Amash Will Not Run As a Libertarian
Libertarian Pragmatists, posting on X, have captured a statement reportedly by Justin Amash.
According to them, Amash discussed his presidential candidacy thoughts:
I continue to get asked whether I intend to seek the Libertarian Party nomination for President in 2024.
I’ve had a lot of time to think about this, and the answer is no, I do not intend to run. If you would asked me this question a couple years ago, the answer would’ve been yes, absolutely.
What changed?
When I joined the LP, the party enjoyed widespread ballot access and seemed interested in expanding its reach. Today, not so much.
To be clear, this has nothing to do with ideological differences. If anything my policy views align more closely with those who describe themselves as right-libertarians. It’s about the proper role of political party and the infrastructure of the party.
Running for President is a massive undertaking, not one I’m willing to begin unless I believe I can run a competitive campaign that, if I can’t win, substantially impacts the outcome. Right now, I don’t believe the LP is positioned to support an effective presidential run.
This is not an issue likely to be resolved in the short run. Simply put, I haven’t been able to convince party leaders that they should focus almost exclusively on organizing libertarians to win elections. We just have a different philosophy about the role of parties.
I think that libertarian activism should come from outside the party, and libertarian ideology should be driven primarily by Libertarian individuals, including party members in the party’s candidates for office, not the party itself. That’s not to say the party shouldn’t take ideological stances; it certainly will and must.
But to be a successful political party, the LP will have to appeal to at least 1/3 of the electorate. It can’t do that when the party itself is focused on being the ideological torchbearer for libertarianism.
It instead needs to be a place that is welcoming to almost anyone who feels the Republicans and Democrats aren’t libertarian enough. That’s a low threshold, unsatisfying to those who believe the party must be the leading voice of libertarian activism. But if we want libertarians to compete in elections nationally, that’s what it will take.
Justin Amash
For the Source: https://twitter.com/LibertarianPrag/status/1709717041286926495
Good. Amash is as libertarian as Bill Weld meaning not at all.
There is no better way to change the direction of a party than a strong candidate people can coalesce around. That’s how Ron Paul supporters gained their foothold in the GOP between 2008-2012 and established the libertarian faction inside the Republican Party. Never would have happened without Paul. It’s also how Trump captured the RNC and even years later has held off the never-Trumpers, and despite everything that happened is now virtually guaranteed to be the GOP nominee again.
What Heise and Mises Caucus did in an off-cycle with no presidential candidate was a serious historical anomaly and likely won’t be repeated any time soon (but note that even then, it still was heavily tied to a potential Dave Smith candidacy, so really not that much of an anomaly after all).
Amash could have organized delegates around his campaign and easily remade the LNC in his preferred image, if he wanted to. So saying he’s not running because of the LNC is pretty non-sequitur. He had a chance to unite the warring factions and save the party, but he chose to pass. Now I’m not saying he had an obligation to do this. Just saying that he could have done it if he wanted to, so putting the blame on the LNC doesn’t really cut it.
He could still surprise us by running for LNC Chair in 2024 but the hurdle is a lot higher to overcome than running for president and bringing your allies into party leadership.
Indeed, the rationale I recall being quoted for moving the convention to the even-numbered year would be all the press coverage we would get. The change did not work as claimed.
Most recent campaigns have had little organization of volunteers. The Badnarik campaign leadership saw no merit in volunteers, so Steve Gordon needed until Labor Day to convince them to appoint a national volunteer coordinator.
The Democrats and Republicans have their nominations normally solidified by March, so maybe push the Convention 2 months earlier?
I just find how and when we select our presidential nominee to make this argument you make disingenuous when we don’t pick the nominee for another 7 to 8 months.
“Had Amash been raising a significant amount of money and preparing for a campaign that would build organization and name recognition with the general public he could be putting those things in place without regard to the LNC.”
We’re talking millions of dollars that would need to be raised to register with general public raised for a guy that could then lose to a unified Mises Caucus pick for the nomination, and what happens to all those donations? Money doesn’t grow on trees, especially in the current economy. You could do like No Labels and donate to the party in an account earmarked for the nominee when one is selected, but who is doing that in this national party environment?
Who at this point – talking donor and activist class, but activists only in terms of hours of labor – is committing big resources to the Rectenwald, Oliver, Josh Smith, and Hornberger campaigns when at least 3 of them will die next May? And we have nothing except anecdotal word of mouth to tell us who is a favorite to win. There’s no credible polling of any sort. Compare to the Republicans and Democrats, barring some health event or some black swan event, we know who is winning those nominations.
