Editorial note: The League of Independent Voters of Texas is a 501(c)(4) nonprofit that advocates for independent voters in Texas. This article was submitted by LIV and is published for its editorial value on independent politics. It does not represent the views of the Outsider Media Foundation or Independent Political Report. Readers can find more articles by LIV on its website.
I just turned 74. I’m still dreaming the same dream inspired in me by Martin Luther King. At age 12, I was living in one of the most segregated cities in America, Miami, Florida. I acted out my MLK dream to question authority, to question orthodoxy, and to take a risk. The risk was a life’s work to get America out of the two-party stranglehold on electoral competition.
Dr. King’s greatest risk is barely remembered or even known by most Americans. He risked losing his stature as our country’s most important civil rights leader as he considered an independent presidential run with Ben Spock. This would have united two mass movements underway: the civil rights movement and the movement to end the Vietnam War.
It was a revolutionary break with two-partyism. And, it died with Dr. King. It was replaced with a reform movement for civil, women’s, and gay rights, environmentalism, and consumer protection that was coopted into the Democratic Party and a long era of identity politics.
Fast forward to 1992 when a most unlikely revolutionary stepped forward to run as an independent for President. Ross Perot rose up from the mass movement for the most popular voter initiative in U.S. history — term limits. He sent a shock wave across the political and media establishment, showing 45% in the polls. That’s right. Perot could have won the presidency.* His issue was prescient — the federal deficit was the ticking time bomb on the American economy’s decline.
Fast forward again to this extraordinary 1999 press conference with the then newly elected Governor of Minnesota, Jesse Ventura together with Donald Trump. It was not long after Ventura’s stunning victory on the Perot-founded Reform Party line that was just 3 years old. Donald Trump came to Ventura looking for a way around the “swamp” to run for president in 2000.
But in February 2000, the Reform Party fractured into pieces as the cameras rolled at a national press conference. The party died at this embarrassing event in front of the national media, as several fought over the microphone. See “Reform Party Ousts Chairman at Raucous Meeting.“
In short four years, the Reform Party died.
What did we learn that’s relevant today as Donald Trump steps back in for a second term?
What if Donald Trump ran in 2000 as an independent in a three-way race? Might that have helped shape him as a political moderate, a so-called RINO in today’s world of hyper-partisan poisoning?
I don’t regret a moment of the last 45 years of my life having taken the risk of failure to help get America out of its two-party monopolistic bind. But if you believe, like I do, that failure is our best teacher, we should be able to figure this out.
In Texas, we have been to the courts and the Legislature — many times — to ease ballot access requirements and to ease restrictions on parties and petitions. We have repeatedly failed, yet the numbers of Texas independents keep growing.
What else can we do to break through? I have some ideas that we’ve been working on, but I want to see you at our first online forum for 2025 — on Monday, January 27 at 7 pm. Sign up at our Events page here and feel free to email us at [email protected].
*You may not know or remember, that Perot blew through the ballot access petition requirements with thousands of activated volunteers, but abruptly dropped out for a few months. His volunteers kept petitioning and pulled him back into the race.
Linda Curtis was the state organizer for the Reform Party of Texas and served on the national committee of the Reform Party USA. In 2000 she co-founded Independent Texans PAC. In 2013, she co-founded the nonpartisan, nonprofit 501c4 League of Independent Voters of Texas.
MLK Jr was in conversation with my father Paul and David Nolan to be the Presidential nominee of their projected New Liberal and Libertarian-directions party that became the USLP, with Senator Proxmire as likely VP.
Providence decided otherwise.
Speaking of “From King to Trump”, Pastor Lorenzo Sewell’s prayer was something:
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2025/01/20/let-freedom-ring-pastor-lorenzo-sewell-praises-god-millimeter-miracle-that-saved-trumps-life/
“It was replaced with a reform movement for civil, women’s, and gay rights, environmentalism, and consumer protection that was coopted into the Democratic Party and a long era of identity politics.”
It is not flattering towards poor old Mike, to think that he cleared a path for all that evil trash.
“It was not long after Ventura’s stunning victory on the Perot-founded Reform Party line that was just 3 years old.”
It is similarly unflattering towards – NOT at all poor old – totalitarian leftist Harry, to say he laid a trail for treasonous stolen-valor Ventura’s even more totalitarian leftist antics.
“In short four years, the Reform Party died.”
And yet, they have ascended from nominating the likes of Harry Perot, Joey Buchanan and Rafe Nader to Bobby Kennedy and Annie Shanahan. Less a death then, than an opportunity for rebirth …if only they would disavow their pro-abortion and anti-marriage track-record…
“What if Donald Trump ran in 2000 as an independent in a three-way race?”
Then Alan Keyes would still have been the correct choice in the primary, and Howard Phillips in the general.
“Might that have helped shape him as a political moderate, a so-called RINO”
Trump *is* a RINO now. But there is nothing moderate about left-wing totalitarianism. And what more could totalitarian leftists ask of Trump? Isn’t he deep enough in bed with the child murderers and log cabin crowds? Didn’t Operation Warp Speed do enough damage? Hasn’t he assisted nazi “ukraine” and nazi “palestine” against Russia and Israel enough yet? Didn’t he do enough to frame the socialist BLM insurrection on anarchists? Didn’t roll over and stop fighting for his stolen election victory fast enough? Wasn’t he nasty and dishonest enough in his smear-campaign against DeSantis? … But it’s never enough for the (national) socialist mob, is it? No, if only Trump had been sandwiched between totalitarian leftist RINO Bush and totalitarian leftist DINO Gore, he might have been even worse even earlier…
“I don’t regret a moment of the last 45 years of my life having taken the risk of failure to help get America out of its two-party monopolistic bind.”
…And you “played a key role in putting Lenora Fulani on the ballot as an independent for President in all 50 states in 1988″… So, uh… yeah… that sure is saying something! I think for the purposes of maintaining peace and decorum, I’d better not say what though 😉
“But if you believe, like I do, that failure is our best teacher, we should be able to figure this out.”
That’s a kindly way of saying our legacy is one of failures.
But it really isn’t that hard to figure out the necessary fix: first decentralization, autonomy, secession, then either liberation and denazification or divine intervention, finally anarchy.
“but I want to see you at our first online forum for 2025 — on Monday, January 27 at 7 pm”
Do you really want to see me there though…? U+1F611 …or, even worse – brace yourself – *hear* me… U+1F92A