Fears for Jack Schlossberg: Brutally humiliated and branded with a cruel nickname, even Kennedys are admitting he needs help... but watchful mom refuses to give up

By NICK ALLEN, US NEWS EDITOR (POLITICS) Published: 23:08, 2 July 2026 | Updated: 23:25, 2 July 2026 Jack Schlossberg... you're no Jack Kennedy. That was the unequivocal and devastating verdict of New York voters as JFK's only grandson failed spectacularly in his bid to get elected to Congress last month. It was an ignominious end to a campaign beset by chaos and led by a 33-year-old candidate with seemingly few qualifications for the job, apart from his name. He was listed on the ballot as John Bouvier Kennedy Schlossberg and derided by critics as the ultimate entitled 'nepo baby.' Only 10.8 percent of voters in New York's 12th congressional district, which includes the Empire State building, United Nations and Central Park, gave Schlossberg the nod in the Democratic primary last week. The fallout for the Kennedys could be monumental, marking the end of the latest attempt to reignite the political dynasty. But, perhaps worse, it has sparked a derisory backlash over Schlossberg's wild social media posts, which might be kindly described as zany, or, less kindly, grotesque. One member of the Kennedy clan itself has publicly suggested the posts show he should 'get help.' As to what the family at large thinks, one political insider told the Daily Mail: 'You'll never know, they'll never tell you.' He advised Schlossberg to 'get more serious... you don't have to be Attila the Hun (on social media) to win a congressional seat or get elected to public office.' Schlossberg and his mother Caroline are 'incredibly close' - she encouraged him to run, and was at his side when he lost (pictured together on the campaign trail in May) An expert said Jack Schlossberg should stop trying to be 'Atilla the Hun' on social media During the race, reports emerged about high turnover of campaign staff and internal dissatisfaction with the candidate. The New York Times published a damaging report that on one occasion, Schlossberg disappeared from his own launch in November because he 'needed a nap,' effectively disappearing for the rest of the day. The criticism proved unwarranted. In fact, Schlossberg later said, he had gone to see his sister Tatiana, who was secretly terminally sick with acute myeloid leukemia. Tragically, she died the following month, aged 35.  However, as other details of Schlossberg's sparse resume emerged, the narrative intensified that he was a pampered political prince with no real-world experience. 'It was absolutely brutal, a devastating portrait of someone who hasn't really had a job for more than six months. I think it was harder to take Jack as seriously after that,' a New York political consultant told the Daily Mail. 'Also, he had no base, he was just all over the place, his positions changed during the race. I think the folks that were most enamored by Jack Schlossberg are 16-year-olds who don't vote.' Jack Schlossberg lost his bid to be elected to Congress amid a chaotic campaign and bizarre social media posts  Schlossberg is the only grandson of President John F Kennedy Schlossberg's biggest advocate appears to have been his mother Caroline Kennedy, JFK's daughter, who was Barack Obama's Ambassador to Japan and Joe Biden's Ambassador to Australia. They are 'incredibly close,' she encouraged him to run, and was at his side when he lost. There has never been any question about Schlossberg's academic qualifications. He had been groomed for greatness, attending the nation's oldest private school, Collegiate School in Manhattan, which dates back 400 years and where annual fees are currently $69,000. Then, he graduated from Yale in 2015 with a degree in history, and went on to Harvard Law School and Harvard Business School. In 2017, in his first live TV interview, he spoke about being 'inspired by my family's legacy of public service,' and seemed destined to take up the family's political torch. Commentators noted the striking physical resemblance to his uncle, John F Kennedy Jr. JFK Jr was best man at his mother Caroline's wedding to Ed Schlossberg. And, as a three-year-old, young Jack had been ring bearer at JFK Jr's wedding to Carolyn Bessette. Recently, he has attacked the 'grotesque' portrayal of the tempestuous JFK Jr-Bessette marriage in Ryan Murphy's Hulu drama 'Love Story.' A young Schlossberg was ring bearer at the wedding of John F Kennedy Jr and Carolyn Bessette, pictured here on March 9, 1999 The social media influencer has said he sometimes behaves like a 'silly goose' In Ryan Murphy's Hulu series Love Story, actors Paul Kelly and Sarah Pidgeon recreate the infamous fight between John F Kennedy Jr and Carolyn Bessette in Washington Square Park in New York City Jack Schlossberg slammed Ryan Murphy over Love Story Continuing his apparent rise, in 2023, Schlossberg announced that he