No Labels is watching. And plotting. They’re taking a cold, hard look at the results of the first two primary tests of this Presidential election and gaming out scenarios. Frankly, I’d mostly pushed thoughts of them to the back of my mind. Then I heard one pundit (for the life of me I can’t remember who – it was a single, fleeting comment) mention that the dark money group No Labels will be looking hard at how much independent support a candidate like Haley could get. More importantly they’d be looking at whether/how they could gain control of it and use it to bolster whomever they put on the ballot.
However the organization started out back in 2010, and regardless of what they did during their first decade (remember the Problem Solvers caucus in Congress?) No Labels is a very different animal now. Now they are, despite their mealy-mouthed protestations to the contrary out to play spoiler. They want to affect the voting in enough states to keep President Biden from getting 270 Electoral Votes. The practical result would be to hand the Presidency to Donald Trump again. Harnessing a bloc of never/anti Trump disaffected Republicans along with a good chunk of Independent voters is what they need to do. The scary thing is they’ve got more resources in the form of money and knowledge than Ralph Nader or Jill Stein had.
No Labels can sit back and watch a substantial portion of the electorate who fervently don’t want Trump AND who have reservations about Biden form. Then figure out how to target them. That’s what makes Haley’s emergence as a threat to the aura of invincibility Trump has tried to cultivate a cause for concern. Haley is positioning herself as an alternative to “the same old choices” with a not at all subtle emphasis on the “old” part. THAT folks is what makes what Haley has done and will continue to do a double-edged sword. Yes, she will keep knocking Trump off his game since she’s willing to actually challenge him some now. Maybe not hard punches to the nose like Chris Christie but she’s already tweaking him pretty good. But on the age thing she’s also getting in some digs at President Biden.
If No Labels senses that Haley has sufficiently tarred Biden by association on the age issue, if they sense real “blood in the water” they will go all-in and mount a well-funded ticket. With enough votes in the right places, and not all that many they can change the outcome of the election, just like Nader did in 2000 and Jill Stein even more so in 2016.
It was no secret prior to this past Tuesday that Nikki Haley was counting on Independents (they call them unaffiliated) voters to give Trump a run for his money. Just like Trump once did seemingly a lifetime ago. Despite the best efforts of Trump and frankly news outlets to, even before the New Hampshire primary to declare the GOP nomination process over Nikki Haley is still standing. More importantly she’s vowing to keep going despite the likelihood of her losing the next major contest, the primary in her home state of South Carolina a month from now. Even more importantly, it looks like she’s going to have the resources, the money and organization to stay in the race at least through Super Tuesday in early March.
Plenty of people including yours truly are enjoying Trump’s fury over things not being over and done with after all. He’s gotten everyone else to bow down and kiss his ring, then crawl around behind him and kiss his ass – publicly. Tuesday night before the results started coming in Trump believed what the polls were saying, that he’d win by over 20 points. As it became clear he’d win, but maybe not even by double digits it would have been a bad time to have to be around him. Then, fifteen or twenty minutes after the polls closed and results were being announced Haley went out and gave a stirring speech. Poised, confident. Presidential even. Yeah, it couldn’t have been fun to be anywhere near Trump. He junked the speech cued up in his teleprompter and you’ve seen what he was like.
However don’t let the enjoyment of seeing Trump destroy himself with everyone who’s not hard-core MAGA blind you to this fact. The stronger a movement Haley builds, the more No Labels will have to work with. In a way, I suspect President Biden and his re-election team wish the GOP process was in fact now over. Without Haley getting attention and building more never/anti Trump and/or independent support they could be working to attract those voters. However, the more of a coalition Haley is able to build and the longer she has to build it the more difficult it will be for Biden to attract those voters.
Because No Labels will pick right up and be targeting them as soon as Haley is eventually forced to the sideline. I hate to start your morning with a “downer” but what I’m driving at is we should take what I’m saying as a warning. Yes, it’s good to see Haley carving big chunks out of Trump’s bloated ass and candidacy. However that does NOT give us a chance to sit back and coast while she does so. No Labels is LURKING out there and we (and Biden) are going to have to compete with them for the folks who are/will looking to Haley.
Well, No Labels will have a bit of a go to get any of its candidates on state ballots–especially as it’s NOT a “political party” by any conventional sense of the term.
