Politics


Third Party Could Have Outsize Impact on 2024


With right and left so evenly divided, it would only take a few rebellious voters to upset the major candidates.


A BY JOHN FUND


2024 matchup between Joe Biden and Donald Trump is the election that voters are begging not to


happen. Key issues such as inflation or the


rise of China could be kicked to the side as the race devolves into a debate over the legal peril former President Trump is mired in versus President Biden’s age and ability to lead. An Economist/YouGov poll in June


found that 59% of voters are thumbs- down on the idea of Biden running again, and 56% are against Trump seeking another term. That represents a degree of alien-


ation never seen in modern presiden- tial polling and has led to speculation a third party or independent candidate could have a chance to win in 2024. A self-styled centrist group called No


Labels says it wants to offer Americans an alternative in the form of an “inde- pendent unity” ticket that would seek “solutions” to problems rather than “gridlock.” A Quinnipiac survey finds that


47% of voters would theoretically con- sider voting for such an option. But that changes when actual names are attached to such an effort. No Labels held an event in New Hampshire in July featuring Sen. Joe Manchin, a West Virginia Democrat, and former Gov. Jon Huntsman, a Utah Republican. Both men hinted they’d be available


to run under a No Labels banner. But neither lights up the political sky. A Monmouth poll in July found that


only 2% of voters would definitely vote for, say, a Manchin-Huntsman ticket,


40 NEWSMAX | SEPTEMBER 2023


and just 14% would probably vote for them.


Democrat strategist Ed Kilgore


points out that “traditionally, support for third-party or independent candida- cies begins to fade as actual voting grows nigh amid fears of ‘wasted’ votes.” No Labels insists that it won’t run a candidate at its nominating convention in Dallas next April unless it looks like he or she could win. In the months before then, No


Labels must: Secure ballot status in something


close to all 50 states; Develop a platform that goes beyond


the mindless pabulum it currently spouts; Learn if either Trump or Biden falls


short and doesn’t become their party’s nominee; and Overcome suspicions that the group’s mysterious donors aren’t a stalking horse for an effort to tilt the election one way or the other. The reason the motivations of No


Labels backers are important is that third-party candidates did play a role in determining both the 2016 and 2020 elections. In 2016, an historically high number


of voters picked third-party candidates. Libertarian Gary Johnson won 3% of the national vote, and Jill Stein of the Green Party won more than 1%. In the 2020 race between Biden


and Trump, fewer voters hated both candidates and only 2% plumped for third-party choices. That made a huge


difference. Take Pennsylvania. In 2016, Trump


defeated Hillary Clinton there by 48.2% to 47.5%. In 2020, Trump’s share of the vote grew to 48.7%. But a decline in third-party voting


allowed Biden to win the key state by 49.9%-48.7%. Wisconsin provided another exam-


ple. Trump won it in 2016, by 47.2%- 46.5%. But in 2020, Biden got 49.5% and Trump 48.8%. Exit polls show that among voters


who disliked both candidates, Trump won by 19 points in 2016. But in 2020, Biden defeated Trump with those vot- ers by more than 2 to 1. Democrats fear that their chances of


keeping the White House will go down if No Labels runs a candidate and pro- vides a vehicle for protest votes. They are desperately trying to stop


the group — from filing lawsuits to keep them off the ballot in Arizona to trash- ing the chances a third-party can win. “No third-party candidate has ever


come remotely close to winning, includ- ing Theodore Roosevelt, running on a Progressive Party ticket just four years after leaving office as an enormously popular Republican president,” said a recent joint statement from the leaders of a coalition of Democrat groups that range from the centrist Third Way to the left wing’s MoveOn. But Republicans have their own


agita about third-party politics in 2024. What if Trump fails to win the GOP nomination and launches his own inde- pendent candidacy? Privately, Trump has often talked


about just that possibility. But a new study in the Harvard Journal of Law


Expect Democrats to be especially active in trying to stop Cornel West’s Green Party candidacy.


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