Hi, Mr. Powell–
Thanks for the thoughtful comments.
>>earlier nomination has been tried in the past to no apparent advantage. Not only is nominating significantly outside of the expected timeframe heighten the perception by voters that we are an off-brand product,
–Studies we (LP) did showed a nomination a year earlier would be a significant short and long term advantage IF the candidate concentrated on touring college campuses. Polls (the now dormant Libertarian Poll Group) show the second factor is the candidate a) Focusing on a key policy issue where we can get movement and b) Having relevant political experience (Governor is good) or excellent explanation abilities while c) Running in 2 elections for name recognition in a non-attack fashion
>>it also removes the opportunity to use the nomination race for building organization because the factor to motivate involvement, the nomination contest, is absent.
–The major factor is people at the polls (especially in discouraging vote snatching with teams from all parties as has been done in Florida), signing up interested for NEXT election for contact; another issue that follows is the LP NOT documenting its successes high and low and using them to educate newbies and the public.
A long term factor is people in local office wishing to ascend, and then moving to state/federal legislative which is not handled by the LP but the LPCC Pac. Not sure what they’re doing these days.
Hope this helps. Thanks.
“earlier nomination has been tried in the past to no apparent advantage”
If I do or do not do four things, and a fifth thing doesn’t happen, it isn’t obvious that one of the four things I did was responsible for the outcome. There are likely both advantages and disadvantages to nominating earlier.
One of the advantages is an advantage the “major” parties try to utilize right now: When a “major” party candidate gets into a position where he or she looks “inevitable,” it becomes a general election campaign instead of a nomination campaign.
Nominating fairly late in the year prior to the election would give an LP nominee more time to focus his or her campaign on the general public instead of on a few hundred LP national convention delegates, and to try to get into the media mix accompanying the “major” party caucus and primary contests.
He or she could be campaigning in November/December in (traditionally, the calendar does seem to be changing) Iowa and New Hampshire when you can’t swing a cat without hitting a political reporter , drawing the contrast between herself/himself and the “Big Two” likelies.
There would also be more time for general election fundraising and ad spending.
And to the extent that the party apparatus is involved in ballot access work, there would be a longer time for preparation, and cooperation with the campaign, to get a particular candidate on the ballot.
The major DOWN side would seem to be that there wouldn’t be an exciting national convention, in roughly the same time frame as the “Big Two” conventions, for everyone except C-SPAN to ignore.
Chris Powell: Exactly. After Howie Hawkins grabbed the SPUSA nomination in 2019 before seeking the GP nomination (and thus stirring a hornets’ nest as to whether or not he was breaking GP rules or not), I asked them (whether they went down the co-nomination road or not) to not do that this cycle, and wait until early 2024 instead of 2023. Unfortunately, they didn’t listen, and their nominating convention is later this month.
Ryan, earlier nomination has been tried in the past to no apparent advantage. Not only is nominating significantly outside of the expected timeframe heighten the perception by voters that we are an off-brand product, it also removes the opportunity to use the nomination race for building organization because the factor to motivate involvement, the nomination contest, is absent. As Heinlein said, “When it comes time to railroad you can railroad, but not before.”
X, it’s not incumbent on me to mind-read Amash if he doesn’t make himself clearer, especially vis-a-vis Libertarian issues of the last couple of years on certain social issues.
One could also argue, with small “l” vs capital “L” and the US an outlier in general, that whatever the term might mean, there’s a diff between right-libertarianism and right-Libertarianism. Or that, in the US, right-libertarianism may not be the same as right-libertarianism abroad.
A response to various people who don’t think The Libertarian Party should run former Major party officeholders for elective office.
Every new party has built itself by recruiting activists, including candidates and officeholders from existing parties. New parties must recruit voter support from people who have voted for other parties, obviously; previous support for another party is not grounds for rejecting a vote from a voter.
The Republican Party, started in 1954 by people who had been active in the Whig Party, the Liberty Party and the Free Soil Party. The first Republican Vice-President, Hannibal Hamlin, had been elected as a Demorat as a Representative from Maine and US Senator, before joining the Republican Party.
In 1924, Senator Robert LaFollette received almost 17% of the vote as an Independent Progressive candidate for President. He was and remainded til his death a Republican member of the US Senate. His V-P candidate was Senator Burton K Wheeler, a Montana Democrat.
In 1936 William Lemke ran for President on the Union Party ticket, while running for re-election to Congress as a Republican. In 1968 George Wallace ran for President on the American Indpendent Party ticket, but remained an Alabama Democrat. In 1972, the AIP nominated Republican Congressman John Schmitz.
