The Libertarian Party has announced The Parity Project, a ten-year plan to grow its membership and visibility to rival the Democrats and Republicans. The effort draws inspiration from past membership drives, including the 1990s-era Project Archimedes.
In an October 15 letter to members, Libertarian National Committee Chair Steven Nekhaila outlined a plan to “equalize” the party by targeting Americans who already identify with libertarian principles. Citing research from “eleven different studies,” he estimated that 30 to 60 million Americans either identify as libertarian or hold mostly libertarian views. Nekhaila noted that many of these voters currently cast ballots “defensively” for Democrats or Republicans and that activating this base could significantly expand the party’s reach.
“The two old parties each have about 68 million Americans who identify with them. Both of those parties also have universal visibility,” Nekhaila wrote. “The LP has almost no visibility. Finding and activating dormant libertarians will change that. If we developed 30–60 million libertarians with little visibility, imagine what universal awareness could achieve.”
Nekhaila pointed to the United Kingdom’s multiparty system, which operates under a similar winner-take-all structure, as evidence that a three-party America is possible. “If you gain attention in London, the rest of Britain follows, but America requires heavy investment in hundreds of large population centers,” he wrote. “The only way to fund that is to locate and recruit the people who already see themselves as libertarians.”
Unlike past initiatives that focused on converting non-libertarians, Nekhaila said the project will follow a “discovery before persuasion” strategy prioritizing those who already agree with the party’s principles. He described this as “taking yes for an answer,” with the goal of building resources and momentum before expanding persuasion efforts. Nekhaila also introduced a subsidiary effort called “Operation Everywhere,” aimed at making libertarian candidates and ideas visible “to everyone, everywhere, every day.”
The project will begin by expanding an existing internal database of one million contacts, updating it with new information acquired from public resources, email appeals, and social media advertising. Respondents will be asked to affirm whether they identify as libertarian or libertarian-leaning, if they’d like to see the Libertarian Party on equal footing with the two major parties, and whether they’d be willing to help. The party plans to measure its success on a monthly basis, with donations funding further outreach and visibility.
According to the plan, each new supporter, donor, or increase in visibility will be treated as an incremental measure of success, with Nekhaila noting that even adding 100,000 more libertarians would “accomplish more than the previous 50 years of LP effort.” Nekhaila contends that even modest gains could eventually translate into electoral successes, with the long-term goal of giving the party enough prominence to influence governance “long before it achieves a majority.”
The project is being led by strategist Perry Willis, who previously designed Project Archimedes in the 1990s under then-chair Steve Dasbach. That effort produced record membership and revenue for the party at the time, with Nekhaila first alluding to its potential revival in remarks during an LNC meeting earlier this year. “Project Archimedes used only direct mail,” Nekhaila added. “What was done before on a small scale can now be done in a large way.”
Willis will be working in conjunction with advisor Jim Babka and the firm Iron Light, which will oversee data enhancement and advertising placements.
The party is seeking $48,000 in initial funding to launch the project, with half of that total allocated to Iron Light for enhancements and booking work, and the remainder covering email and advertising costs. Nekhaila said prefunding for the project is necessary for initial momentum, with sustained growth in supporters, donors, and visibility critical to maintaining that energy.
“We aim to make our numbers constantly grow in the following areas, month after month,” Nekhaila added, referencing names, new donors, net revenue, and media attention. “Do that for a few years and we’ll achieve the ultimate goal, full parity with the Democrats and Republicans.”
Best wishes, though repeating the far-right conservatarian claim (i.e. Nekhaila noting that even adding 100,000 more libertarians would “accomplish more than the previous 50 years of LP effort.”) is not encouraging and suggests he will be re-designing the flat tire. The internet, fall of USSR, my Paused Libertarian Program (put 13K people in local office) and more started in USLP meetings. Is he going to match that? Not to mention we’re supposed to have 250K families in our D-Base–did he lose them?
The most critical thing for the LP to do in each state is put in direct democracy as we did in Florida, and on that model along with all the other fine work. Next is protecting our poll numbers (we did about 12% in 2020 and I believe 7% in 2024 and 2016 per the now defunct Libertarian Poll Group, stolen by the duopoly-, next someone seeing there’re several dozen LP-favorable news articles daily. ONE a day would be good. The rest then follows.
Just off the top of my head. Repeating a version of Archimedes seems very promising as well.
It’s also interesting to note that in 1812, the Massachusetts House of Reps had 749 members. After the creation of Maine in 1820 (which had been part of Massachusetts), Massachusetts had a max of 635 members in 1837, after which the number was cut to 240 members. It remainded at 240 members until 1978, when it was further cut to 160.