had passed the New York State Bar exam with a score of 332, which would put him in the top 1 percent. It was a remarkable achievement, especially when compared to the problems his uncle JFK Jr had with the same exam, famously failing it twice. However, that is where Schlossberg's life becomes more puzzling. He has never practiced law and his peripatetic work history includes no famous law firms. It does feature a spell at a surf shop in Hawaii. When his mother went to Japan and Australia as ambassador, so did he. In Japan, he worked at Suntory, the distillery famously depicted in the movie Lost in Translation. At one point, he apparently considered becoming an actor like his cousin Patrick Schwarzenegger, who starred in White Lotus. However, the pinnacle of Schlossberg's Hollywood career was a small role as a police officer in Blue Bloods. He did put in several months in 2016 at the State Department's Bureau of Oceans, Environment and Science, as a staff assistant under family friend John Kerry. Schlossberg with his mother Caroline Kennedy, the daughter President John F Kennedy who served as US Ambassador to Japan and Australia Schlossberg called his famous relative Robert F Kennedy Jr a 'freaking p***k' Your browser does not support iframes. During the 2024 election, he was a political correspondent for Vogue, contributing seven pieces. In financial disclosures for 2025, released as he was running for office, he reported virtually no earned income. Fortunately, he does have trust funds and other assets valued at up to $32 million. Apparently, not having a job for lengthy periods has left Schlossberg ample time to develop a bizarre social media persona on Instagram and TikTok. But many have wondered what he has been aiming to achieve with it, apart from attention and notoriety. He has described himself as a 'silly goose' and appears in videos shirtless, dancing, lip syncing, talking about dating, showing off ear piercings, or donning a wig and parodying Melania Trump. All harmless enough, if somewhat bizarre. In a New York Times profile, which someone without the name Kennedy would not have received, more details of his odd sense of humor emerged, including that he keeps a skeleton called 'Dr Bones' which wears his grandfather JFK's hat. Schlossberg also told the newspaper he was a fan of Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part 1 and quoted one of its great lines: 'I'll so offend to make offense a skill; redeeming time when men least think I will.' In the play, that is Prince Hal explaining that he is only wasting his time with raucous drunkards to make his future transformation into a great leader seem all the more impressive.  The 33-year-old has raised eyebrows with some of his online posts, ranging from bizarre and humorous to grotesque Rather than taverns like Prince Hal, Schlossberg (who doesn't drink) has been idling away in the modern cesspit of social media.  His output there has had a dark side to it, including attacks on members of his own extended family, in particular his uncle Robert F Kennedy Jr, who he called a 'freaking p***k,' and RFK Jr's wife, the actress Cheryl Hines. 'Hi Cheryl Hines, it's Jack Schlossberg,' he wrote in one post last year. 'I just got out of the shower. We've never met, but I've got a favor to ask. I need you to call up the family of the child who died of measles and say sorry. Can you do that for me babe?' That was a reference to a measles outbreak in Texas. RFK Jr's eldest daughter Kick Kennedy, 38, publicly hit back. Last year, she told the New York Post: 'I hope he gets the help he needs.' Following her relative's electoral defeat, she did not respond to a request for comment from the Daily Mail. Schlossberg also targeted Second Lady Usha Vance, suggesting he was having a child with her, and asking 'True or false: Usha Vance is way hotter than Jackie O.' Jacqueline Onassis was his own grandmother. There was also a particularly disturbing online rant at Alan Dershowitz, who was the lawyer and friend of the late Senator Ted Kennedy.  Following Schlossberg's electoral loss, Dershowitz told the Daily Mail: 'Schlossberg was a joke from the beginning. The only surprising thing about this election is he got ten percent of voters. Schlossberg's grandparents in the 1960s 'Why would anybody possibly vote for him, other than to get to touch a Kennedy. He has no qualifications, never held any office, and if his name were John Smith, he wouldn't get a single vote. It's such an insult to the intellect of voters to have a candidate like this even run. I wouldn't vote for him for dog catcher.' Dershowitz added: 'I love the Kennedys, I have very high regard for the Kennedys. This doesn't help their reputation, but the Kennedys can't be blamed for him. The Kennedys are a great family, and they deserve to be respected, and one black sheep shouldn't hurt the reputation of the family. 