2024 Third Party and Independent Candidate General discussion

[PSOL]

Richard Winger of Ballot Access News says in the comments that West is afraid of the FEC

Cornel West switched from Green to independent because he mistakenly believes that the Federal Election Commission might charge him with violating campaign finance laws if he continues as a Green. His campaign has been raising money to pay for Green Party petition drives. There is no basis for his fear; the FEC has never said a presidential candidate can’t pay for paid circulators for party petition drives.

https://ballot-access.org/2023/10/05/cornel-west-to-run-for-president-as-an-independent-unaffiliated-with-any-political-party/

This can't possibly be the reason. Or rather, if it is, Peter Daou is the dumbest man in politics. (Which is admittedly possible)

If he's saying he wants to run as an indy while not paying signature gatherers in any state...Cornel West might be on the ballot in like Colorado, Tennessee, and Louisiana but good luck getting on the ballot in any state that's even remotely tough.

Peter Daou plays the long game in trying to destroy the Green party and wider progressive movement

The Green Party as a vehicle for progress is gone and has no reason to exist.

[PSOL]

love claudia from her work w/ the people's forum, codepink and lots of other leftist organizing. hate claudia for making me have to choose between her and cornel 

well at least theres no competition between the two for my vote now

Like I said beforehand, Democratic Centralism is necessary for grassroots activism to be relevant.

To make this cycle even more of a clown show, Lincoln Chaffee endorsed RFK Jr. we’ve long past the point of this environment being dominated by awful memes.

[AltWorlder]

I mean even Nader has given up on the Greens, so

[RidinWithBiden24]

Bent the knee to Uncle Joe - Green Party malarkey = eliminated!

[Shaula🏳️‍⚧️]

...why

[VBM]

I disagree. I mean yeah he may take some votes from Trump who would go for him otherwise,  but he's still getting 15% among democrats within the Democratic party, he has the Kennedy name and don't forget many independents could go for him and Biden carried them in 2020. I think he def hurts Biden more than Trump. Trump's base is a lot more locked in to vote for him than Biden voters are to vote for him. Biden is on the border of not having enough support to run right now and his support is paper thin in strength. His approval is high 30s. RFK Jr. has the chance to get Perot like numbers.

90% of that 15% probably can't even name a single one of RFK Jr's policy positions. Most of his support comes from the "anyone but Biden" crowd

[Progressive Pessimist]

I disagree. I mean yeah he may take some votes from Trump who would go for him otherwise,  but he's still getting 15% among democrats within the Democratic party, he has the Kennedy name and don't forget many independents could go for him and Biden carried them in 2020. I think he def hurts Biden more than Trump. Trump's base is a lot more locked in to vote for him than Biden voters are to vote for him. Biden is on the border of not having enough support to run right now and his support is paper thin in strength. His approval is high 30s. RFK Jr. has the chance to get Perot like numbers.

90% of that 15% probably can't even name a single one of RFK Jr's policy positions. Most of his support comes from the "anyone but Biden" crowd

Not to mention that RFK Jr. as an Independent bid would attract more attention and his conspiracy-mongering would probably be a turn-off to most tepid Biden voters.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Those who think that any candidate who receives X% of a party's voters in primary polling would automatically take all of those voters -- or anything remotely close to it -- along with him to an independent run are either very naive about politics, engaging in wishful thinking, or both.

[DaleCooper]

Saying he has the Kennedy name would be like saying that someone named Eisenhower would take votes from Republicans by that name alone. All that matters here is that polling consistently indicates that Republican voters have a very high opinion of RFK Jr. and Democratic voters have a very low opinion of him. A candidate who appeals to Republicans will hurt Republicans when he runs third party. Go f-cking figure. It's the same reason why Willard Romney would hurt Biden if he ran third party.

[7,052,770]

I disagree. I mean yeah he may take some votes from Trump who would go for him otherwise,  but he's still getting 15% among democrats within the Democratic party, he has the Kennedy name and don't forget many independents could go for him and Biden carried them in 2020. I think he def hurts Biden more than Trump. Trump's base is a lot more locked in to vote for him than Biden voters are to vote for him. Biden is on the border of not having enough support to run right now and his support is paper thin in strength. His approval is high 30s. RFK Jr. has the chance to get Perot like numbers.

Supporting RFK over Biden in a Democratic Primary doesn't imply support for RFK as an Independent over Biden in a general election.

I liked Biden in the 2008 primaries, but I obviously would have supported Obama if Biden had decided to run 3rd party that year.

[Ferguson97]

RFK Jr. has the chance to get Perot like numbers.

This is wishful thinking on your part.

