Minor Party and Independent General Election Discussion

[AltWorlder]

What the heck, does Jade Simmons actually have access to 372 EVs.

https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Third_party_and_independent_candidates_for_the_2020_United_States_presidential_election

[PSOL]

I’d just like to say that my analysis of the PSL having no “solidarity” with the wider left is wrong. I mean, for one local chapters are much more willing to work in local broad fronts, and the relationship with the PFP and LUP is also something too.

On the PFP, I think the reason why it is what it is is from it being open and willing in allowing various entryist factions to participate and “use it”. Back in the past; it had the same relationship with the Black Panthers, what eventually became of the Avakian cult, RadFems (although that ain’t happening now for good reason), progressive quack doctors, and anyone else with the “deepest truth”. Hawkins and the Green Party just ain’t it for them; maybe because of deficiencies in the Green Party, maybe because the PSL is dependent on them for relevance as well to replenish their numbers as an “activist” party, or any other crazy reason. What I will say is that such a plan is genius for their long term survival. Movements come and go, but they will forever be “with the times” and not implode so fast like the Reform Party. In fact, what it could mean is that they are playing a gamble on how long they can wait. Of course I could be 100% wrong.

It’s odd that California is where the two most competent state parties are, like them and the Cali AIP

[StateBoiler]

For the Libertarian Party nationally, I've put together a chart of results. Below is the list of states with the last election where their percentage of the vote went down there. This list I'm sure massively changes tomorrow and becomes heavily "Jorgensen 2020".

1992 Marrou: Texas

Marrou '92: 19.7k votes, 0.32%
Browne '96: 20.3k votes, 0.36%
Browne '00: 23.2k votes, 0.36%
Badnarik '04: 38.8k votes, 0.52%
Barr '08: 56.1k votes, 0.69%
Johnson '12: 88.6k votes, 1.11%
Johnson '16: 283.5k votes, 3.15%

2000 Browne:

Indiana, Maryland, Missouri, New York, North Dakota, Rhode Island

2004 Badnarik:

Alabama, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Minnesota, Mississippi, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, Washington, Wisconsin, Wyoming

2008 Barr:

Alaska, Arizona, Connecticut, District of Columbia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Montana, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia

2012 Johnson:

Michigan-had write-in status only
Oklahoma-no ballot access nor write-in status

For oddities that don't mean anything: the last time the Libertarians picked a presidential candidate whose surname did not begin with B or J was 1992.

[AltWorlder]

The last eight minutes starting at 1:06:25 of the latest episode of the Gadfly third party podcast mentions the Unity Party's presidential candidate Bill Hammond. The rest of the episode is about down-ballot third party candidates who are running in this election. Turns out that the Unity Party was founded in 2004 to draft Wesley Clark as a third party candidate and has the same slogan as Andrew Yang's 2020 campaign. And candidate Hammond is running for love.

[StateBoiler]

Here's an odd one from BAN:

The Socialist Workers Party says in its newspaper, The Militant, that it will sue the Washington Secretary of State is she releases the names and addresses of the party’s nominees for presidential elector to the public. See the story here.

Although the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1982 that the party had a right to keep the names of its campaign contributors private, the party had never before asked that the names of any of its candidates be kept private. And the party’s ability to keep the names of its campaign contributors private expired several years ago, and the party has not asked that it be reinstated.

Considering we're voting for electors, I'm not sure what leg the SWP will stand on other than "threaten legal action so they don't want to be bothered with it and choose not to".

[PSOL]

You know, researching this a bit I’ve found around two parties that could surprise us in being up and coming newcomers that are under the radar. The first is the Alaska Independence Party, needing no introduction. The second is the Working Class Party active in Wisconsin and Michigan, and apparently has its own elected local officeholders. The latter is a democratic socialist party organized around the Trotskyist organ “The Spark”. Outside of the fact that apparently SAlt isn’t active in the Midwest, there is one key difference from it and other parties...

That difference is it’s alignment with Lutte Ouvriere, the most entrenched and radical revolutionary Vanguard party controlled tightly by its cadre in a central committee. Outside of LO having tight control over its international, with it more resembling an more tightly interconnected Second International, this is perhaps the closest throwback to the 1930s. LO literally struck gold with this. For comparison; the SEP are an irrelevant international sex cult and SAlt parties are only connected through the American SAlt through writings in a collective publishing cooperation.

The future of third parties is going to be quite odd going forward. 2024 is most likely going to see continuations of consolidation, election rigging for the duopoly, and genuine growth from disappointment destined to come. Anyway, we have less than a few hours before the polls start opening, and only then will we get good data to extrapolate from. Out of all of this, there’s still no word out on what the Alliance & friends are doing right now, only data showing they are in an incline in membership. Seriously, what exactly are they doing?

