No Labels Party may be boon to Trump
Centrist ticket could siphon Biden votes
Republicans and Democrats, move over. There’s a new political party in town.
One that’s supposed to deliver the holy grail of goodness, an alternative to the nutballs on the right and the oddballs on the left.
Centrist candidates who actually represent middle-of-the-road America.
That’s the theory, anyway.
This week, the No Labels Party qualified for Arizona’s 2024 ballot. This could be welcome news for Sen. Kyrsten Sinema and terrible news for Rep. Andy Biggs.
Donald Trump? I picture his trademark cat-ate-the-canary smile.
No Labels has been around for a while, promoting the rather astonishing idea that there’s nothing wrong with bipartisan solutions to the problems that plague us. Now it’s a political party, hoping to compete in key battleground states.
It certainly could be a force in Arizona’s presidential election. As a spoiler, that is.
Democratic Secretary of State Adrian Fontes predicted No Labels would be a “center right” party that siphons votes from Republican candidates.
“I think the big losses are going to be to the Republicans,” Fontes told KTAR.
I think Fontes is dreaming.
Joe Biden won Arizona by less than a percentage point. He won because suburban Republican women and right-leaning independents either held their noses and voted for him or left their ballot blank.
Give those voters a third choice and Fontes is right. They’re going to grab it, just not with the result that he’s envisioning.
This week, Third Way, a center-left think tank, warned that a No Labels “unity” ticket would likely kneecap Joe Biden’s chances at reelection.
“No Labels is committed to fielding a candidate that will, intentionally or not, provide a crucial boost to Republicans – and a major obstacle to Biden,” the group said, in a memo obtained by Politico. “As a result, they’ll make it far more likely – if not certain – that Donald Trump returns to the White House.”
The group noted that “double haters” – voters who don’t like either major-party candidate – tend to back Democrats when forced to choose. Biden won the “double haters” by 15 points, the think tank said.
Elsewhere on Arizona’s ballot, No
Labels offers some intriguing possibilities.
It could be a boon for Sinema, who changed her party registration last year from Democratic to independent.
Sinema hasn’t yet said whether she’d join No Labels but it seems like a no-brainer.
An independent must collect nearly six times as many nominating signatures as a candidate from a political party. And No Labels, which reportedly has some deep-pocketed donors, could provide Sinema with some organizational help she’ll no longer get from Democrats next year.
A No Labels candidate would have a shot at loosening Biggs’ far-right grip on his congressional district though only if Democrats and other thirdparty candidates stayed out of the race.
No Labels also could play a role in electing more moderates to the Legislature.
Former House Speaker Rusty Bowers, who lost his Republican Senate primary in Mesa to Trump loyalist David Farnsworth, would have been a shoe-in had he been on the ballot in November. Ditto for former Rep. Morgan Abraham, a moderate Democrat who lost his Senate primary in Tucson to the more progressive Priya Sundareshan.
Ultimately, however, No Labels is no fix for what ails Arizona politics.
With a third of the state’s voters rejecting the parties, it’s time to scrap the partisan primary system that allows Republican and Democratic voters to call the shots.
Political strategist Chuck Coughlin is working to put what he’s calling “Final Five” on the 2024 ballot. Really, it’s ranked-choice voting, a system in which voters rank the candidates in their order of preference.
Look for Couglin’s group to begin gathering signatures by August and look for Republicans to predict the end of days if such a thing gets traction.
Already there are several bills in the Legislature to try to stop it.
But Republicans can’t stop No Labels.
And really, why would they want to?