclusion is that Kennedy is not running a serious campaign and thus can’t find a serious running mate.

So maybe he settled on someone who at least had a lot of money. Fair enough; running for president is expensive. But that would suggest Kennedy is facing a money crunch. Back in January, a super PAC close to Kennedy called American Values 2024 reported that it had raised $50 million, but half of that came from just two people: Republican megadonor Timothy Mellon, who gave $15 million to American Values in 2023 (and $10 million to a pro-Trump super PAC), and private security honcho Gavin de Becker, who gave $10 million. Mellon’s largesse was likely motivated by the assumption that Kennedy, who until October was running as a Democrat, hurt Biden much more than Trump.