Presidential longshot Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced Tuesday that he has selected Nicole Shanahan as his vice-presidential running mate in his independent bid for the White House. Shanahan, an attorney and entrepreneur who is well-known in tech circles, has never before sought public office.
For Kennedy, it caps a long search for a prospective running mate that set the political rumor mill on fire in an otherwise repetitive election cycle. Still, many Americans may not be familiar with Shanahan. Here’s what to know about her.
She has funded aging and menopause research
Shanahan is currently president of Bia-Echo, a foundation that aims to be “a catalyst for constructive social change.” It focuses on three areas: reproductive rights, criminal justice, and the environment. It has led the launch of a Center for Reproductive Longevity and Equality at the Buck Institute for Research on Aging, which researched menopause and works on developing strategies to prevent or delay ovarian aging.
She was once married to Google cofounder Sergey Brin
Shanahan and Brin were married in 2018 and divorced in 2022. They have a daughter together. The dissolution of that marriage thrust Shanahan into the glare of the media spotlight when the Wall Street Journal alleged she had an affair with Musk in 2021. Musk and Shanahan have both denied the allegations. (The Journal has stood by its reporting.)
“I was thrust into the public eye, the online images and commentary felt more like a Zeitgeist than depictions of my lived experiences,” Shanahan wrote in a 2023 essay. “The story was a forum for people to project their opinions on a wide variety of topics including extreme wealth, infidelity, and whether I’ve had plastic surgery (I have not).”
Before Brin, she was married for two years to Jeremy Asher Kranz, a Bay Area investor.
She helped pay for Kennedy’s Super Bowl commercial
RFK Jr’s Super Bowl ad echoed a 1960 campaign for John F. Kennedy, turning heads and further estranging some members of his family. A Super Bowl commercial in 2024, however, came with a $7 million price tag for 30 seconds of airtime.
Shanahan contributed $4 million to the Super PAC American Values 2024 about a week before the game to help pay for the ad—as well as helped coordinate its production.
“It seems like a great opportunity to highlight that he’s running for president,” she said at the time.
She beat out a swath of celebrities for the VP role
Kennedy’s search for a VP put a lot of names in the spotlight. At one point, New York Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers was on his list, as was former Minnesota governor, actor, and professional wrestler Jesse Ventura. Kennedy also spoke with Dirty Jobs host Mike Rowe about the job.
Other names that had reportedly been bandied about include former presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard and former Massachusetts Republican Senator Scott Brown.
She used to be a board member of the Sloomoo Institute, a slime-based ASMR experience
Among the numerous job credits Shanahan has had over the years, the most interesting was likely “global joy officer” at SlooMoo Institute, an interactive experience that calls itself “the world’s #1 slime experience.” She also served as a board member. (She is no longer an active member of the company, according to Sloomoo.) She joined the company following a post-pandemic visit with her family in New York, which prompted her to invest $2.5 million in the company.
“I was taken by how the kids responded,” she told Forbes. “Sloomoo occupies their senses and their hands so they can’t actually use their phones.”
She has a special interest in autism
Shanahan has an autistic daughter and has funded research into the disorder, working with researchers to understand variations, biological markers that might help with earlier diagnoses, and the root causes of autism.
She has told the New York Times she is “not an anti-vaxxer,” but did want to see more screening of risks for vaccinations.
“I think there needs to be a space to have these conversations,” she said.
She describes herself as a “bullish defender of the press”
In the essay following the Musk allegations, Shanahan expressed her anger and disappointment with the Journal’s report, saying, “I can’t think of anything worse for a professional woman’s career than publicly shaming her for a sexual act.”
At the same time, though, she said she was a First Amendment advocate, having published pamphlets in high school objecting to the war in Iraq, and led student walkouts. “I believe freedom of the press is one of the most important tenets of American liberty; and while I still do, I now am also deeply familiar with what it feels like to be the subject of fast and furious, and sometimes sloppy, journalism,” she wrote.
Her hobbies are diverse
Shanahan stays busy. In addition to the not-so-unusual hobbies of yoga, paddleboarding, snowboarding, swimming, running, cooking, meditation, and kiteboarding, she has said she has a special affinity for Native American culture—and one of the things she enjoys doing is making head dresses.
She got her first job at age 12
To help her family’s income, Shanahan began bussing tables at a local burger restaurant when she was 12 years old. Three years later, she was a hostess at a more upscale restaurant. “I would unpack my tips envelope in front of my mom,” she said, “and she was blown away by how much was coming out.”
She has historically been a Democratic political donor
Among the politicians Shanahan has backed financially are Hillary Clinton in 2016 and Joe Biden in 2020. She also, in 2020, hosted a fundraiser for Pete Buttigieg. She was a Kennedy supporter when he was running as a Democrat earlier in this election cycle as well.
Correction, March 28, 2024: This article has been updated to reflect that Shanahan is no longer a board member of the Sloomoo Institute, according to the organization.
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