The Biden campaign is celebrating following the announcement on Thursday that the No Labels group would not field a presidential candidate in 2024.
“No Labels is ending our effort to put forth a Unity ticket in the 2024 presidential election,” Nancy Jacobson, No Labels’ founder and CEO, said in a statement. Jacobson, wife of former GOP strategist Mark Penn, said that the group would only have offered to field a ticket if there had been a credible path to victory.
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There never was, and No Labels is finished.
“No such candidates emerged, so the responsible course of action is for us to stand down,” Jacobson said. She added that the group would continue promoting “unity” and giving “voice to America’s commonsense majority.”
There may be a “commonsense majority” that hates both Biden and Trump, but no third-party entry will destroy the stranglehold on power maintained by the Republicans and Democrats.
Sure, the system is rigged against them with ballot access rules worthy of any Communist dictatorship. But it’s the people, including you, me, and your friends and neighbors, who refuse to allow a third party entry in the presidential or congressional races.
Put simply: the people won’t vote for it.
It’s not that third parties don’t have good ideas or good candidates. The plain and simple truth is that American voters are comfortable with the two-party system. And since democracy craves stability in order to function, voters may toy with the idea of voting for a third party right up until the point where they punch the hole for a Democrat or Republican.
To posit the notion that reforming the rules for ballot access and giving third parties an equal opportunity to run presupposes the American people really crave more choices. I think the 1992 election disabused us of that idea. Ross Perot received 20% of the vote and didn’t win a single electoral vote. He was on the ballot in all 50 states and spent $60 million of his own money, more than $128 million today.
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In 2024, Robert F. Kennedy is pulling about 20% of the vote as well. But even if he gets on all 50 state ballots, history shows us that the 20% he’s receiving today will fall to well below 10% by election day.
That may still mean curtains for a Biden second term, yet the Biden supporters are celebrating the end of No Labels.
“Millions of Americans are relieved that No Labels finally decided to do the right thing to keep Donald Trump out of the White House,” said MoveOn executive director Rahna Epting. “Now, it’s time for Robert Kennedy Jr. to see the writing on the wall that no third party has a path forward to winning the presidency. We must come together to defeat the biggest threat to our democracy and country: Donald Trump.”
MoveOn and other pro-Biden organizations are now planning to challenge signatures on Kennedy ballot access forms as the Biden team plans to force state officials to slow-walk Kennedy’s efforts at gaining the ballot.
“We are deeply relieved that everyone rejected their offer, forcing them to stand down,” said Matt Bennett of the centrist group Third Way. “While the threat of third-party spoilers remains, this uniquely damaging attack on President Biden and Democrats from the center has at last ended.”
Kennedy may have toyed with the idea of tacking to the center this summer, but his choice of radical-left activist Nicole Shanahan scotched that notion. Kennedy and radical-left professor Cornel West could ruin the Biden campaign by stealing 3-5% of the far-left vote. This is the vote that Biden needs to win in swing states like Michigan, Pennsylvania, Georgia, and North Carolina.
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No Labels was never a factor in the race simply because they never fielded a candidate. The conditions that allowed the creation of No Labels probably won’t exist in 2028, so it’s doubtful the group will rise again.