[StateBoiler]

You know, researching this a bit I’ve found around two parties that could surprise us in being up and coming newcomers that are under the radar. The first is the Alaska Independence Party, needing no introduction. The second is the Working Class Party active in Wisconsin and Michigan, and apparently has its own elected local officeholders. The latter is a democratic socialist party organized around the Trotskyist organ “The Spark”. Outside of the fact that apparently SAlt isn’t active in the Midwest, there is one key difference from it and other parties...

That difference is it’s alignment with Lutte Ouvriere, the most entrenched and radical revolutionary Vanguard party controlled tightly by its cadre in a central committee. Outside of LO having tight control over its international, with it more resembling an more tightly interconnected Second International, this is perhaps the closest throwback to the 1930s. LO literally struck gold with this. For comparison; the SEP are an irrelevant international sex cult and SAlt parties are only connected through the American SAlt through writings in a collective publishing cooperation.

The future of third parties is going to be quite odd going forward. 2024 is most likely going to see continuations of consolidation, election rigging for the duopoly, and genuine growth from disappointment destined to come. Anyway, we have less than a few hours before the polls start opening, and only then will we get good data to extrapolate from. Out of all of this, there’s still no word out on what the Alliance & friends are doing right now, only data showing they are in an incline in membership. Seriously, what exactly are they doing?

https://theallianceparty.podbean.com/e/a-pre-election-update-on-the-alliance-party/

https://theallianceparty.podbean.com/e/alliance-party-state-chairs-discuss-the-upcoming-election/

[AltWorlder]

You know, researching this a bit I’ve found around two parties that could surprise us in being up and coming newcomers that are under the radar. The first is the Alaska Independence Party, needing no introduction.

Gadfly has two episodes covering them:

https://www.buzzsprout.com/760511/2741026-alaskan-independence-party-part-1
https://www.buzzsprout.com/760511/2865562-alaskan-independence-party-part-2

[GlobeSoc]

You know, researching this a bit I’ve found around two parties that could surprise us in being up and coming newcomers that are under the radar. The first is the Alaska Independence Party, needing no introduction. The second is the Working Class Party active in Wisconsin and Michigan, and apparently has its own elected local officeholders. The latter is a democratic socialist party organized around the Trotskyist organ “The Spark”. Outside of the fact that apparently SAlt isn’t active in the Midwest, there is one key difference from it and other parties...

That difference is it’s alignment with Lutte Ouvriere, the most entrenched and radical revolutionary Vanguard party controlled tightly by its cadre in a central committee. Outside of LO having tight control over its international, with it more resembling an more tightly interconnected Second International, this is perhaps the closest throwback to the 1930s. LO literally struck gold with this. For comparison; the SEP are an irrelevant international sex cult and SAlt parties are only connected through the American SAlt through writings in a collective publishing cooperation.

The future of third parties is going to be quite odd going forward. 2024 is most likely going to see continuations of consolidation, election rigging for the duopoly, and genuine growth from disappointment destined to come. Anyway, we have less than a few hours before the polls start opening, and only then will we get good data to extrapolate from. Out of all of this, there’s still no word out on what the Alliance & friends are doing right now, only data showing they are in an incline in membership. Seriously, what exactly are they doing?

i've heard of the WCP before, largely because of it getting comically high %s for its size. I haven't heard of any connection to LO though. What do you mean by them striking gold?

[PSOL]

You know, researching this a bit I’ve found around two parties that could surprise us in being up and coming newcomers that are under the radar. The first is the Alaska Independence Party, needing no introduction. The second is the Working Class Party active in Wisconsin and Michigan, and apparently has its own elected local officeholders. The latter is a democratic socialist party organized around the Trotskyist organ “The Spark”. Outside of the fact that apparently SAlt isn’t active in the Midwest, there is one key difference from it and other parties...

That difference is it’s alignment with Lutte Ouvriere, the most entrenched and radical revolutionary Vanguard party controlled tightly by its cadre in a central committee. Outside of LO having tight control over its international, with it more resembling an more tightly interconnected Second International, this is perhaps the closest throwback to the 1930s. LO literally struck gold with this. For comparison; the SEP are an irrelevant international sex cult and SAlt parties are only connected through the American SAlt through writings in a collective publishing cooperation.

