Can we find a way to get a legitimate third party on the national ballot in 2028? Glenn Greenwald believe that, as a country, we are motivated to try. The alternative is more of the same. More incompetence. More corruption. More focus on getting re-elected rather than improving the country.
Glenn Greenwald: “I think where people are who never before would have considered it are going to be much more open to identifying with movements or even kind of campaigns or parties that are not connected to or identifying as Republican or Democrat. We’ve seen ones in the past that have worked like Ross Perot. Of course, he was a billionaire, which is maybe what you need. But he had a very successful third-party candidacy based on the support by both Clinton and Bush 41 for free trade. That, as he very presciently warned, would deindustrialize the country, suck out all jobs, and you know you’ve seen that before. But I think we’ve never been more ripe for it because both parties are hated, and the system itself is hated, and I think people are craving a credible alternative. It’s just hard to create a credible alternative given all the barriers that have been deliberately erected.”
Tucker Carlson: “But something is coming. You feel that?”
Greenwald: “For sure. I mean, no doubt. How can it not? I mean, this is you know, the biggest myth, the biggest lie of our political system is that the two political parties can’t agree on anything. They’re always at each other’s throats. It’s always so polarized. The reality is that the two political parties agree at 90% at least of major policy issues. The only time the media covers it is in those very few cases when they disagree, and it casts the appearance that they’re always disagreeing. Obama himself, when they used to use this very vitriolic language against him, like John Boehner and the House Republicans, he would always say in private, we all know it’s theater. We’re all playing within the two 40-yard lines. That’s the reality of the two political parties in the United States. This myth that there’s these vast fundamental differences between the two parties is crucial to giving you the sense that you have this wild freedom that everything is just so free spirited and and and and nothing is controlled or limited. When reality, there’s lockdown on most policy debates because both parties are fully on board because they save serve the same donor classes, they serve the same interests, and that is, I think, more and more people are realizing that.”
I would love to see an alternative political party. For the past several elections I have cast vote for increasingly, the worst candidate I have ever voted for. That is not a meaningful action. That is a joke. That is theater. And many of the people with whom I speak, feel the same way.
I am concerned, however, that the cost of forming a third-party and successfully getting that candidate on the ballot is daunting. I say this because of what the DNC did to Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. last election cycle. Democrats, including the DNC and its allied groups, pursued multiple legal and regulatory challenges aimed at limiting Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s 2024 independent presidential campaign, primarily by contesting his ballot access and related activities. And it’s worth remembering that these obstructionist actions mirror historical Democratic efforts against third-party or independent candidates seen as potential spoilers (e.g., extensive litigation against Ralph Nader in 2004 across many states).