In California, for instance, they’ll have to get nearly 220,000 signatures on a petition to get a candidate on the November ballot–and the deadline for turning in the petition is August 9, 2024. If Haley chooses to “take it to the convention,” that deadline will be just over 3 weeks after the GOP Convention ends. (My source is Ballotpedia and there’s nothing indicating whether the group would be able to just leave the candidate’s name blank or if they would need to have an actual name to go on the petition. I’m thinking it’s the latter.)
Looking at Texas, there’s a bit of a major hurdle involved. “Independent candidates for President file an application with the Secretary of State. The application must be submitted with a petition, and both documents must be filed no later than May 13, 2024. The petition can be circulated beginning after March 5, 2024. For 2024, the petition must contain 113,151 signatures of registered voters who did not vote in the presidential primary of either party. The application must include the information about and signed consent from the candidate’s vice-presidential running mate.” (This comes from https://www.sos.state.tx.us/elections/candidates/guide/2022/president.shtml .) Again, if Haley takes it to the convention, No Labels won’t be on the Texas ballot.
Arizona? As best as I can make out, Haley will NOT be allowed to appear on the ballot as Arizona law reads “A candidate may not run as an independent if he or she is representing a party that failed to qualify for the primary election. Additionally, a candidate cannot run as an independent if he or she tried and failed to qualify as a political party candidate in the primary.” So, if she makes it to the Arizona GOP primary (not sure if this applies if she were to drop out before the primary), she’s ineligible to appear on the Arizona ballot.
Michigan? Well, the deadline for filing as an independent candidate is July 21, 2024–just a few days after the GOP convention ends. No Labels would need to get at least 12,000 signatures on a petition with at least 100 signatures from each of at least 1/2 of the state’s congressional districts–that only accounts for 700 signatures (with 13 congressional districts, half would be 7) but I’m guessing this is to ensure signatures don’t come from just one or two districts.
North Carolina? No Labels will be out of luck because the filing deadline is MARCH 5, 2024. Also, North Carolina has a “sore loser” law meaning that Haley cannot run for President in the state if she loses the GOP nomination.
Pennsylvania? Well, the petition signature requirement for this year hasn’t been established (at Ballotpedia, anyway) at this time but in 2020, an independent candidate/party needed 5000 signatures. This year’s filing deadline is August 1. But, more importantly, Pennsylvania ALSO has a “sore loser” law. If she’s on the Pennsylvania GOP primary, she can’t appear as a presidential candidate on the November ballot.
So, that’s two major states (CA and TX) which have supported only one party or the other in the past 8 election cycles and 4 which are relative swing states. In the past 8 elections the D/R split has been: AZ, 2/6; MI, 7/1; NC, 1/7; and PA, 7/1. And No Labels will have very little chance in 3 of the states and absolutely NO chance in the other 5 (if the group tries to back Haley).
format is too wide to read all of it…looks interesting.
Flip cell horizontally (?). Lost my pc awhile back and never could read posts on empty wheel🤦🏻♂️ Even though had seem folks everywhere do that🤦🏻♂️🤦🏻♂️
That is a great comment with good information clearly presented. Thank you Joseph.
If you turn your phone/tablet sideways, you can read the format of Joseph’s comment.
Are there rules about having your candidate on the ballot in every state? No labels can defeat Biden by getting their candidate on in the ballot only in Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Georgia. They don’t need to get on ballots in ANY other states. They just need 100k votes or so to go to their candidate across 3 of those states and Trump is in the WH. If Dems win the Senate & Congress with decent majorities, they could impeach him and convict him before he’s there a month, then dump the electoral college. They wouldn’t for the same reason I’m afraid the SC is going to find some no-resolution resolution other than booting that deranged & most insecure demagogue who has ever lived from the ballot. MAGA loons will be looking to assassinate them.
Haley would forfeit any possibility of being elected to anything as a republican if she decides to go the NO Labels route. Also, Larry Hogan, Joe Manchin and others would not take 2nd place to a woman. The attention that No Labels has been getting from several pro-democracy groups has highlighted the spoiler role they are trying to play. Hopefully, the independents are aware. Most of the indies that voted for her in New Hampshire said it was a protest vote against Trump and they planned on voting for Biden in the general.