Story highlights
Jack Schlossberg, 24, will award former President Obama with the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award Sunday
Schlossberg is "proud of" his family's public service and said "stay tuned" as to whether he'll ever run
Former President John F. Kennedy’s grandson Jack Schlossberg gave a rare live interview Friday, discussing why he thinks former President Barack Obama is courageous and also his favorite JFK speech.
“My favorite speech of his is the speech he gave at Rice University explaining to America why we should go to the moon,” Schlossberg, 24, told “Today.” “In that speech he said that great challenges are actually great opportunities. I think that’s a really important thing to remember today when for my generation when it seems like things couldn’t be any worse. We’re going to inherit a world that has a lot of unsolved problems.”
Schlossberg recently graduated from Yale University and will soon attend Harvard Law School. On Sunday, he and his mother, former US Ambassador to Japan Caroline Kennedy, will award Obama with the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award. Schlossberg said he was inspired by Obama’s 2008 campaign and his work on issues like health care and climate change.
“I was inspired by President Obama’s vision for America and all the promises that he laid out for our country, and this award really recognizes that he made tough choices over the last eight years to execute on that vision, to give people health care, to get serious about climate change and to reach out to international partners and really improve America’s standing in the world – and that takes political courage,” he said.
As to whether he’ll run for office one day, Schlossberg was open.
“(The Kennedy legacy is) something that I’m very proud of, but I’m still trying to make my own way, figuring things out, so stay tuned,” he said.
He also gave a live interview to CNN after the second inauguration of Obama in 2013.
Correction: This post has been updated to reflect Schlossbergs 2013 interview on CNN.