Counting lower offices there are too many examples of new parties running candidates who had made their name in the old parties. Why? Because new parties need candidates with experience as candidates, with name recognition, and with existing supporters, in order to impact any election. Few alternative parties have lasted long enough to develop their own experienced and well known candidates.
Those that have lasted – The Socialist Party and The Libertarian Party – have remained too ideological and too alien to the public at large to develop a cadre of elected office holders who can build on their experience and assets to run for higher office.
That is why The Libertarian Party has gotten its best vote totals with former Republican officeholders. Those who don’t like this should concentrate on building The Libertarian Party in their community and their state so that they will have an alternative source of viable candidates in the future.
That said, I think it is reasonable for Justin Amash to pass on a Presidential race. If, like Ron Paul, he does not think he can be elected in his Congressional district as a Libertarian, he would have a hard time convincing reporters and supporters that he can be elected by the whole country. And I agree with his views generally on the role of The Libertarian Party, and the need for other Libertarian organizations to promote the philosophy of individual liberty,
An organizational note – libertarians who form local or statewide non-partisan groups can operate with less regulation than political parties, and more ability to control their internal affairs. I think that’s where we need to put more energy and resources.
I am not sure if Justin Amash has any experience in or knowledge about the inner working of the Libertarian Party. He got placed on the LNC’s Ballot Access Committee for part of last year and he did absolutely nothing to my knowledge. I don’t think he ever showed up for even one meeting or ever said anything in any email discussions.
So I would not automatically assume that he would be a good candidate for National Chair or that he has any interest in being National Chair.
Perhaps Congressman Amash should run for chair of the LNC?
Your post Chris is an argument for earlier presidential selection. A delegate convention such as ours it’s much more difficult to correctly project what is going to happen, and there’s no such thing as accurate polling on what prospective Libertarian delegates think, so if I wanted to support a campaign with say a $1,000 donation, would I really be doing it now when I have no idea the makeup of the National Convention next year and who they plan on backing? What value does me giving the candidate $1,000 help toward securing the nomination? I think it’s a little disingenuous to act like a presidential campaign should be fully formed to make the national general election message 8 months before you might not even get picked to be the nominee, and if Justin Amash did hypothetically enter I would not say it’s automatic he would have become the nominee. The one exception is when you’re presented with a clear frontrunner such as Gary Johnson 2016 and they can get going early, but even he had Austin Peterson to deal with.
In my view aside from ballot access the national party organization’s issues, whatever they may be, are a minor factor in the ability of a presidential campaign to be effective. The campaign organization is not controlled nor funded directly by the party and history shows clearly that a presidential campaign cannot rely on being carried by the LNC. Had Amash been raising a significant amount of money and preparing for a campaign that would build organization and name recognition with the general public he could be putting those things in place without regard to the LNC. Barring that sort of approach, neither Amash nor any other candidate will be well-positioned for an effective general election campaign after being nominated.
Perhaps SG is having difficulty grasping this because he equates right libertarianism with extremist posturing. Actually, libertarianism is not intrinsically left or right, so left and right leaning libertarianism is a separate scale from pragmatism vs extreme posturing. Amash unsurprisingly reveals that he’s a right leaning pragmatist within the LP internal debates. That’s exactly where I expected him to be.
On a side note, fix captcha. 5 x 3 = 15. The demeaning captcha is bad enough, but counting correct answers as wrong is a new low.
Never expected him to run in light of the current state of things so it’s not surprising to me.
I agree with everything he says as far as what a political party is supposed to be. Like a preacher at a church I attended when I was younger used to joke: “If the only people that ever get to Heaven are Presbyterians, Heaven is going to be a pretty empty place.”
About what I figured. Can’t say I’m sad about it, either. No more retreads. I’m looking forward to seeing #Spike Cohen as the nominee. Of course the LP is not positioned, as Amash said, for a campaign. The kiddie crew running things has managed to f*ck that up.
I would have struggled with a vote for Amash if he had run. I’ve tolerated pro-life candidates in the past, but I don’t think I will going forward, given the Supreme Court decision. 2020 was his window. He missed it, unfortunately.
I am sorry to hear that he will not be running for the Libertarian Party Presidential nomination. He was my first choice.
Innnteresting, starting with his comments on where he aligns within today’s LP factions or branches, while, at the end, he seems to fully endorse “Libertarian-lite,” as in Gary Johnson. Just a bit self-contradictory?
Perhaps he should contest for Speaker as has been suggested by Reason.