Libertarian Senatorial candidates set vote records

Joe Miller Shatters Libertarian US Senate Record While 8 Others Set New State Party Marks | Smart Politics - Eric Ostermaier:

November 20, 2016 - "The nation’s third largest political party notched by far its most successful election cycle in races to the nation’s upper legislative chamber....

"Alaska’s Joe Miller ... was an 11th hour recruit by the Libertarian Party in September 2016 and his brief, two-month campaign won him an impressive 29.4 percent of the vote in the general election.... Miller not only far exceeded his polling numbers (which usually had him in the mid- to high teens), but he demolished his party’s mark for its all-time best showing in a race for the office....

"Party records were also set in:

• Arkansas, Frank Gilbert (3.98 percent): Gilbert nearly doubled the 2.03 percent won by Nathan LaFrance in 2014. Gilbert and LaFrance are the only two U.S. Senate candidates to get on the general election ballot in the state under the Libertarian Party banner. 
• Colorado, Lily Williams (3.61 percent): Williams, the seventh U.S. Senate nominee for the party in state history, eclipsed Gaylon Kent’s 2.59 percent record from 2014 by just over a point. 
• Florida, Paul Stanton (2.12 percent): Stanton more than quadrupled the support received by the party’s only other nominee for the office in state history – Alexander Snitker in 2010 (0.46 percent). 
• Georgia, Allen Buckley (4.16 percent): Buckley broke a 20-year record held by 1996 nominee Jack Cashin (3.60 percent). Libertarians have fielded U.S. Senate nominees in 10 elections in the Peach State since its first nominee in 1992. 
• Iowa, Chuck Aldrich (2.71 percent): Aldrich, the seventh nominee fielded by the party for the office, broke 2010 nominee John Heiderscheit’s record (2.27 percent)....
• North Dakota, Robert Marquette (3.08 percent): Marquette almost doubled the party’s previous best showing in the state in a U.S. Senate race – Keith Hanson’s 1.63 percent in 2010. 
• Oklahoma, Robert Murphy (3.00 percent): Murphy – the first nominee to gain ballot access under the Libertarian banner in 20 years for the office – crushed the party’s previous best mark of 1.23 percent set in 1996 by Agnes Reiger. 
• Wisconsin, Phil Anderson (2.96 percent): Anderson bested Joseph Kexel’s 2012 campaign (2.07 percent) by nearly a full point. None of the other seven U.S. Senate Libertarian nominees in the Badger State over the decades had reached one percent.... 

"An additional six other 2016 nominees turned in the second best Libertarian U.S. Senate performance in their respective states: Robert Garrard in Kansas (5.52 percent), Edward Clifford in Pennsylvania (3.84 percent), Sean Haugh in North Carolina (3.56 percent, 0.18 points shy of his own record), Kent McMillan in Illinois (3.22 percent), Richard Lion in Connecticut (1.14 percent), and Alex Merced in New York (0.65 percent).

 "Libertarian U.S. Senate candidates outperformed their party’s presidential nominee, Gary Johnson, in seven states: Alaska, Arkansas, Kansas, Indiana, Georgia, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania. "

Read more: http://editions.lib.umn.edu/smartpolitics/2016/11/20/joe-miller-shatters-libertarian-us-senate-record-while-8-others-set-new-state-party-marks/
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Did Haugh 'spoil' election for Democrat in NC?

Analysis: Did Libertarian votes hurt Kay Hagan? - Meghan Molleruss, WFMY:

November 5, 2014 - "In the day following Democratic incumbent senator Kay Hagan's loss to Republican challenger Thom Tillis, voters speculate what role Libertarian candidate Sean Haugh played in the end result.

"North Carolina House speaker Tillis clinched victory by two percent over incumbent Hagan, who was favored in the majority of polls leading into Tuesday's Mid-Term Elections. Final numbers indicated Tillis received 49 percent of the vote. Hagan received 47 percent. Haugh received four percent -- a historically large number for a third party in Mid-Term Elections.

"Past elections and party platforms suggest Libertarian candidates tend to take away votes from Republican candidates. But, the trend might have been the opposite in this Senate race, according to a political poll.

"Elon Poll director Kenneth Fernandez, Ph.D. said, 'We (Elon Poll) did an online survey, and we found that basically two-thirds of the votes were being stolen from Hagan'....

"He added, 'I think this is a tough, tough decision for Hagan to think -- could I have done something different to woo those Sean Haugh voters or maybe have tacked Tillis to woo some independents? Tillis did much, much better with independents.'"

Read more: http://www.wcnc.com/story/news/politics/elections/2014/11/05/analysis-did-libertarian-votes-hurt-kay-hagan/18532449/
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Conservative group runs web ads for Haugh in NC

Conservative group funds pro-weed campaign for North Carolina Libertarian candidate - Washington Post - Matea Gold, Post Politics:

October 23, 2014 - "Sean Haugh, the Libertarian candidate for Senate in North Carolina, is getting a big lift in the waning days of the election from an unlikely group praising his support for marijuana legalization and his opposition to U.S. military action abroad.

