The Guam Election Commission recently published sample ballots for its 2024 territorial election, including its non-binding presidential straw poll. The poll features seven presidential tickets.
The Commission did not officially announce the presidential and vice presidential candidates appearing on the straw poll ballot. However, it released a series of sample ballots for the territory’s villages earlier in the month, with each ballot reflecting the names and party affiliations of all candidates who requested to be included.
Although Guam’s citizens have participated in U.S. presidential elections through the straw poll since 1980, the territory is not entitled to Electoral College votes, making the process largely symbolic. In addition to the straw poll, Guam voters will elect new territorial officeholders, senators to the Guam Legislature, and a non-voting member of the United States Congress.
According to these sample ballots, seven presidential tickets will be listed. These tickets include the Democratic Party’s Kamala Harris and Tim Walz, the Republican Party’s Donald Trump and JD Vance, the American Solidarity Party’s Peter Sonski and Lauren Onak, the Prohibition Party’s Michael Wood and John Pietrowski, the Socialist Party USA’s William Stodden and Stephanie Cholensky, the Green Party’s Dr. Jill Stein and Dr. Butch Ware, and the independent ticket of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Nicole Shanahan.
Notably absent from the list are Libertarian nominees Chase Oliver and Mike ter Maat. The Libertarian Party’s presidential candidates have otherwise appeared on every Guam straw poll ballot since its inception, with the exception of the party’s 2016 ticket of Gary Johnson and Bill Weld.
Credit to Richard Winger of Ballot Access News for first reporting on the Guam presidential straw poll ballot.
Ed Clark in 1980 was on the ballot in Guam.
To be fair, the overlap between the few people who will see Guam’s presidential results before they vote, and the few people who will end up voting for Oliver-ter Maat without having already previously made up their mind to do so, will be approximately nil.
Or to put it another way, I would be astonished if even a single person would have voted for Oliver-ter Maat as a result of Guam’s presidential election. So I don’t think they are missing out by not appearing on Guam’s ballot.
Because they didn’t do whatever paperwork that requires.
OK, I’ll bite:
Why aren’t Oliver and ter Maat on their ballot?