On Wednesday, the Libertarian Party made an eyebrow-raising announcement about its upcoming convention: the headline speaker will be Donald Trump. For the little-noticed third party, which has mostly been overshadowed this year by more prominent independent candidates, it was certainly an attention-grabber.
It is unusual, to say the least, for the presumptive Republican nominee to speak at an event which is also slated to nominate a candidate to run against him. It’s also bizarre given that Trump is, by any measure, the exact opposite of an ideological libertarian. But beneath the incongruity, there is a certain logic on both sides of this odd exchange.
Trump, for his part, obviously seeks to undercut a perceived spoiler threat. In 2020, the Libertarian candidate Jo Jorgensen exceeded Biden’s margin of victory over Trump in several swing states. Trump has also previously complained that his loss of the national popular vote in 2016 can be pinned on Gov. Gary Johnson’s Libertarian bid, which set a record for the party by taking 3.2 percent of the popular vote.