The future of third parties is going to be quite odd going forward. 2024 is most likely going to see continuations of consolidation, election rigging for the duopoly, and genuine growth from disappointment destined to come. Anyway, we have less than a few hours before the polls start opening, and only then will we get good data to extrapolate from. Out of all of this, there’s still no word out on what the Alliance & friends are doing right now, only data showing they are in an incline in membership. Seriously, what exactly are they doing?

i've heard of the WCP before, largely because of it getting comically high %s for its size. I haven't heard of any connection to LO though. What do you mean by them striking gold?

Forming a national US section is great to coordinate activism and bring in new membership to the LO internationale. You have to understand that all international sections are basically branches of the French party. With the US tacking left enough for record participation and activism within the Socialist Left, there is no doubt they struck gold.

[StateBoiler]

The last eight minutes starting at 1:06:25 of the latest episode of the Gadfly third party podcast mentions the Unity Party's presidential candidate Bill Hammond. The rest of the episode is about down-ballot third party candidates who are running in this election. Turns out that the Unity Party was founded in 2004 to draft Wesley Clark as a third party candidate and has the same slogan as Andrew Yang's 2020 campaign. And candidate Hammond is running for love.

Listened to it. The co-host adds nothing to the show and is just reactionary.

[AltWorlder]

You usually need someone for banter and contrast, it's a common show format.

[StateBoiler]

You usually need someone for banter and contrast, it's a common show format.

Get someone that can add something then.

Any 3rd party results comments.

[StateBoiler]

I think Jorgensen will clear 1% nationally, but she'll be on the lower end. 1.5% looks too far gazing at some states' partial results.

[StateBoiler]

As of me posting, from Google:

Jorgensen 1.1% - 710k votes
Hawkins 0.2% - 140k votes
Others 0.2% - 139k votes

Think the magic mark for Jorgensen right now is to clear Ed Clark's 1.06% from 1980. That would make her the 2nd-most successful Libertarian presidential campaign ever as far as share of vote.

[AltWorlder]

ASP is performing well

https://twitter.com/AmSolidarity/status/1323849026270351362

https://twitter.com/AmSolidarity/status/1323908795429367809

https://twitter.com/AmSolidarity/status/1323857196829081600

[StateBoiler]

All from The Green Papers. Don't have a time so I'll add on Trump's and Biden's vote share to provide a reference point.

Biden 68,867,490 49.96%
Trump 66,733,901 48.42%

Jorgensen 1,570,136 1.14%
Hawkins 312,340 0.23%
West 60,403 0.04%
De La Fuente 58,642 0.04%
La Riva 57,942 0.04%
Blankenship 53,012 0.04%
Pierce 41,383 0.03%
Carroll 21,107 0.02%

These numbers have no write-ins.

Total non-Biden/non-Trump vote 1.62%

[StateBoiler]

Working Families Party and Conservative Party both passed the state's new ballot access threshold. No one else did.

[PSOL]

Apocalyptic results for the Green and Constitution Party. The worst result for the former since 2008, the latter in 1996. The Constitution party is terminally over, and the Green Party is going in the woods for a few years—but they will never be relevant again. Still, the Green Party has the state ballot purges to deflect on, so they won’t break apart.

Gloria La Riva massively underperformed. Her political career is done as the PSL central committee is probably going to choose someone else, most likely Eugene Puryear. Still, I don’t think they are “over” as their party membership continues to grow.

Brock Pierce and ASP’s Carroll outperformed heavily.

The major winner though is the Libertarians though.

[StateBoiler]

Apocalyptic results for the Green and Constitution Party. The worst result for the former since 2008, the latter in 1996. The Constitution party is terminally over, and the Green Party is going in the woods for a few years—but they will never be relevant again. Still, the Green Party has the state ballot purges to deflect on, so they won’t break apart.

Gloria La Riva massively underperformed. Her political career is done as the PSL central committee is probably going to choose someone else, most likely Eugene Puryear. Still, I don’t think they are “over” as their party membership continues to grow.

Brock Pierce and ASP’s Carroll outperformed heavily.

The major winner though is the Libertarians though.

I thought Jorgensen underperformed some. Clearing Ed Clark's 1980 performance (1.06%) as well as Gary Johnson 2012 (0.99%) still can give a viewpoint of growth though as it's the 2nd-best performance of the party ever for what was pretty much a stock Libertarian candidate.

Hawkins was really hurt by the Democratic militarization of state election boards against the Green Party. That and the splintering of the party pre-election that SocraticGadlfy at his blog had discussed with seemingly every losing Green Party candidate running separately in the general. Not that they got a lot of votes, but further splintering the left when he was trying to consolidate the left beforehand.

