Polls showing support for 'political upheaval' help make case for third option: 'No Labels' strategist
After post-Iowa caucuses Fox News voter analysis surveys showed support for "substantial/total [political] upheaval" versus "no/small changes," a top "No Labels" official said Tuesday it illustrates a path for a unity candidate.
The survey of Iowa Republicans showed 89% of voters in favor of "upheaval" versus 11% favoring more of a status quo.
Ryan Clancy, chief strategist for the "No Labels" group, said such polls depict a need for a third major candidate in a presidential race to square off against a Republican and Democratic nominee.
"The thing is the broken establishment in DC knows this appetite is out there, which is part of the reason they're mobilizing so strongly to come after us," Clancy told "The Story."
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"We've said all along this is something we only want to do if we think there's an opening, if we think a unity ticket can win, and if it's a Trump-Biden rematch, we think those are the conditions where there's the best opening."
Clancy, who previously worked for then-Vice President Biden as well as former Washington Democratic Gov. Gary Locke, also keyed into a claim made recently by independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. about the viability for an outside bid.
In a recent interview with Fox News, Kennedy said he now sits within about 10 points of Biden and Trump in key races, and that he could mathematically win the presidency with just over one-third of the vote.
"Hypothetically, I could win with 34 points if the other two got 33, and it's winner-take-all," he said.
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Clancy appeared to agree with Kennedy's logic, pointing out that in 48 states – all but Nebraska and Maine – the electoral college tally is a winner-take-all affair.
"So in a multi-candidate race, you can have 34 or 35% of the vote in a state, [and] you get all the electoral votes that come with it," he said.
"That's one of the main reasons we think a unity ticket really has a shot this year."
Another potential independent presidential candidate, Sen, Joe Manchin, D-W.V., recently said he would do "whatever it takes" to save America, when asked whether he is ruling a 2024 bid.
Manchin, however, also said, "I love my country too much to vote for Donald Trump."
IClancy said in-part that a Trump-Biden rematch would be the best conditions for a third-party or independent candidate's viability.
Former Maryland Republican Gov. Larry Hogan recently stepped down from "No Labels" leadership and endorsed Nikki Haley.
Hogan, a staunch anti-Trump figure, had previously been mentioned as a potential third-way candidate himself, but told the Associated Press last week he wants to see the "strongest possible Republican" nominated.
Other top "No Labels" figures include founding chairman former Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., former NAACP executive director Ben Chavis, former Missouri Democratic Gov. Jay Nixon and former North Carolina Republican Gov. Pat McCrory.
The last substantive independent bid was launched in 1992 by populist Texas industrialist Ross Perot, whose strong showing led critics to claim his closer proximity ideologically to losing incumbent President George H.W. Bush led to former Arkansas Democratic Gov. Bill Clinton's upset win.
Segregationist former Alabama Democratic Gov. George Wallace, running as an American Independent in 1968, and Republican-turned-Progressive ex-President Theodore Roosevelt in 1912 round out the last trio of substantive third-party candidates in the modern era.