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Independents, Party Engagement, and More · Project 2028

• 0:00
  Hello and welcome back to Project 2028. Today we're going to be discussing different independent
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  candidates, their views, and what states they're on the ballot on. We will also be discussing
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  whether or not it is prudent to vote for an independent candidate in such a tight election
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  and what could be done if you're interested in more party options. Now without further ado,
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  let's dive right in. Okay so there are two major independent candidates that are on the ballots.
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  Obviously not all the states have them on their ballot so I'll in a minute kind of give a rundown
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  of that or LaTrona will do that. But there are technically four, like the two major independents,
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  and then there are two others. There's obviously JFK who dropped out. How, or post-pone. No no,
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  JFK didn't drop out. He got assassinated. I think what we were meaning to say was Robert F. Kennedy
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  Jr. had a, he was very passionate about his race for a while but now he really just doesn't have
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  any chance of winning with the current voter lineup although there are still some people who
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  are passionate about their love for him. And so as Brian has kind of informed me, he is still on
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  ballots however he cannot win because of his, because of the ballots he is on. Because of the fact that he's on
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  ballots in states that at least mostly aren't either gonna swing which would include higher
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  volatility states and the chance of him winning is one in many millions. So he is on the ballots
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  in Wisconsin and Michigan but none of the other battleground states which are Pennsylvania,
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  North Carolina, Georgia, Arizona, and Nevada. And then the other less likely because of the polling
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  on him is Chase Oliver who is in the Libertarian Party. He is on every single ballot except for
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  New York, Illinois, and Tennessee. However he's not doing well enough in the polls to be considered
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  a major threat to anything. Well it isn't that he's not doing well enough in the polls, it is
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  actually a fact that he's never been polled before. They don't consider him to be to be somewhat of a
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  genuine contender. So the two like main independent or third party presidential candidates are
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  Jill Stein and Cornell West. So Jill Stein is on more ballots than Cornell West. However Cornell
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  West is receiving more support than her in a lot of polls. So Jill is on battleground ballots in...
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  Oh um I'm talking now. Jill is in battleground ballots in um all of the battleground states
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  except Nevada um she... I don't know. Oh that's lovely um she is she is on the ballot in a majority
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  of states and she provides an option for voters who tend to be more liberal voters who don't
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  support Kamala's position on the crisis in Israel and Palestine. So she's an option for them. She's
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  a member of the Green Party so she also has very strong stances about climate but one of the things
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  about her is when it's this tight of an election and Trump is predicted to win or have more votes
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  people who tend to be more liberal by voting for Jill Stein they end up giving their vote to Trump
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  because it's... Just to add some context Luchon is 100% on the trail here. In Michigan for example
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  over 93,000 voters in the Democratic primaries abstained from voting for Joseph Biden who is now
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  out of the race. However Harris has the same views relatively as Biden so it will kind of carry over
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  and she could definitely divert a lot of votes in a swing state like Michigan that has you know
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  at least the Democrats have a desperate need for those Arab voters that they're kind of losing and
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  hemorrhaging right now through that but also to push back it's not a vote for Trump it's not a vote
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  for anybody. It doesn't help Trump as much as it just doesn't it doesn't help Trump just as much as
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  it doesn't help Harris. Obviously you could be losing somewhat of a Democratic voter through
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  through that thing with with the Arab voters in Michigan in more concentrated places but but
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  obviously civilly it is not. Cornell West is another one of our candidates he's not on the
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  ballot in a lot of the battleground states or many of the states at all like we mentioned earlier but
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  he's very passionate about health care for Black women especially like maternal health care he's
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  passionate about education disabilities LGBTQ issues and racial issues. This also makes him appeal
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  to more of the liberal voters which again is something where votes for him would take away
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  from people who could be voting for Kamala rather than Trump so that's an interesting point. Okay so
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  I guess I'm gonna kind of move us on to our second half of this episode which will take up more time
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  of kind of if it is not necessarily right but if there is a good reason to be voting independent
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  so like LaTrona kind of mentioned it is usually talked about in the sense that a vote for
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  an independent is a vote against the Democratic candidate and the reason for that is most people
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  who are voting independent are usually people who would in primaries and stuff like that vote
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  liberal and the main reason for this is they don't agree with some of the policies that the liberal
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  presidential or the Democratic presidential candidate has put out and we see more
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  conservatives and Republicans agreeing with more and not necessarily letting one policy kind
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  of interfere with their overarching beliefs that align more with the conservative party.
