Nationwide Libertarian voter registration now above 500,000

1. Justin August 20, 2018

   The LP needs to change its stance on minimum wage and support a livable wage in order to connect with people. The LP can also gain fame and notariety by supporting a noble cause that affects millions of people and that is a cap of $900 for each bedroom that a landlord rents out. Too many rooms are being rented out at over $1000, and even over $2000. It is especially bad in the Bay Area. There are issues that need to be addressed that can capture an audience and I believe these 2 issues can get you free press in the media, if only the LP would adopt them in their campaign
2. langa August 13, 2017

   Thomas Woods does not like Jews.

   What a load of bullshit.
3. Andy August 12, 2017

   Stuart is probably a troll. but I will answer this anyway.

   Tom Woods has cited Murray Rothbard as one of his biggest influences, and he was friendly with Rothbard before he passed away. Rothbard was a Jew.

   I do not know that Glenn Jacobs is Jewish or not. I have never heard that he is, but even if he is, so what? He is a solid libertarian and he seems to be a good fellow. I doubt that he is Jewish since it has never been mentioned in any of his bios.

   The name Jacobs is not a completely Jewish name. Around 40% of the people with this last name are Jewish, which means around 60% are not Jewish.
4. Stuart August 12, 2017

   Thomas Woods does not like Jews. Glenn Jacobs is a Jew.
5. paulie August 12, 2017

   True… if it wasn’t for that they would be below the Working Families Party, which is now expanding to several states.
6. Cody Quirk August 12, 2017

   Also remember that the CP number totals are still inflated by their Nevada affiliate (Independent American Party) today.
7. paulie August 12, 2017

   Interesting also if you look at the historical numbers… LP and Greens were both around 100k in 1992, and both grew to around 200k by 2000… but the Greens have been essentially treading water with minor moves up and down in the 200-300 k range ever since then while the LP has continued to grow the numbers steadily.

   Constitution Party was also able to claim its share of the mantle of “third largest party” for a number of years by claiming the AIP registrants in California, who are mostly either A) older people who signed up with the AIP to support George Wallace 50 years ago and B) people of all ages who have checked the box since then, the overwhelming majority of whom did so by mistake with the intent of actually checking the “decline to state a political party” box. Even as late as the 2011 LP News screencapped at http://i2.wp.com/independentpoliticalreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Screenshot-from-2017-08-11-131703.png, at least some people were giving the CP undeserved credit for those registrations. But by now it’s clear that the AIP is not coming back to the CP fold, so they are nowhere near third or even fourth place; and while http://i2.wp.com/independentpoliticalreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Screenshot-from-2017-08-11-131703.png shows the CP beating the LP in one category – votes for Governor – that was an anomaly and a similar article today would not show any alt party close to the LP in any category.
8. paulie August 12, 2017

   I’m not sure whether it’s a coincidence or not that LPHQ noticed a Ballot Access News article from July 27 on the same day that IPR did 🙂
9. paulie August 12, 2017

   Now covered at LP.org:

   https://www.lp.org/libertarian-party-registration-surges-democrats-republicans-shrink/

   Libertarian Party registration surges, while Democrats and Republicans shrink

   by Staff on August 11, 2017 in Features
   Not Left. Not Right. Just Free.

   Libertarian Party registration has grown by nearly 25 percent in the past year while Republican and Democratic registration continues to shrink, according to a report in Ballot Access News. In 2016, the Libertarian Party increased to over 511,000 registrants. Ballot Access News points out that the Libertarians are the first U.S. political party other than Republicans and Democrats to have reached that milestone. Meanwhile, GOP and Democratic registration continues to shrink.

   Polling by Rasmussen Reports indicates that voters are increasingly receptive to a competitive third party, with more than half of voters now saying that they have voted for a candidate outside of the Democrats and Republicans. Rasmussen reports that 13 percent of voters have switched parties or gone independent.

   “The Republicans and Democrats are bickering over whose candidates are more compromised by Russia. Both are,” explained Libertarian National Committee Chair Nicholas Sarwark. “They’re arguing about whose health insurance bureaucracy is most disastrous to Americans’ health care. Both are awful. Both Democratic and Republican policies are careening us toward economically impoverishing trade wars, and violent wars that put our very lives at risk. Libertarians offer the only common-sense solutions of freedom to live and trade in peace.”

