The Free Market Has Produced Another Candidate

Republicans have discovered a troubling defect in political freedom: voters can use it to select somebody else.

The Associated Press reports that party strategists are worried Libertarian candidates could draw enough votes to affect close Senate contests in Texas, Ohio, Kansas and Iowa. Nothing has been decided. Nobody has counted a final result. But the advance search for a responsible third party is going beautifully.

The concern is not mysterious. Some conservatives dislike Trump's war with Iran or his expansion of presidential power. Libertarians offer a place to put that objection without voting Democratic. This is the sort of consumer choice Republicans generally celebrate until the consumer chooses the item with somebody else's name on it.

Texas provides an especially elegant demonstration. Libertarian Ted Brown has a campaign budget of about $30,000 and has spent $7,000 on advertising. AP reports roughly $390 million in combined advertising by Ken Paxton, James Talarico and their aligned groups since the May primary.

That isn't a fair fight between advertising operations. It's two aircraft carriers worrying about a folding kayak.

But a ballot does not allocate votes according to who bought the most screen time. Brown only needs to appeal to a small share of voters to matter in a close race. He argues that Republicans unhappy with that possibility could nominate a better candidate. Former Texas Republican Party executive director Wayne Hamilton told AP that Paxton's legal and ethical history could send some conservatives looking elsewhere.

The distinction between a third-party voter and a Republican vote that was stolen is rather important. The latter assumes the major party owned it before the person entered the booth. Voters are not campaign furniture temporarily misplaced by the movers.

Nor are all third-party effects guaranteed or identical. AP reports that Republican Senate officials were less worried about Iowa than the other three states. The outcome depends on turnout, margins and what voters would otherwise have done, not simply subtracting every Libertarian vote from the Republican total.

Meanwhile, in Ohio, an organisation with Republican ties has distributed material promoting a socialist candidate, apparently to pull support from Democrat Sherrod Brown. Federal records show that the PAC behind the fliers received $2.5 million from Conservative Americans PAC.

So there are two kinds of third-party candidacy: an irresponsible threat to democracy when it inconveniences you, and a refreshing expansion of political discourse when it inconveniences Sherrod Brown.

As Trump's defensive campaign stop in Mississippi showed, a Republican stronghold is not a warranty. In these Senate races, the party also has to persuade unhappy conservatives that loyalty is a better option than protest.

Republicans can make their case to dissatisfied voters. They can answer the objections about war, presidential power and their nominees. Or they can keep explaining that the freedom to choose comes with a preferred selection.

The ballot, inconveniently, has no “accept all cookies” button.