Maybe the Massachusetts House of Reps should return to 240 members.
@SocraticGadfly:
The New Hampshire state House of Reps has 400 members, about 1 for every 3,300 residents, which also made NH a good candidate for the Free State Project. Libertarians HAVE been elected to the NH House of Reps from time to time, and I believe in the 1990’s there may have been as many as 4 LP reps in the NH House at the same time.
There is a proposal to increase the size of the US House of Reps called the Wyoming Plan. This would apportion Reps based on the population of the least populous state, currently Wyoming, hence the name. Implementing this plan would increase the size of the US House (and also the Electoral College) by about 120 new members.
Texas Libertarians, a decade-plus ago, had candidates for every state Senate seat. That, too, has fallen by the boards.
To otherwise riff on Walter and Root?
Whether a parliamentary government, or a strong-president system like France? Most Western democracies have one member in their lower house per 100,000-125,000 members. In addition to a regional base, MUCH smaller districts, vs the nearly 800,000 in a US House district now, make it a LOT easier to elect third-party candidates.
Bundestag? 630 members for 83 million. French National Assembly? 577 members for 66 million.
Commons? 650 members for 69 million. Canadian Commons? 343 member for 41 million. Etc etc.
Good luck getting the US House up to even 600 members.
The only possible way for third parties to leverage into the US is by adding 200 or so national representatives to be elected by proportional representation. Good luck with THAT.
As a third-party voter on the left, I have almost zero expectations of changing the current structure of United States governance. But, I’ll keep voting third-party anyway.
The proposal very much appears to be a recycle of Perry Willis’s Operation Everywhere, which didn’t work last time.
Members, donors, and income are a success metric…something the LNC is kind of short of. They are NOT an underlying cause of success, they are a RESULT of success. Success is created by running good candidates, giving them campaigns that are as effective as can be within the limits of all resources, and between elections advocating for sensible libertarian solutions to serious problems, and creating all of the other things that libertarian candidates need to succeed. Success will then be incremental
There are serious efforts to determine how many people there are in the Libertarian quadrant, as opposed to these three-question items with odd ideas about Libertarianism. The quadrant is relatively empty.
Root’s Teeth: That was the Bergland “Strategic Plan”, a short piece of nonsense that had neither strategy nor a plan.
Expanding on my comment, and relating it to the LP plan, IMO the best idea that Libertarians ever had was the Free State Project. Move as many Libertarians to one place to get enough political clout to elect someone. This would effectively make the LP a regional party under our current voting system.
Well, they chose New Hampshire, which wasn’t a bad choice: a small New England state with some libertarian attitudes already. Unfortunately, the Libertarian Party in New Hampshire is a mess, and not remotely possible of achieving this any time soon.
In the 1990s, the LNC sent out a fundraising letter promising a Libertarian majority Congress by 2010.
Not one Libertarian in Congress, but a Libertarian majority. Both houses.
I suppose 2010 seemed a long way off in the 1990s. It was a safe promise to make. And maybe it even seem doable at the time.
Why is the LNC asking for another $48K to test this project? They are sitting on $630K just realized from the sale of party HQ and apparently have no moral concerns about not offering the proceeds back to those who explicitly gave contributions to purchase a headquarters building in honor of David Nolan. I imagine a good number of those displeased building contributors will be giving the middle finger to any future calls to contribute to the LNC.
After 50 plus years of trying to gain traction it would seem to me that without a structural change in our voting system this will be unsuccessful. Not saying I’m happy about it but just stating what would appear to me to be obvious.
Following up on my prior comment, IMO, the quickest way to create a multi party system in the US would be to annex Canada.
“Nekhaila pointed to the United Kingdom’s multiparty system, which operates under a similar winner-take-all structure, as evidence that a three-party America is possible”
Third parties that exist in winner-take-all voting systems usually have a regional base. In the UK, the Scottish Party is concentrated in Scotland, and several other smaller parties have regional strength in Northern Ireland and Wales. The Liberal Democrats are more widespread, but it is interesting to note that historically they were strong in Ireland, being strong supportesr of home rule there,and were a major party, until Ireland became independent.
The same is also true in Canada, Canada looks like a multi party country, but nearly all provinces have only two major parties on the provincial level.
Best wishes to Steven Nekhaila and the Libertarian Party on this ambitious project. I hope it will be successful.
I wonder whether they will bother reaching out to those of us who resigned after the MC takeover. I’ll sit and wait…!