TIME reports:

A livestream behind the scenes showed dozens of people hooting, clapping, and chanting "Bobby!" from plastic chairs in a dark studio as Robert F. Kennedy Jr. stood behind a lit-up blue podium with a screen behind him reading "The Real Debate." 

Kennedy used his shadow debate to offer live commentary on his rivals, saying they represented the "vitriol, the division, the polarization that makes [Americans] disgusted with politics.”

"If you want more of the same, you should vote for President Biden, President Trump—you know what's going to happen, you know that they're going to give you four more years of the same stuff," he said. "If you want things to completely change, then you're going to vote for me, because I'm going to change everything."

When Trump and Biden —who are 78 and 81 years old, respectively—insulted each other's health and cognitive ability, Kennedy, 70, took the opportunity to boast about his fitness. "All I can say is I hope they let me on the stage for that contest," he responded, to loud cheers from the audience, in response to Biden's invitation to play golf with Trump if the former President could carry his own bag. "I hike every day, I go to the gym every day, I don't eat processed foods, and I do intermittent fasting."

Kennedy, who failed to qualify for the presidential debate hosted by CNN, said his exclusion was due to "collusion between two establishment parties." The network says he didn't meet their criteria to qualify, which required he reach at least 15% in four national polls. “This is something that’s important for our democracy because Americans feel like the system is rigged,” Kennedy said in his opening remarks before the debate. “This is exactly the kind of merger of state and corporate power that I’m running to oppose.”

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