George HW Bush 'voting for Hillary', claims member of Kennedy family

President George HW Bush is reportedly voting for Hillary Clinton in November, according to a Facebook post from John F Kennedy’s niece.

The post by Kathleen Kennedy Townsend – the former lieutenant governor of Maryland and daughter of Robert F Kennedy – shows her posing with George HW Bush with the caption “The President told me he is voting for Hillary!!”

Townsend – writing on Facebook under the name Kathleen Hartington – has been a longtime vocal supporter of Clinton’s campaign.

Jim McGrath, a Bush family spokesman, told the Guardian: “The vote President Bush will cast as a private citizen in some 50 days will be just that: a private vote cast in 50 days. He is not commenting on the presidential race in the interim.”

The former president made clear in May he would not endorse Donald Trump, a stance echoed by his son, former president George W Bush. At the time, Jim McGrath, a spokesman for George HW Bush, told the Guardian “At age 91, President Bush is retired from politics. He naturally did a few things to help Jeb, but those were the ‘exceptions that proved the rule’.”

George HW’s son and George W’s brother, Jeb Bush, was one of Trump’s unsuccessful opponents in the 2016 Republican primary. The Republican nominee repeatedly maligned Jeb Bush, a former two-term governor of Florida, as “low-energy”. Jeb Bush has repeatedly derided Trump and his “abrasive, know nothing-like nativist rhetoric” but ruled out support for Clinton in a Washington Post editorial in July, writing: “I haven’t decided how I’ll vote in November – whether I’ll support the Libertarian ticket or write in a candidate.”

If George HW Bush does cast his ballot for Clinton, he’ll join a number of prominent Republicans who have crossed party lines in 2016 out of disdain for Trump. The ranks include many close to the Bush family including Brent Scowcroft, George HW Bush’s national security adviser as well as Sally Bradshaw, a longtime top aide to Jeb Bush.

Spokespeople for the Trump campaign and the Clinton campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.