Did JFK Jr. Want to Run For Office? Inside His Surprising Political Aspirations

When JFK Jr. was born in 1960, his dad had just recently been elected president

NEED TO KNOW

• John F. Kennedy Jr. was born into one of the most prominent political families in 1960
• Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette explores whether or not JFK Jr. had plans to run for office before his 1999 death
• Although he didn’t hold public office, several of his family members have campaigned in recent years

The Kennedys are one of the most prominent political families of all time — but John F. Kennedy Jr. never actually held public office.

The political heir was born in November 1960, just weeks after his father, John F. Kennedy, won the presidential election. When JFK entered the White House in 1961, JFK Jr.’s early years unfolded in the spotlight, growing up just outside the Oval Office with his sister, Caroline Kennedy.

As he reached adulthood, JFK Jr. carved out his own legacy by building a career that touched media, law and even pop culture: he co-founded George magazine, received his law degree and, yes, was even named PEOPLE's Sexiest Man Alive in 1988. But with FX's Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette teasing the possibility of a future political run, fans are wondering whether he ever seriously planned to enter politics, and if he might have campaigned had he not died in 1999.

So, did JFK Jr. want to run for office? Here's everything we know about his political aspirations before his death.

Did JFK Jr. want to work in politics?

In PEOPLE editor-at-large Liz McNeil and JFK Jr.'s former assistant RoseMarie Terenzio's 2024 book, JFK Jr.: An Intimate Oral Biography, several of the George co-founder's friends shared their thoughts on how he felt about entering the "family business" of politics.

Historian Steve Gillon, a friend of JFK Jr.'s who had been his professor at Brown University, told McNeil and Terenzio that JFK Jr. initially didn't want to enter politics "because of his last name," but had eventually come around to the idea of it.

"And what he discovered in those last couple of years was that politics was a part of his DNA. This was his calling," Gillon, who also wrote the 2019 JFK Jr. biography America’s Reluctant Prince, shared. "And he was ready to answer that call."

Was JFK Jr. considering running for office?

Gillon told McNeil and Terenzio that JFK Jr. wanted to run for governor of New York, "but his ultimate goal was to return to the White House, no doubt."

In the weeks before his death, JFK Jr. had been contemplating a run for the New York governor’s seat after Hillary Clinton declared her intention to run for U.S. Senate. 

Why didn’t JFK Jr. run for office before his death?

Terenzio spoke to PEOPLE in 2017 about JFK Jr.'s political aspirations, saying that while he was "certainly considering going into politics at some point," he was determined to make his political magazine "a success" before moving on to his next endeavor.

Although JFK Jr. was considering running for New York governor in the weeks leading up to his death, he never had the chance to run for office. Those weeks were instead marked by him trying to find new financial backing for George, which was struggling at the time.

"No one knows for sure what that would’ve been but he always said that he would not move on to the next thing until George was a success," Terenzio told PEOPLE in 2017. "He felt very strongly about not going into any sort of public service or political office without having a success. He did not want to run on his name, he would say."

She added, "So he had talked about possibly running for governor. And I think he probably would’ve ended up doing that. But I think he would’ve had a pretty good shot if he decided to run for president."

Although JFK Jr. never ran, his nephew, Jack Schlossberg, is currently running for Congress in New York's 12th District.

Meanwhile, JFK Jr.'s cousin Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — who is the secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services — ran for president in 2024.

For more on the lives of John F. Kennedy Jr and Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, pick up PEOPLE's special edition, available now on newsstands and here.

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