The Cascade Party presidential ticket of Krist Novoselić and James Carroll will no longer appear on the Washington ballot. This decision was made at the request of the Cascade Party, as it never intended to field a presidential ticket.
In August, the Cascade Party announced on social media that the Washington Secretary of State’s office had approved its request to be omitted from the ballot. Although Novoselić and Carroll were one of eleven presidential tickets to initially qualify, the party had only done so to comply with state law. Under Washington law, the party was required to field a presidential ticket and collect 1,000 valid signatures to be recognized as a minor party.
Novoselić, a bassist who co-founded Nirvana, formed the Cascade Party earlier this year, citing his disillusionment with both the Republican and Democratic parties. At the time of its announcement, the party stated that it would focus exclusively on local elections in Washington, with plans to field candidates starting in 2025. The party was also actively petitioning the state to change the law requiring minor parties to field a presidential candidate, and said it was prepared to file a lawsuit if necessary.
In the meantime, party members nominated Novoselić and Carroll as their presidential ticket at the party’s first state convention and submitted names for twelve electors.
Although the Washington Secretary of State’s office never formally announced the removal of the ticket, and the link provided in the party’s social media post offers no additional information, the state’s updated list of candidates no longer includes Novoselić and Carroll. Instead, the list now shows ten remaining tickets, including those from the Democratic, Republican, Libertarian, Green, Socialist Workers, Justice For All, Socialist Equality, and Socialism and Liberation parties. The list also reflects the suspended Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Nicole Shanahan ticket under the We The People Party, as well as the independent ticket of Shiva Ayyadurai and Crystal Ellis.
It’s already happening to the libertarians and it’s not just the liberal party, there are multiple and multiplying splinters under various names in various states and that’s only going to accelerate. Somehow, they mostly avoided this for half a century, but now they are dealing with what minor parties of every ideology have always dealt with (socialist parties are the worst as far as this goes.)
As for “libertarian,” there’s nothing even remotely approaching unanimous agreement, whether among people who call themselves that or not, as to what that even means or who is or isn’t one or close to being one, as with any other political label. Libertarians are probably the worst at the vociferousness of their disagreeable disagreements over this question.
Meanwhile, all political parties, both major and minor, are increasingly disreputable and increasingly disadvantaged at all sorts of particular tasks via a vis other forms of political organisations. Minor parties are hurt by this more than major parties because the major parties are propped up by the increasing hate and fear of each other. Getting caught in that crossfire is a bad place to be, and results in acceleratingly bad ballot access barriers which in turn increases the worsening of all their other problems in a feedback loop.
Independent is more and more the way to go, with parties more and more being useful only as temporary ad hoc ballot access vehicles for individual campaigns or years/states in those states where getting on as an independent is more difficult. This trend is already obvious and will only accelerate.
“Socialist Workers, Justice For All, Socialist Equality, and Socialism and Liberation parties”
How many Socialist parties does one election need?
This is what’s going to happen to the libertarians if the “Liberal” party succeeds in getting off the ground, although they’re not terribly libertarian.
“Otio et libertati” … A little less smelling like teen spirit, or whatever it is that Nirvana does when they aren’t painting the walls in brain, and a little more Cascadian secessionism, would be in order.