This article was originally published by Source New Mexico on April 10, 2026. It is republished here under a CC BY‑NC‑ND 4.0 license. Any views expressed are the author’s alone and do not necessarily reflect those of Independent Political Report or the Outsider Media Foundation. Source links and article image appear as in the original. Title amended for style.
Former Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Andrew Yang took to the Roundhouse steps in Santa Fe on Friday afternoon to announce that the political party he co-founded, the Forward Party, will officially organize as a minor party in New Mexico.
Yang co-founded the party with former Republican New Jersey Gov. Christine Todd Whitman, who served as Environmental Protection Agency secretary during George W. Bush’s presidency. Party organizers have said they hope to appeal to voters disenchanted with the country’s two current major political parties. The Forward Party’s tenets include treating “everyone with dignity and respect” and acting “with ethics, integrity and compassion.”
Yang and New Mexico Forward Party Chair Bob Perls at a news conference announced that they are searching for a handful of candidates to run for office in New Mexico, particularly against state lawmakers who voted against opening the state’s primary elections to independent voters. The June 2 primary election marks the first time independent voters can cast a ballot in a New Mexico primary.
“How could you vote against open primaries?” Yang said at the news conference. “They’re running unopposed. You see how that works?”
In Utah, Yang said the Forward Party is currently fielding more than two dozen candidates, including one incumbent.
After the event, Yang told Source NM that he saw strong demand in New Mexico for a political party that spoke to Republicans who don’t fit the MAGA mold and Democrats who don’t conform to the national party’s norms.
New Mexico has seen a significant increase in independent voters, also known as “decline to state” voters because they decline to register with either of the major political parties. Nevertheless, the governor’s office and both chambers of the state Legislature are controlled by Democrats. Republicans, meanwhile, weren’t able to get a candidate on the ballot for New Mexico’s junior U.S. Senate seat this election cycle.
Yang, though, said he isn’t concerned about the state Forward Party’s viability.
“There’s a misconception about the Forward Party…that we’re the third party. In a lot of places, we’re the second party,” he said. That would be the case in New Mexico, where many Democrats run unopposed, he added.
While the deadline has passed to field candidates for the June 2 primary, New Mexico Forward Party officials are focusing their efforts on fielding candidates for the Nov. 3 general election. Since the party is so small, though, its candidates will likely be subject to the same signature-gathering requirements as independent candidates, who have to collect more than 14,000 signatures to run.
State Chair Bob Perls called that “discrimination,” and said he hopes to field two to five candidates in races across the state by November. Yang, for his part, said he believes the U.S. is the only democracy in the world where election officials like secretaries of state are party-affiliated.
“If you’re a sports fan, imagine if the referees had one of the team’s jerseys on,” he said. “Imagine if you only had two teams that played against each other. How would you start feeling about the other team’s fanbase over time?”
Hello! I don’t know how to directly reach Andrew Yang or Rob Perls, of the Forward Party, so please post this message for them to hopefully see! My name is Cris Ericson, I live in Vermont which is a very low petition signature requirement State. I need only 500 petition signatures of Vermont registered voters to get on the official election ballot for the Nov. 3, 2026 general election in Vermont as a candidate for Representative to U.S. Congress. I am going to be 74 years old next month and I have bilateral arthritis of the knees so I am not steady on my feet. I need volunteers to collect the petition signatures for me. I live in very low population, small town Chester, VT 05143 but there is a Recycling Center in Springfield, Vermont 12 miles away and it is open 3 days a week. Car after car pulls in and lines up in rows and then the people get out and put their cans in one bin and plastic in another bin and cardboard in another bin. I used to go there until I got the arthritis. They are open 3 days a week and you can collect petition signatures there, lots of candidates do. Just wait until people are finished depositing their recycling items and then say “Hi!” when they are closing their car trunk. You can get a lot of signatures every day that Recyling is open. You can google me, I was on the election ballot every two years in Vermont from 2002 though 2022. I have never won a general election, but I won a several statewide Primary election races in 2020 as a Progressive Party candiate. After that, I was excluded from all candidate debates and forums for the 2022 race. The Federal Election Commission did not rule on my complaint until 2025, and then they just dismissed it. I do not have the money to pay a signature gathering company. If Andrew Yang or Rob Perls reads this, please go over my website and let me know if enough of my political issues are agreeable to you that you would consider helping me get the 500 Vermont registered voter petition signatures I need to get on the ballot. I do have a guest bedroom in my little house, so someone could stay here while they are volunteering on my campaign. They need their own car, this is rural Vermont, there is no Taxi, no Bus, and by the way, don’t pet the dog. The more out-of-state tourists who buy up homes around here, the harder it is to find registered Vermont voters, that’s why Recyling is the best place, they are all homeowners there. The next town north is 12 miles up the road, Ludlow, Vermont, and VAIL bought out Okemo Ski Resort, so now 80% of the homes in Ludlow are owned by rich out-of-state people. There are very few homes left for sale in Chester, Vt where I live. My property taxes have gone sky high, home heating fuel prices are the product of the devil right now, and I am just sitting here praying that someone will Volunteer to get the petition signatures I need to get on the election ballot. If you read my website, I do believe you will agree that I have excellent ideas that need to be heard by the public, nationwide. http://crisericson.com also known as http://VERMONTparty.com Oh! and the great thing is that in Vermont, you can put up to 3 descriptive words on the ballot rather than “independent”. See my petition on my website, and print it out and just put in “Forward” party and that will go on the official election ballot when you get the 500 petition signatures for me.
Isn’t “forward” and “New Mexico” in the same sentence an oxymoron? /s