According to this story, Effective Leadership for America, a Republican PAC that supports the Republican nominee for U.S. House, Arizona First District, is also spending money to boost the Green Party nominee in the same race. The incumbent Democrat. Ann Kirkpatrick, is not running for re-election. In 2014 she defeated her Republican opponent 97,391 to 87,723. No minor party or independent candidates were in this race in 2014.
The 2016 Green Party nominee in this race, Ray Parrish, was nominated in the 2016 Green Party primary with 66 write-in votes. A Libertarian, Kim Allen, ran in the Libertarian primary in this district this year. Allen received 144 write-ins in the Libertarian primary. But under discriminatory Arizona election laws, the Green candidate only needed one write-in to be nominated in his primary, whereas the Libertarian needed several hundred. So the Green is on the November ballot but the Libertarian is not. This law was written in 2015 by the Republican-majority in the legislature, and is being challenged in U.S. District Court by the Libertarian Party. Thanks to Rick Hasen for the link.
Greens shouldn’t worry about getting support from Republicans. This is a Republican contradiction not yours.
Hell, Lenin even said once: the capitalists will sell you the rope to hang the enemies of the revolution.
Paul Babeu, the Republican candidate, is a very bad dude. As sheriff of Pinal County, he tried to deport his ex-boyfriend.
http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/news/paul-babeus-mexican-ex-lover-says-sheriffs-attorney-threatened-him-with-deportation-6454567
A similar case happened during the Montana 2012 Senate Race when a far left environmentalist group spent money of pro-Libertarian ads. Tester (D) ended up being re-elected with 48.58%, Rehberg (R) had 44.58%, and Cox (L) had 6.56%.
It may be ethically unsound, but it’s politically a good idea.
Good point, Richard! Thanks! And, Vulpes too; we had started to try to describe the effectiveness/lack of effectiveness of siphoning efforts in the article, but decided to leave that to the reader. Arizona has also had races recently that one side or the other claims the 3rd party candidate swung the election (w/ or w/o siphon efforts)
Its a very ancient tactic, called divide and conquer.
Did you see the new poll that DonaldcTrump is leading in Utah and Evan McMullen is in Second place.I just read the article on reason.com I think pp or Rasmussen did the poll.
Interesting a Republican PAC funding both the Republican and Green party Candidates.What is the big idea behind that .
Top 2 would eliminate both problems:
(1) All candidates would have equal ballot access.
(2) Spoiler effect eliminated.
Top 2 absolutely does not eliminate the spoiler effect. Candidates “spoil” each other in top-two primaries constantly. The presence of a minor party candidate in a top-two primary can easily “spoil” the chances of one of the major party candidates.
Spoil? As if the two major parties are all that matters. Note, we were pulled down to 66 votes when the dems challenged every single vote we fought for. Soon these two parties won’t matter, into the dust heap of history thanks to our brilliant young people that are sick of it.
http://www.rayparrishforcongress.com/