Americans are losing faith in our democracy.
Just 1 in 10 believe the government either represents them or works very well. And the next presidential election may further entrench this existential distrust and dissatisfaction: A large majority of voters don’t want Trump or Biden to run for president — 60 percent and 70 percent, respectively — yet they are party frontrunners.
Given this bleak reality, the group No Labels is working to secure ballot access for an alternative, bipartisan ticket in 2024 on the belief that voters deserve a better option. They have attracted a torrent of criticism from opponents who believe a third option may “spoil” the race by taking more votes away from Biden and electing Trump — a risk they deem too high given Trump’s demonstrated hostility toward democracy.
Both happen to be right. Yet both miss the point.
While No Labels’ diagnosis is spot on, their prescription is a placebo — an illusion of choice in an electoral system that does not permit it. I don’t say that lightly after years of involvement with prior pioneering efforts (including Americans Elect in 2012), support for such candidacies in the past, and having run for Congress myself as an independent.
But unfortunately, the reality is clear: In a highly polarized environment, the risk of wasting one’s vote or spoiling the election ultimately forces most voters into their partisan corners by Election Day. The infinitesimally small chance that any third candidate can overcome these dynamics, not just in a single state but in a sufficient number of states to garner an electoral college majority, is not worth increasing the risk of a second Trump term.
No Labels says they won’t nominate a ticket at their convention in April if the data shows they would be a spoiler; however, that may not be known until much closer to the election when ballots will not be able to be changed.
On the other hand, those conspiring to stop No Labels say they’re protecting democracy, but what are they suggesting actually be done about it? Taking aggressive political and legal action to deny ballot access is not a healthy American tradition.
North Carolina has already delayed certifying ballot access despite No Labels meeting the requisite requirements. The Arizona Democratic Party sued its secretary of state after he recognized No Labels as a political party in the state. Pretty soon, righteous calls to “protect democracy” ring hollow and look an awful lot like protecting one’s own political power at any cost.
On one thing, both sides should agree: Our presidential election system is broken. No Labels would not face such daunting odds, nor would their opponents have as much reason for concern, if we had a level playing field that facilitated more competitive elections capable of producing more representative outcomes.
There are two, fixable flaws in the way we pick our president. First, the primary process rewards candidates like Trump who can win state primaries without earning a majority of votes. Second, again due to plurality-winner rules, the general election robs voters of more choices through the perverse reality that voting for the candidate you most prefer might actually help the candidate you least like. Thus, serious candidates outside the two major parties are discouraged from running in the first place.
The simplest solution is to implement instant runoffs in both primary and general elections using ranked choice voting (RCV). Currently, around 13 million voters in two states, three counties and 46 cities across the nation use ranked choice voting, according to FairVote. Two states will use RCV for general elections. There is still time for more states to follow.
Under this system, voters have the option to rank the candidates according to their preference and whoever earns a majority of the vote is the winner.
For example, in the general election, you could rank a theoretical No Labels candidate Larry Hogan #1, Biden #2 and Trump #3. If no candidate earns an outright majority of first-choice votes, the candidate with the least votes is eliminated and his supporters’ second choices are instead counted. With instant runoffs, a No Labels candidate would not be a spoiler — but could become president.
A complementary proposal, championed by the Election Reformers Network, is to proportionally allocate electoral votes among the top two finishers in each state’s presidential election.
For example, a 55 percent-45 percent popular vote result in a state with 10 electoral votes would result in the two candidates receiving 5.5 and 4.5 electoral votes, respectively. Not only would this further level the playing field for candidates outside of the two major parties and mitigate spoiler candidacies, but it would also make votes matter in every state — not just the presidential swing states.
A fairer process would produce more representative outcomes, as presidential elections in other countries have demonstrated. In 2017, France elected an independent candidate, Emmanuel Macron, over a far-right populist, Marine Le Pen, and did so again in 2022 — through a “top-two” voting system. Notably, if France used our electoral system for those contests, as Dr. Richard Barton wrote, “the best evidence suggests that Le Pen would have won handily.”
The fight over a third-party presidential campaign should not distract from how best to truly protect our democracy over the long term: reforming our elections.
Nick Troiano is the executive director of Unite America, a philanthropic venture fund that invests in nonpartisan election reform to foster a more representative and functional government.