Constitution Party need a complete rethink. Blankenship was a bad candidate, but they were not unified around Castle either 4 years ago. Think it's safe to say they've fallen out of the 3 national third parties group.

Alliance Party I don't know what to say as there's no baseline to compare to. De La Fuente will about double his vote count from 2016 but that's because he's on the ballot in California. PSL I view more or less even compared to 4 years ago, but I thought they'd perform better than they did due to leftist activism being higher. American Solidarity Party is up, although starting from a low base.

[AltWorlder]

https://twitter.com/johnrobertgage/status/1324027405367943170

[StateBoiler]

https://twitter.com/johnrobertgage/status/1324027405367943170

As sure as the sun will rise tomorrow, the two major parties will blame everyone except themselves for their own failures.

In the middle of updating. These numbers still do not include any write-in votes:

Jorgensen 1,611,642 1.15%
Hawkins 321,981 0.23%
West 60,857 0.04%
De La Fuente 59,980 0.04%
La Riva 57,363 0.04%
Blankenship 53,949 0.04%
Pierce 41,772 0.03%
Carroll 21,585 0.02%

[StateBoiler]

Marshall Burt won a seat in the Wyoming State House for the Libertarians. Bethany Baldes lost by 32 votes.

[AltWorlder]

Constitution Party need a complete rethink. Blankenship was a bad candidate, but they were not unified around Castle either 4 years ago. Think it's safe to say they've fallen out of the 3 national third parties group.

I truly wonder if this means the American Solidarity Party will supplant them, but absent deeper pockets, a wider movement, and more forgiving ballot access laws, they probably can't match the reach of the '90s Constitution Party in its heyday. But numerically, they might end up as the party polling the most after the Greens and Libertarians.

I also wonder if the Constitution Party even has any legs to stand on. Their form of "graybeard" paleoconservatism has been dying out like its members. While Trump's policies are somewhat closer to theirs than to traditional establishment Republican neoconservatism + corporate boosterism, it's completely two different cultural worlds.

So I'm bring back my old idea, based on a question: is it possible that if Trumpism wanes in the Republican Party, there might be third party efforts (probably unassociated with Trump or his kids) that attempt to continue Trumpist policies? Something like an American version of European populist right-wing parties, centered around immigration restrictions, "secular" culture wars, trade war, Sinophobia, and modest welfare increases for the white working class. I don't think they would, but I'd like to discuss the idea.

Alliance Party I don't know what to say as there's no baseline to compare to. De La Fuente will about double his vote count from 2016 but that's because he's on the ballot in California. PSL I view more or less even compared to 4 years ago, but I thought they'd perform better than they did due to leftist activism being higher. American Solidarity Party is up, although starting from a low base.

Does de la Fuente have the attention span to continue being a prominent figure? While the Alliance Party has its own history (and prehistory) as an amalgamation of a bunch of centrist minor parties, Rocky's niche popularity, somewhat dynamic personality, and money is pretty useful to that organization. He shouldn't run again (if interested, he probably will), but he should at least be an elder statesman in the party to help them along. Funnily enough, Brock Pierce is probably a decent fit for them too, as he seems to be in the liberal to moderate camp and he can bring in blockchain interest which is all the rage among libertarian third party types.

[StateBoiler]

Latest count, some write-ins in here, some not.

Jorgensen 1,685,612 1.16% - she will have 2nd-best Libertarian performance ever
Hawkins 339,521 0.23% - better than Cobb 2004 and McKinney 2008, that's about it

The Great Race for 5th!

De La Fuente 63,512 0.044%
Kanye 63,023 0.043%
La Riva 61,742 0.042%
Blankenship 56,121 0.039%
Pierce 43,321 0.030%
Carroll 24,727 0.017%

Carroll and the American Solidarity Party get a few multiples higher in write-in votes than everyone else on this list. There's a lot more grassroots strength for them than anyone else above (not counting the Libertarians or Greens). For example, 1382 write-in votes in Ohio and 1262 write-in votes in Texas (compared to 138 for La Riva). They had a strong write-in performance in 2016 as well considering the size of the party and they were new.

Really the strongest 3rd party presidential candidates after Jorgensen and Hawkins was Kanye followed by Blankenship because neither one had California ballot access while La Riva and De La Fuente did. Later post-election can form results showing share of vote only counting places these people had ballot access in.

Jorgensen finished 3rd everywhere. Closest Hawkins got to her was losing 3rd by 181 votes in D.C. Kanye finished ahead of Hawkins where both were on the ballot in Arkansas, Iowa, Mississippi, Tennessee, and Utah. Blankenship finished ahead of Hawkins where both were on the ballot in Tennessee and Utah.