OPINION: War on 3rd parties could come back to haunt Dems in November
By David Larson, Carolina Journal
For years, the Carolina Journal has been following Democratic Party efforts to keep third parties off the ballot. The Democrat strategy makes some sense practically, since the fewer left-of-center options there are, the more Democrats can dominate that voter pool. But it was always a strategy with some risks.
The biggest risk is that it looks really bad and, well, undemocratic. Undecided voters, and even some Democratic voters, often respond negatively to these efforts. Third-party supporters, whose votes the Democrats are trying to corral, often come to see the Democratic Party as their enemy and become less likely to "come home" as November approaches.
Images attached of Robert F. Kennedy Jr speaking to supporters. Source: Creative Commons by Gage Skidmore; graphic of Carolina Journal poll, Source: Carolina Journal
The blowback to this strategy seems especially pronounced in the case of major third-party presidential contender Robert F. Kennedy Jr. More on that in a moment.
But first, let's review what Democrats and their aligned political organizations have been up to on this front in recent years.
In 2022, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, North Carolina Democratic Party, and top Democratic attorney Marc Elias went all out to prevent the Green Party and their US Senate candidate, Matthew Hoh, from getting on the ballot.
The Greens had enough signatures to get on the ballot, and these signatures had been certified by the local boards of elections. But Democrats were not to be deterred. They developed a strategy of contacting everyone who had signed the Green Party petition and throwing doubt on whether they had signed or if they had properly understood what they'd signed. If the person had signed and understood, they'd try to convince them to "unsign" by repeatedly contacting them by with calls and texts, and even going to their homes, until the person agreed to take their name off the petition.
Below you can hear one such effort, where one of these operatives contacted a Green Party petition signer and tried to get them to take their name off the petition, going as far as to pretend they were acting on behalf of the Greens. A recording circulates on social media showing an alleged Democratic operative posing as a Green Party volunteer and asks them to remove their name from the petition for Green Party ballot recognition.
Ultimately, after a long legal battle, the matter had to be decided by a federal court, since the Democrat-majority state board of elections allowed the signature strategy to sway their decision on whether to certify the Green Party.
Again in 2024...
Not content to leave that failed strategy in the past, the Democrats formed a PAC this cycle called Clear Choice PAC (maybe so official Democratic Party organizations wouldn't have to be involved) and targeted inconvenient third parties across the country. In North Carolina, they especially went after Kennedy's We the People Party and Cornel West's Justice for All Party, successfully keeping both off the ballot for a time. Like last time, the strategy ultimately failed.
While Kennedy was eventually successful getting on the ballot in North Carolina, Clear Choice PAC, funded by two Silicon Valley billionaires, was such a thorn in the side of his campaign nationally that, according to his runningmate Nicole Shanahan, their campaign lost all momentum.
Both Kennedy and Shanahan were strong life-long Democrats. Shanahan even gave $25,000 to Joe Biden's 2020 campaign. But now, due to the endless lawfare to keep them off the ballot, Democrats have made enemies out of them.
Now it looks like Kennedy and Shanahan will announce they are dropping out and giving their full endorsement to Trump. So, Democrats have to ask themselves if crushing Kennedy's campaign did more harm than good overall.
Usually, a third-party candidate doesn't pull more than a point or two in the final vote. But Kennedy was polling in the double digits until recently. Consolidation around the two candidates has brought this down to around 4% in the RealClearPolitics polling average, but that's certainly enough to effect the race.
The latest Carolina Journal poll, taken in early August, found 3.6% of North Carolina likely voters chose Kennedy. Earning the bulk of Kennedy's supporters could push Trump over 50% in the Tar Heel State.
Granted: just because your candidate drops out and endorses someone else doesn't mean you are necessarily going to take their recommendation. But some analysts predict the bulk of Kennedy's supporters will indeed vote instead for Trump in the event Kennedy drops out and endorses him. And in these swing states, where races are won by a razor-thin margin, 4% of the vote is enough to make all the difference.
If post-Kennedy polls suddenly show Trump regaining comfortable leads in the swing states, Democrats will have nobody to blame but themselves. Trying to crush third-party movements may have made enemies of those it would have been wiser to court or ignore.
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