Third-party ‘No Labels’ movement could help Trump win Michigan — and re-election | Opinion

The leaders of No Labels really want you to understand that they’re not like other third-party political movements: They don't have a candidate, for starters, but they have an awful lot of money.

And they're definitely, totally, really not at all like Jill Stein, the Green Party/Russian-social-media-backed spoiler candidate who had a disastrous effect on the 2016 presidential election.  

Rather, No Labels proponents say, their movement is simply an appeal to the common sense of an American electorate tired of partisanship and dissension, weary of Donald Trump and Joe Biden, and ready for consensus on an agenda we can all agree on — which, of course, is where the whole thing starts to fall apart, because the vaguely appealing platitudes of No Labels’ “Commonsense Agenda” aren't policy, no matter how confidently the group's members say them.

No Labels was repped at a Detroit Economic Club forum last week by former governors Jay Nixon (Missouri) and Pat McCrory (North Carolina), experienced statesmen who speak with easy charm and a whole lot of confidence, full of the promise of a cooperative new America and hand-picked to put the movement’s prospective voters at ease.

No Labels is peddling a particular kind of fantasy that appeals to a particular kind of person (he’s a Democrat and he’s a Republican but they get along!); largely, I think, Republicans aghast at Trump's takeover of their party, of whom there are unfortunately not that many.

Third parties are a tough sell, spoilers more often than not (yo, Jill Stein), because the U.S. is a two-party system, even when things aren't going so hot. No third-party candidate in U.S. history has crept close to a win, not even Teddy Roosevelt. Most often, the third-party effect is negligible; for every Ross Perot or Jill Stein, there have been a hundred Libertarian or U.S. Taxpayers party candidates who caused nary a blip on the electoral radar.

Nixon and McCrory told the Econ Club crowd that No Labels is viable because this is an unprecedented moment of disenchantment and gridlock, and because the present unpopularity of both Biden and Trump has caused a unique disinterest in next year’s presidential contest. (Some of this, of course, is true. Our politics are particularly grim right now, and that’s probably not going to change.) 

And No Labels is different: The group has raised about $70 million, and has won a spot for its hypothetical future candidate on the presidential primary ballot in 12 states ― and that’s where the cheery hey-folks-remember-when-things-were-better nostalgia of the movement goes entirely off the rails.

When Nixon and McCrory say you can't compare No Labels to Jill Stein, they're right, because No Labels is actually much more dangerous.

The political establishment is nearly unanimous in the belief that No Labels will benefit Donald Trump’s re-election bid — Republicans currently like Trump more than Democrats like Joe Biden — which the No Labels crowd views as a sign that they’re hitting a nerve. But really, it's just an accurate assessment (or warning) about how American presidential politics work. 

There may not be a lot of disaffected Republican voters, but they’ll play an outsized role in 2024, just as they did in 2022 and 2020 and 2018 and 2016, because this election will be decided by a vanishingly small margin. Indulging the conceit that a vote for Joe Biden evokes the same moral disquiet as a vote for Trump is a damaging falsehood, and Nixon and McCrory, who seem intelligent and articulate, ought to know better.

Big on feelings, light on details

One thing Nixon and McCrory really didn’t want to talk about is how any of this would work.

During the forum, the men deflected audience questions about trivial matters like how a third-party candidate starting late in the cycle could win, or how much that would cost, with the same answer: The candidate will sort all that out.

Which is really convenient, because No Labels does not yet have a candidate.

Ostensibly, this is because No Labels is a movement, not a political party, Nixon and McCrory explained, that is currently evaluating candidates from the military, business and politics, which really narrows it down.

No Labels is hoping for a bipartisan ticket. West Virginia Democrat Sen. Joe Manchin and former U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming were mentioned. (A Democrat whose name evokes heavy sighs from members of his own party, and a Republican who couldn’t win her home state — what could possibly go wrong?)

The spots on 12 states' primary ballots No Labels has been able to finagle are blank; if Biden and Trump emerge as their parties' obvious frontrunners after the Super Tuesday primaries, the governors said, No Labels' candidate will slot into those states' ballots.

Afterwards, I asked Nixon about the No Labels 30-point "Commonsense Agenda," which the governors said was the result of paying careful attention to the American people. The introduction bills it as a "clear blueprint for where America's commonsense majority wants to go," but it's a mix of vague statements like "It’s in America’s interest to work with our allies to advance our mutual interests" (Item #19) and "Building more homes in America will make housing more affordable for Americans” (Item #30) and standard GOP boilerplate like removing burdensome business regulations (#38). The section on criminal justice (#8, #9 and #10) calls for crackdowns on "career criminals" and investments in community policing, but notably absent is any recognition of inequity in policing; a statement like “the justice system must treat everyone fairly” would have been relatively anodyne, but no such sentiment is included.

“You've been a governor,” I asked Nixon, “how does any of this become policy?”

“That's really up to the candidate,” Nixon replied.

The group’s most actionable policy position calls for limiting access to abortion. That’s Item #26, "America must strike a balance between protecting women’s rights to control their own reproductive health and our society’s responsibility to protect human life.”

This isn't exactly common sense: Americans support a woman's right to choose by a margin of two-thirds or better, I asked Nixon, so if your platform is about consensus, why does it include restrictions on women's autonomy?

You guessed it: Also up to the candidate, Nixon answered.

There's only one way to beat Trump

The governors say there's an exit ramp: If the hypothetical military officer, business person or politician's candidacy isn't going well, they'll shut it all down before the general election, because No Labels does not want to be a spoiler.

They ought to shut it down now.

There are many possible takeaways here, but these are the most important: Third parties don’t work in America, and don't trust anyone who won’t show you what they’re selling.

I feel for the folks on the other side of the aisle, I really do. It must be awful to wake up one day and find that the party you told yourself was about fiscal conservatism has been hijacked by Donald Trump, but there’s only one way to stop Trump’s re-election, and it’s to vote for the Democrat.

Nancy Kaffer is the editorial page editor of the Detroit Free Press. Contact: nkaffer@freepress.com.