   Sarwark continued, “Republicans and Democrats are hanging on to their political duopoly by billing themselves as the least of two evils. That works until it doesn’t. New political parties can completely supplant parties that cling to old and outdated ideas. Antislavery Whigs formed the Republican Party in the nineteenth century, and with the election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860 replaced the Whigs as a majority party.”

   Today, Sarwark said, we see a similar exodus from the modern Democratic and Republican parties and their neverending expansion of costly and intrusive government.

   “Antiwar and anti-crony capitalist Republicans, along with antisocialist Democrats, among others, are uniting under one Libertarian banner to replace either the Democrats or the Republicans,” Sarwark said. “We don’t care which. To that end, the Libertarian Party plans on fielding more than 2,000 candidates in 2018. By using the wrong ideas, the wrong policies, and the wrong strategies, President Trump is failing at taking our country back. Libertarians can succeed.”
10. Stuart Simms August 12, 2017

    “michael
    August 11, 2017 at 19:34
    I wonder if the Reform Party will just fade away with only a few hundred active members scattered across the country. How long will it take for the Libertarian Party to cross 1 million.”

    I can’t disagree with much of what Andy stated in his response. But there are other reasons why it is difficult for the LP or any third party to gain traction. Here in Maryland only Rs and Ds are permitted to have primaries. I should have taken a picture of the primary voter guides that MD sent to my wife (D), my daughter (R) and me last year. On my primary ballot were “non-partisan” judges, that was it. So I get to subsidize the Rs and Ds while I’m not permitted to participate. Important because primary winners are automatically on the general election ballot, but only if you are a primary party because the state won’t recognize a privately funded primary of a non-primary party, we tried.
    Following the 2002 mid-terms the MDLP failed to meet the minimum vote percentage threshold and lost official party status and all registered Ls were placed in the “Other” column. After quickly collecting sufficient signatures to be recognized again, previously registered Ls had to reaffirm that they wanted to be a registered L again. MDLP registrations were 6733 in DEC 2002; 0 in DEC 2003 and 2685 in DEC 2004 as a result.
    These are but two examples of the states’ discrimination that suppress third party growth.
    The answer to the question is it depends. If the LP runs more non-paper candidates (especially ones that admire neither Merkel or Hitler) then the LP will continue to gain. Some will see that the party needs to double and the LP doubled from 2008 to 2016 so eight years. Others believe that growth could come very quickly once a certain level is achieved as the LP has been gaining credibility. For better or worse, the level of LP ballot access is a draw as well. Assuming a reasonable candidate for President in 2020 and a solid number of candidates up and down the ballot then I would think the LP would cross the million registered voter mark in these 32 jurisdictions sometime in 2020.
11. Andrew McCarrick August 11, 2017

    Trust me… this isn’t accurate. There’s many of us who still haven’t had the time to de-register.
12. Andy August 11, 2017

    “michael
    August 11, 2017 at 19:34
    I wonder if the Reform Party will just fade away with only a few hundred active members scattered across the country. How long will it take for the Libertarian Party to cross 1 million.”

    It has taken the Libertarian Party a long time to surpass 500,000 registered voters.

    Part of this is due to the word libertarian becoming more popular over the last 10 years. Part of it is due to a few states allowing people to register to vote online if they have a state drivers license or ID card from that state (since lots of libertarians are computer geeks, being able to register to vote online skews in favor of the Libertarian Party). The LP has done paid voter registration drives in a few states, so this has helped pump up the numbers a little bit, but I think that it is mostly due to population increase and the word libertarian getting more popular. The part is going to need a heck of a lot more registered Libertarians than this if it is every going to be more successful.

    Note that about half of states do not have voter registration under party labels, so the figures above only represent the states were people can register to vote under a party label.
13. michael August 11, 2017

    I wonder if the Reform Party will just fade away with only a few hundred active members scattered across the country. How long will it take for the Libertarian Party to cross 1 million.
14. Tony From Long Island August 11, 2017

    This is pretty good news to start the weekend on. The LP is growing and the Dems still rule 🙂

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