Ever since he squired a certain blonde starlet named Gwyneth around town a few years ago, ketchup heir Chris Heinz has been likened to JFK Jr.—at least physically. “It depends on where my hair is,” jokes Heinz, the stepson of presidential hopeful John Kerry and the son of the late Pennsylvania senator John Heinz. If Kerry is the Democratic front-runner when it comes to cash (with Howard Dean nipping at his heels), it’s thanks in part to the 30-year-old Heinz. Like any smart and rich venture-capitalist kid, he hit up his equally rich friends (like Yale buddy Bronson Van Wyck and cosmetics heir William Lauder) to help raise $2 million in New York so far. And Liev Schreiber and Charles Rockefeller will likely appear at Kerry’s next benefit on July 16 at Beacon restaurant. But Heinz isn’t always comfortable soliciting donations. “It’s awkward to ask young people when the economy sucks,” he says—though he may just end up raising money for his own campaign one day: “This is a test for my ability to stomach it.”