Playing to Trump's ego, Kennedy's invitation started off with an expression of gratitude to the former president for spotlighting major media's "rigged polling" against Trump.  "We have this concern too," said Kennedy in a lengthy post on X, saying Democrat-aligned pollsters use deceptive methods that result in them "pretending" Kennedy is languishing in the single digits. 

Kennedy then shared the results of his campaign's own taking of America's electoral pulse: 

This is why we did our own poll with Zogby — the largest and most accurate poll of this election cycle. We had Zogby ask about head-to-head matchups. (1) You versus President Biden. (2) Me versus President Biden. (3) Me versus you. The results? You beat President Biden handily. I crush him as well, by even more. And against each other, I beat you in a nail-biter.

In a three-way, you are ahead but I'm coming up strong. Two new polls (CNN and Quinnipiac) have me above the 15% debate threshold. Another (Activote) has me at 26% among young voters. And you and I are tied among America's 70 million Independents.

It wasn't all flattery: Kennedy also slid in a shot at Trump's policies, saying many of the former president's supporters are backing Kennedy this time, saying they're "upset that you blew up the deficit, shut down their businesses during Covid, and filled your administration with swamp creatures."

Citing a previous Trump statement that he'd be open to sparring with Kennedy if his poll numbers were decent, Kennedy said he meets that threshold, saying "I'm the only presidential candidate in history who has polled ahead of both major party candidates in head-to-head races."