Third Party Watch

Picked this up off the LP’s national website, it’s a rap music video for 2007 Libertarian for Governor of Louisana, T. Lee Horne.

My first thoughts were negative when I hit play, assuming that it would degenerate into some cheesey mess. As I watched the whole video, it’s actually kind of interesting. I’m sure [...]

This is a piece from the Berkeley Daily Planet that highlights all of the various success stories that the Green Party has to show for the 2006 election.

I think the author goes a bit overboard in calling this year an “unqualified success” considering the Greens lost their only state legislator and lost several winnable state [...]

Libertarian Senatorial candidate Steve Osborn received just under 13% of the vote statewide in a one-on-one contest against Senator Dick Lugar. However, results on the CNN website and on Dave Leip’s site both point to a 60-40% win for Osborn in Warren county. This is not Osborn’s home county and it’s not [...]

Hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday. We’ll be back with new updates sometime later in the weekend.

So, who do you all think were the most successful minor party candidates this year? That can be a tricky question because there are all sorts of factors to consider.

On one hand, if a person scores an 8% showing in a 2-way race, that really can’t be considered better than someone who gets 4% [...]

First off I want to apologize about the update I posted earlier on Randy Stufflebeam’s write-in totals. The original post missed the fact that the Stufflebeam campaign was including “undervotes” in the totals until such time as hard numbers became available. This probably created an extreme over-estimation of the

In my correction to [...]

With the 2006 elections starting to fade from memory, it’s time to look ahead toward 2008. With that in mind, leading Libertarian Presidential candidate Steve Kubby has issued the following “open letter” that outlines his position on the situation in Iraq.

Dear fellow Libertarians,

Since I declared my candidacy for our party’s 2008 presidential nomination [...]

The Constitution Party’s candidate for governor of Illinois posted an impressively strong showing last week… as a write-in candidate.

While the numbers are still pretty sketchy, Randy Stufflebeam appears to have captured at least 1% of the vote statewide… and potentially more than that.

See here for the campaign’s latest and best attempts at pulling together a [...]

Here’s another handful of notable results from this year’s midterm elections, focusing on the gubernatorial races…

> Minnesota Independence Party nominee Peter Hutchinson received 6.5% of the vote in a race in which the Republican defeated the Democrat by a margin of less than 1%.

> In Texas, Kinky Friedman finished fourth statewide with about 12% of [...]

Sad news today as we learn that political strategist Doug Friedline has passed away at the age of 49.

From the St. Petersburg Times…

Campaign workers at Max Linn’s office knew something was wrong Friday when Doug Friedline didn’t show up for work.

The workers found Friedline, campaign manager for Linn’s failed gubernatorial bid and a political strategist [...]

A quick statement from campaign manager Allen Hacker has been posted over at Michael Badnarik’s blog:

Well, there you have it… or do you?

Maybe it is what it is, and maybe it only looks that way. We’re going to take some time to carefully examine what happened, and then we’ll make a policy statement about [...]

More bad news for third party candidates. It looks like Libertarian County Commissioner Paul Trujillo was defeated in his New Mexico re-election bid last night…

DAVID R. MEDINA (DEM) . . . . . 1,781 (47.10%)
PAUL E. TRUJILLO (LIB) . . . [...]

Libertarian state house candidate Hardy Machia is in a respectable fourth place with 18% of the vote in his race, with at least one precinct left to report in.

The LP’s website reports a few local wins including a seat on the Hardeeville City Council in South Carolina and a few Soil and Water Supervisors.

Oh yeah, [...]

Some last minute gubernatorial numbers and then I’m off to sleep.

In Texas, Strayhorn took 18% for third place and Friedman was back in fourth at 12%.

In Alaska, Andrew Halcro is picking up 10%.

In Minnesota, Peter Hutchinson has 6% of the vote.

In Illinois, Green candidate Rich Whitney has pulled in an impressive 11% of the vote.

In [...]

John Eder appears to have been narrowly defeated for re-election in Maine. As the party’s only state representative nationally, this is a huge blow.

Matthew Reading, another Green seeking a Maine state house seat has fallen short by 4 votes and this race will probably be heading to a recount.

Benjamin Meiklejohn, another promising state house [...]

Libertarian state house candidate Rex Bell is running a distant third in his Indiana race.

No word yet on the potentially viable candidates for state house in New Hampshire and Vermont.

Looks like Rick Jore is solidly in the lead to capture a state house seat up in Montana… a bright spot in this otherwise not-so-great night for minor parties.

The CP’s other hope for a state house pick-up, Ed McGarr in Utah, appears to be trailing very badly at this moment.

I’ve been sweating out a really tough race of my own tonight, but as it stands now things are looking pretty good. I’m leading my opponent by about 6% or 11,000 votes. He’s got a strong base and a lot of institutional support, but with more than 90% of the votes counted… I’m [...]

Bob Smither and Michael Badnarik have both failed to top 10% in their respective races.

In Maine, Merrill hits 20% and LaMarche is topping 10%. Whitney holding a solid 10% in Illinois.

No solid word yet on state house races…

Eric Eidness polls greater than 10% for Congress in Colorado. Max Linn scores a 3% showing for third place in the Florida gubernatorial contest.

Michael Badnarik and Bob Smith both finish their races with somewhere between 12% and 20% of the vote. To predict more specifically than that would just be plain guessing.

The LP [...]

Well, this is it. Today is the day we find out if Bob Smither or Michael Badnarik will be elected to Congress… and how well the Greens fare in Maine and Illinois.

Will any parties gain new state house seats?

Rick Jore, Rex Bell, Max Linn, Andrew Halcro, Pat LaMarche… (I’ll spare you the “we didn’t [...]

I had a few beers tonight with Loren Collins, write-in candidate from the Bull Moose party for Georgia’s 4th Congressional district. More correctly, I should say that I drank several ales while Loren drank water and Coke. Something about being a responsible driver. Anyway, I came away really impressed with Loren and [...]

I guess the Badnarik campaign did a little Halloween sign waving…

Ballot Access News reports that Ben Meiklejohn is making great progress in his race for Maine state house…

Ben Meiklejohn, Green nominee for the Maine State House in the 120th district, is considered somewhat likely to win his race. A few weeks ago, the Republican in the race dropped out and endorsed Meiklejohn. Meiklejohn is an [...]

This is a nice little item from the NY Daily News that talks about the often overlooked cabinet races in New York state… and some of the third party candidates running for those offices.

From the New York Daily News…

With scandals swirling around two major statewide races this fall, third-party candidates are gaining the attention of [...]