In former September , former Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz announcedhe would not be runningas an self-employed person for the 2020 presidential election . " Schultz ’s decision , after spending months away from public life because of health upshot , will come as a relief to Democratic leaders , who feared an independent electioneering by a self - funded billionaire would limp their eventual nominee,“wrote The Washington Post . " Despite growing foiling with the nation ’s politics , his aborted footrace serves as a exemplary tale about the resiliency of the country ’s two - party political system . "
It surely does . In 2008 ( and 2012 and 2016 ) , former New York City city manager and fellow billionaire Michael Bloomberg also flirted with a White House run as a third - company candidate . Bloombergultimately concludedthat third - party candidacies are a lost suit and put his money behind the Democrats .
But even if American voter are feed up with the two - party system — 68 percentsaid in 2018 the two major parties do n’t interpret their views and that a third option is require — could they ever in reality harmonize on a candidate ? And more importantly , is the U.S.electoral systemengineered so that any presidential campaigner without a D or R after their name does n’t stand a fortune of being anything other than a spoiler ( seeRalph Nader 2000 ) ?
Getting on the Ballot
In nineteenth - hundred America , mounting athird - political party presidential campaignwas as promiscuous as tease supporters , name a nominee and passing out vote . If the major parties — the Whigs and the Democrats at the time — nominated stinking candidate at their summertime rule , third - party like theLiberty partyandFree Soil partyhad plenty of time to get their guy cable ’s name on the ballot by November .
" The balloting access rules now totally close out that , " say Micah Sifry , author of " Spoiling for a Fight : Third - Party Politics in America " and founder ofCivic Hall . Independent candidates have to collect crazy turn of signature in every state , some withfiling deadlinesas betimes as June of the election year . So , it ’s inconceivable for a third - company nominee to enroll the race after the major political party conventions . " There ’s absolutely no give in the system . "
No Debates, No Chance
Even if a well - organized and well - funded main presidential campaign gathers all the necessary signatures , fights off the inevitable legal challenge from the major party , and manages to get its candidate ’s name on ballots in all 50 states , another meaning hurdle remains — access code to the debates .
Sifry order that the nonprofitCommission on Presidential Debateshas countersink prohibitively in high spirits barriers for entry into the nationwide televised debates , which are all important for name credit among voters . fit in to the Commission ’s rules , candidates need to be poll 15 percentage or higher across the nation to earn a berth at the debates , which is why you almost never see Libertarian or Green Party candidate behind a debate dais .
" How do you get to be over 15 pct if you ’re not included in the debates ? " take Sifry .
Just reckon at the exercise of Texas billionaire Ross Perot , who ran as an independent in the 1992 presidential election . This was before the Commission on Presidential Debates established its 15 percent regulation and Perot was poll at ameager 1 percenta week before the first disputation with Bill Clinton and George H.W. Bush . Perot ’s strong performance in all three telecast debates run to the nifty third - party carrying into action of the modern geological era with Perot winning 18.9 pct of the popular vote ( but not a single electoral vote ) .
Compare Perot ’s performance with Libertarian and Green Party candidates Gary Johnson and Jill Stein in 2016 , whose low-down polling numbers ( 9 percent and 3 percent respectively ) barred them from share the argument story with Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton . Johnson wonjust 3 percentof popular vote and Stein only take 1 percent .
How a Third Party Can Still Win
While Sifry trust that the current electoral process has been " rigged " by popular and Republican lawmakers to " unnaturally advantage them , " he and others still see a potential , if outback path to victory for an self-employed person .
Daniel Franklin , an associate professor of political science at Georgia State University , say that the only agency a third company can get traction is by possess a single policy issue that ’s been completely cut by the two major parties and has huge saliency for voter . He point the Republican Party of the 1850s , a third political party that rose to prominence on its anti - slavery stance .
" In the 1856 election , neither the Democrats nor the oddment of the Whig Party would touch the slavery issue with a ten - foot pole , " says Franklin , " And in 1860 that gave Abraham Lincoln a political lane to the White House . "
The question , then , is what issue would be salient enough with a great city block of the American electorate to propel a third - political party to the presidency ? Even though more than two - third gear of Americans say they desire a third - political party selection on the balloting in 2020 , they have very different ideas of where that candidate should sit around on the political spectrum . A third want a centrist party ; about 11 percent need a partymore liberalthan the Democrats ; and a fifth want onemore conservativethan the Republicans , harmonize to one survey .
Also working against third - political party hopefuls is the fact that Democrats and Republicans have gotten very good at neutralizing parvenu campaigner by atomic number 27 - opting their best idea . Franklin says that Perot blazed into the popular consciousness in 1992 with his crusade against the deficit , but Clinton and Bush stole his thunder by making the interior debt one of their talk points .
" offspring like ending child parturiency , set up a minimum pay , the verbatim election of senator — all of those were originally third - company ideas that one or both of the major party adopt , " say Sifry .