[The Mikado]

Saying he has the Kennedy name would be like saying that someone named Eisenhower would take votes from Republicans by that name alone.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Eisenhower

Younger than Biden! Married to Julie Nixon Eisenhower, so grandson of one President and son-in-law of another!

Get David and Julie out there, they're GOP royalty!

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

It's not 2016 anymore VBM is far better for Ds than Rs and 2016 it was same day.  Rs have a serious proem with provisions ballots they went 80/30 K D because they are usually younger voters and they don't like his tax cuts Trump, be ause of student loan crisis

[PSOL]

Jill Stein is now on the active search for another Green party candidate.

The damage control candidate here would be Ajamu Baraka or anyone else in the the BAR/BAP crowd, but given how these people have both lives and work to be done within their own organizations I doubt they go for it. The years-long smear campaign by Democratic saboteurs against Howie Hawkins means that he most likely won’t even get it. All this shows is that the Green party spent no effort in creating a roster of options to choose from in creating a base of quality candidates. Unlike parties like the SPA, SWP, CPUSA prior to the 1930s, and other quality parties where the mass organizations provided a filtering effect to rise up the ranks the Greens never invested in the same infrastructure and never was an organizer-driven party. The Greens have no strong links to the public because even the few people who do organize for justice they don’t do it as GPUS members but apart of liberal NGOs who can’t endorse candidates without threatening the ability to grift as non-profits and whose leadership is already working for the Democratic party anyway.

The PSL successfully through the People’s Forum among other projects have in many ways ascended the Greens in doing so with far less resources and in a society much more hostile against communism than the middle class leftist advocated by the Greens.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

ahahaha
https://twitter.com/semafor/status/1710411259265315172?s=20

[DaleCooper]

ahahaha
https://x.com/semafor/status/1710411259265315172?s=20

I strongly suspect that the campaigns have significantly better polling than what is released to the public. Back in 2020 both Biden and Trump knew that Michigan was still competitive in the days leading up to the election, while all public polling said otherwise. The Democrats also supposedly had written off Maine Senate as a loss when there was next to no polls available to the public that indicated Collins was losing. I wonder if that is happening again. I don't think that if the Democrats' polls were indicating landslide Trump popular vote victories that Biden would be running again. Trump's campaign also seems to have information that doesn't support the absolute farce that RFK would take more votes from Biden.

[Yoda]

ahahaha
https://twitter.com/semafor/status/1710411259265315172?s=20

LMAOOOOOOOOOOO

Ah, when republican attempted ratf***ing backfires.....

In all seriousness though I don't think this will end up happening, b/c as we all know (or at least the smart ones know), RFK Jr. is "running" to help trump win. If he sees that he is really pulling more votes from trump than Biden, he will drop out. Hilarious to see all the time and effort Bannon and the rest of the republican fascists put into recruiting him blow up in their faces though.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

I actually think RFK Jr. is running for himself. Whether he thinks he has an actual chance or not is another thing entirely.

[Senator Incitatus]

Trump can and should run ads for the next year saying that RFK and Cornel West support reparations.

[PSOL]

Trump can and should run ads for the next year saying that RFK and Cornel West support reparations.

Cornel West voters at this time would never support Trump, besides Cornel will probably run a safe state strategy so as to not “spoil” the vote.

[Shaula🏳️‍⚧️]

ahahaha
https://twitter.com/semafor/status/1710411259265315172?s=20

LMAOOOOOOOOOOO

Ah, when republican attempted ratf***ing backfires.....

In all seriousness though I don't think this will end up happening, b/c as we all know (or at least the smart ones know), RFK Jr. is "running" to help trump win. If he sees that he is really pulling more votes from trump than Biden, he will drop out. Hilarious to see all the time and effort Bannon and the rest of the republican fascists put into recruiting him blow up in their faces though.

An RFK-funded poll shows him taking more from Trump than Biden. He also said on Theo Von's podcast he takes more from Trump than Biden.
He blamed Trump for the vaccines and has said he really dislikes both Trump and Biden, but what if he's actually secretly trying to help Biden lmao.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Following a couple of user suggestions, I've merged the RFK Jr.-as-Independent threads into this one.

[TransfemmeGoreVidal]

I think RFK Jr will take votes from Trump and Biden but also that he'll hurt Trump worse because I think the Democrats most likely to vote for him are probably older New Englanders with Kennedy nostalgia which might reduce Biden's margin slightly in Rhode Island and Massachusetts though even that could be cancelled out by other gains. In swing states he's far more likely to hurt Trump.

[Roll Roons]

https://twitter.com/daveweigel/status/1711419894997078423

[BigZuck08]

Not surprising.