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Friday, March 16, 2018

PA Libertarian happy to be seen as spoiler

Libertarian Candidate Embraces His Role As Spoiler In Pennsylvania Election - Daniel Marans, Huffington Post:

March 14, 2018 - "Until Tuesday night, Drew Gray Miller, the Libertarian candidate for Pennsylvania’s 18th Congressional District, was treated like an afterthought by Democrats, Republicans and most news outlets.

"Miller jumped through numerous bureaucratic hoops just to get his name on the ballot. His $2,000 campaign haul was below the threshold requiring him to report it to the Federal Election Commission but just enough for some social media outreach to his target demographic of high school seniors and college students....

"He was not invited to the televised candidate debates, and on Election Day he was still publicly pestering CNN, which he had provided with a photo of himself, to mention him as one of the choices on the ballot.

"Then the election results came in. Miller had received 0.6 percent of the vote ― accounting for far more than the 0.2 percentage point lead Democrat Conor Lamb ended up holding over Republican Rick Saccone.... Suddenly Miller was the man of the hour, as pundits discovered that [he] might have cost Saccone the race. When CNN finally flashed Miller’s photo on screen, his 20-person election watch party at Fat Head’s Saloon erupted in cheers ... high-fived one another and took selfies in front of the TV.....

Miller embraced the 'spoiler' moniker on Twitter, gleefully predicting late Tuesday that he would soon be the 'most hated man in America.' But he rejects the ... premise that any one candidate can be an actual spoiler.

"'No candidate is entitled to somebody’s vote. You have to earn somebody’s vote,' he said. 'If you have to silence a third-party candidate because your candidate cannot win otherwise, that tells me that you either have a crappy candidate or a crappy message. And in the case of Lamb and Saccone, it’s probably both.'

"For now, though, Miller appreciates the 'notoriety' that comes with the label, he said..... It’s attention that he hopes to use to spread the Libertarian gospel of individual liberty in all facets of life, including freedom from high taxes, marijuana prohibition and an overbearing surveillance state."

Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/drew-miller-libertarian-spoiler-special-election_us_5aa98129e4b0600b82ffaa03
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