(UnitedVoice.com) – The Libertarian Party held its convention over Memorial Day weekend. Former President Donald Trump and independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. were in attendance. At the end of it, the party rejected both men and went with a member of their own party.
Libertarian Nominees
On Sunday, May 26, the Libertarian Party voted for Chase Oliver to serve as their nominee in the 2024 presidential election. The former Georgia Senate candidate has described himself as “armed and gay.” He is aligned with the traditionalist faction of the Libertarian Party, known as the Classical Liberal Caucus.
Oliver was able to win the nomination after seven rounds of voting that took eight hours. The nominee is best known for his campaign for Georgia Senate in 2022. He received approximately 2% of the vote and forced the election into a runoff between incumbent Senator Raphael Warnock (D) and former football player Herschel Walker (R).
Mike Ter Maat is Oliver’s running mate in the election. He’s a retired police officer, economist, and businessman who worked in the White House Office of Management and Budget from 1989 through 1992.
Oliver celebrated their nominations on X, formerly Twitter. He said, “It’s time to unify and move forward for liberty.”
Third-Party Candidates
The 2020 election was incredibly close. Although Joe Biden won the popular vote by almost 7 million votes, the Electoral College has made presidential races much closer. NPR’s Domenico Montanaro has explained that only “44,000 votes in Georgia, Arizona, and Wisconsin separated Biden and Trump from a tie in the Electoral College.”
Experts have also pointed out that third-party candidates didn’t play a big role in 2020. The next election will be the opposite. Kennedy is already polling at 10% in national polls, according to FiveThirtyEight. Oliver could draw even more voters away from Trump and Biden.
Both the incumbent and former president are unpopular outside of their bases. The American people have expressed the need for change. Although it’s unlikely the third-party candidates will win, they could pull enough voters away from Biden and Trump that the race becomes even closer.
Trump and Biden are going to war against the third-party candidates. The former president has spent months attacking Kennedy and saying he would be worse than Biden. Meanwhile, the Biden campaign has mobilized against him and even won the endorsement of the Kennedy family.
The election is still months away, which is a lot when it comes to politics. Anything could happen between now and then, but it’s clearly going to be a wild ride for the American people.
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