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  A big example of this is things like taxes and the Republican party's pretty consistent opinion on
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  the economy. Those are things that aren't super like wavering and are really big important topics
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  for a lot of people who vote conservatively. So when you hear that kind of voting independent
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  takes a vote away from the Democrat candidate they're mainly saying that because these voters
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  are usually more liberal leaning and they usually vote for a less conservative candidate and for the
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  Democrat candidate that you are losing that vote which in turn sends a 95 percent of the time the
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  independent doesn't have a major chance of winning. You kind of are getting rid of getting rid
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  I'm saying in quotes. You're kind of losing the support from that voter allowing the conservative
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  candidate to have a higher chance of winning and especially with close races we hear kind of the
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  point to pick the lesser of two evils which is basically saying pick the candidate who you agree
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  with more. The main reason for this is when it is a tight race like this all the votes matter for the
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  bigger two-party candidates. So if you are thinking of voting for an independent that is more
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  conservative leaning the Republican Party would rather you vote for Trump because more of their
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  beliefs will line up of those of Trump's than they would with those of Kamala or a different
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  independent and if you are going to vote for either Jill or Cornell or one of the other
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  independent options the Democratic Party would rather you vote for Kamala to give her your support
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  because more of your values and beliefs will line up with those of her. Especially when we like I
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  said have a very close race and all these votes matter the Democrats are really pushing for more
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  independence to show their support for Kamala Harris and they want to use that as a way to kind
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  of increase her numbers. All right kind of wrapping up the podcast last topic it's going to be
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  relatively quick. There's going to be reverse coattails. It's kind of been in the news lately
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  especially in Arizona and a few of the Sunbelt states and it is kind of a theory that suggests
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  that down ballot races so municipal state races could have an effect on the presidential races and
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  they a batch of polling just came out a few days ago and you know just to kind of debunks what
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  some of the more speculative articles have been saying before this down ballot people only go
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  go to vote down ballot and then happen to vote presidential around one every few thousand times.
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  It's very few very far between so that kind of just clears that out of the water obviously
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  state races less municipal races the more or the less municipal it is obviously you're just seeing
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  more reverse coattails and obviously regular coattails would be an executive branch or a
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  federal branch or not just a regular federal race affecting down ballot initiatives. But obviously
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  you kind of see that consistently with races with people just filling out their usual partisan
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  partisanship on the lower half of the ballot that's pretty pretty usual but there was a
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  specific attention at least drawn to Arizona with reverse stuff especially within the gubernatorial
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  race among some of the other things that we've seen recently and I think that this is quite a
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  short episode but I think it will wrap it up pretty much. Is there anything you guys want to say?
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  No I think oh actually yes Luchana is going to now give a very brief explanation of how you fill out
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  your ballot and what you will see when you receive that. Okay um Ryan's gonna bully me a bit for this
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  he's gonna say anyone who can read can figure out how to fill out the ballot and the people who are
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  listening to this podcast surely they can read but it's a little more complex than that so first of
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  all if you're getting a mail-in ballot you will obviously get it in the mail. If you're going to
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  shut up if you're going to a polling place to fill out your ballot you should print out a sample one
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  online so you know all the things that you're planning to bubble in all the candidates you're
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  planning to vote for before you get to the polling place. But for these you obviously have some of
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  the more major um issues on the front where it's president vice president pair um several other
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  municipal leaders but then one of the most important things is it might not seem important
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  but it is um your local judges so it's like a full two-page list of judges and you click yes or no
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  yes I want to um re yes I want to keep them in their position or no I don't and it's important
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  to research these judges because some of them are very corrupt um and it's these are the people that
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  are making the these are people enforcing the laws these are the people trying to keep you safe so
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  it's important to make sure that they're just people that you trust um making good fair decisions.
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  One example of this when my mom showed me her ballot and I was um looking into some of the
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  candidates was there was one judge who if you there's one judge who was um copying very
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  corrupt and unjust and then people were kind of against him but then he changed his name and he
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  moved into our district and now under different names so people don't realize this so it's very
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  interesting you have to make sure you do your research you come prepared to vote um and every
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  candidate that you vote for matters so don't just circle in one and leave the rest blank.
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  Thank you very much. Thank you so much for clicking and listening to this episode of
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  Project 2028. If you want to follow us on follow us on social media our instagram is
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• 14:02
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