'I think he may require some treatment. I mean, if you read his social media, they're not tweets, they're symptoms.' The lawyer added that he had given Schlossberg advice when he was in law school and 'always had a good relationship with him personally until he went off the deep end.' He told the Daily Mail his advice to Schlossberg now would be: 'Just go silent for two years, decide on a career. Compete on the basis of meritocracy, not on the basis of a name.' Soon after his attack on Dershowitz, Schlossberg closed his Instagram and X accounts, writing: 'I'm sorry to everyone I hurt... I'm deleting all my social media. Forever.' However, he resumed posting less than two weeks later with another surreal rant standing next to 'Dr Bones.' Schlossberg targeted Alan Dershowitz online and then briefly deleted his social media Schlossberg's grandmother Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and his uncle John F Kennedy Jr Another person targeted online by Schlossberg, the conservative media figure Megyn Kelly, welcomed his defeat. 'The vile, bizarre, I think mentally unwell, Jack Schlossberg lost,' she said. 'He will not be continuing the 'Camelot legacy,' as I heard some discussing it. He's out and the voters of New York saw right through his slick act. He refused to campaign, he had a sense of entitlement, he's never accomplished anything.' Despite his poor showing, though, it may not be the end of Schlossberg's political ambitions. Moments after his loss, his mother told the New York Times: 'Stay tuned.' Experts said the election became a fight between two other local candidates much better suited to the district. Micah Lasher, 44, the eventual winner, is a veteran New York state legislator who had the endorsement of the outgoing congressman Jerry Nadler, former Mayor Michael Bloomberg and state governor Kathy Hochul. His nearest opponent, local Assemblyman Alex Bores, is a computer engineer promoting AI regulation, which led to his candidacy attracting millions of dollars in spending, both for and against. 'As those two duked it out, Jack's numbers went down, nobody wants to vote for the third candidate,' Chris Coffey, a Democratic consultant in New York told the Daily Mail. 'What Jack tried to do was make it bigger than a district fight, like I'm fighting against Trump. He became just like a little bit erratic.' Despite being the scion of one of America's most powerful political families, critics said Schlossberg has done little in his career to warrant a seat in Congress Experts said Schlossberg's political career may not be over but he will have to better define himself if he runs again He added: 'If there's a district where people care about Kennedys in New York, this is it, but this isn't Boston or Rhode Island. It's been 58 years since a Kennedy has represented New York. 'Running for office is very, very, difficult. It's not just posting videos on TikTok. You have to build a team, you have to build a base, and you have to have a message, and you have to be consistent. 'And you have to be willing to go out there and campaign in subway stops, and all of those things, and I don't think he was able to do that. But now that he knows that, he'll be a better candidate if he chooses to run again.  'George W. Bush ran for Congress and got shellacked his first time. He figured it out and came back, and built his career a little bit, and went and got a real job, and then ran again for governor, and he won.' The Daily Mail has reached out to Schlossberg's campaign for comment.  As to whether he will run again elsewhere, Hank Sheinkopf, a longtime Democratic political consultant in New York, told the Daily Mail: 'There's a future. American politics is very fluid right now. You never count anyone out, especially when they're this young. He is very charismatic, he's very clever, he's entertaining. 'This was a good test run. He was in the wrong race. But he's going to have to make it on his own, not as a Kennedy. Why? Because his grandfather was murdered over 60 years ago. It's incumbent on him to create his own identity and to find the right reason for people to even want to talk to him about public life.' 'Once you have the bug, there's no vaccine for candidate-itis.' No comments have so far been submitted. Why not be the first to send us your thoughts, or debate this issue live on our message boards. By posting your comment you agree to our house rules. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual We will automatically post your comment and a link to the news story to your Facebook timeline at the same time it is posted on MailOnline. To do this we will link your MailOnline account with your Facebook account. We’ll ask you to confirm this for your first post to Facebook. You can choose on each post whether you would like it to be posted to Facebook. Your details from Facebook will be used to provide you with tailored content, marketing and ads in line with our Privacy Policy.