"The 'More Weed, Less War' online ad campaign features beaming young men and women who tout Haugh as 'sharing our progressive values,' chant 'Get Haugh, get high!' and dismiss Democratic incumbent Sen. Kay Hagan as 'out of touch.'

"The outfit behind the campaign does not have a history of advocating for marijuana legalization.

"American Future Fund, a tax-exempt organization based in West Des Moines, has been frequently used as a pass-through for political money on the right. In the 2012 campaign, it was a major player in a network of politically active nonprofits supported by the billionaire industrialists Charles and David Koch and other conservative donors.

"But James Davis, a spokesman for Freedom Partners, the main financial arm of the Koch-backed network, said it no longer funds the Iowa group and has nothing to do with its pro-Haugh campaign....

"Nick Ryan, AFF’s founder, declined to say who was supporting the campaign. 'As a practice, we don't comment on who does or does not contribute to our organization,' he wrote in an email.

"He added that the goal of the pro-Haugh campaign 'is straightforward — share information with voters about where Sean Haugh stands on a variety of issues'.

"Ryan said the campaign is now generating so much buzz that AFF plans to expand its initial $225,000 buy.... 'We are going to re-double our efforts and expand the program next week.'"

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2014/10/23/koch-linked-group-launches-pro-weed-campaign-for-north-carolina-libertarian-candidate/

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Conservatives, libertarians must unite to win, say GOP strategists

Strategists Say Libertarians & Conservatives Must Unite to Win - Josh Siegel:

September 30, 2014 - "Doug Stafford says he and his boss, Sen. Rand Paul, got into politics the same way: through their church, which inspired them to develop pro-life principles.

"Stafford, the executive director of RAND PAC and a close adviser to Paul, sat on a panel this past weekend at the Values Voter Summit in Washington, D.C., a gathering of social conservatives. "

"Stafford was there to sell Paul, the Kentucky Republican with a libertarian streak, as a potential 2016 presidential candidate who can bridge the divide between conservatives and libertarians....

"This week, Paul will travel to North Carolina to appeal to libertarian-leaning voters in a state with a hotly contested Senate seat.

"Republicans are worried that third-party candidate Sean Haugh, a Libertarian running for Senate in North Carolina, could siphon votes from Thom Tillis, the Republican who is challenging Democratic incumbent Sen. Kay Hagan.

"If Republicans are to take control of the U.S. Senate, experts say, they will likely have to overcome third-party candidates, many being libertarian, who could play spoiler and take away votes.

"The best way to do that, Republican strategists say, is to project the similarities of conservatives and libertarians, so as not to give voters a reason or alternative to vote outside of the two major parties."

Read more: http://dailysignal.com/2014/09/30/political-strategists-plot-libertarians-conservatives-can-unite-take-back-white-house/
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LP could affect outcome in 10 U.S. Senate races

Meet Sean Haugh, the Libertarian pizza guy who may deliver a Senate seat in N.C. - The Washington Post - Karen Tumulty & Reid Wilson:

July 6, 2014 - "Most evenings, Sean Haugh is a pizza deliveryman.

"But every other week or so, the Libertarian Party’s Senate nominee in North Carolina opens a few craft beers ... and expresses his Everyman frustrations with the current political system into a video camera.

"So far, Haugh’s campaign barely exists anywhere but on YouTube. But it is doing surprisingly well in a high-stakes Senate contest in which candidates and outside groups have already spent more than $15 million.

"Four polls lately put his support somewhere between 8 and 11 percent — not enough to suggest a realistic possibility of winning, but conceivably enough to affect the outcome of the race. The same surveys show the margin between incumbent Democrat Kay Hagan and her GOP challenger, state House Speaker Thom Tillis, at six points or less....

"North Carolina is not the only state where Democrats and Republicans are starting to look over their shoulders and down the ballot.

"Libertarians are poised to draw votes in at least 10 other competitive Senate elections this fall — in Montana, Oregon, Colorado, Minnesota, Iowa, Arkansas, Michigan, Virginia, West Virginia and Alaska. The party is working to collect enough signatures to appear on ballots in Kentucky and New Hampshire and is attracting attention with gubernatorial candidates in Florida and Kansas

"How well any of them will do is hard to predict. Many pollsters have a policy of excluding from their surveys third-party candidates who lack celebrity or financial resources, on the theory that people who say they will vote for them rarely end up doing it, said Kenneth Fernandez, director of the Elon University Poll, which does not plan to add Haugh to its horse-race questions."

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/meet-sean-haugh-the-libertarian-pizza-guy-who-may-deliver-a-senate-seat-in-nc/2014/07/06/b321c03a-022f-11e4-8572-4b1b969b6322_story.html
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Libertarians shaking up 3 southern U.S. races

Southern-Fried Freedom Lovers Propel Libertarian Candidates - The Daily Beast - Patricia Murphy:

June 5, 2014 - "Drawing surprisingly high support, a trio of Libertarian candidates has the potential to disrupt already tight races in the Deep South, where Democrats and Republicans are waging epic battles for Florida governor, Georgia governor, and one of North Carolina’s seats in the U.S. Senate.

"In Georgia, nanotechnologist Andrew Hunt is polling at 9 percent in the governor’s race, which is otherwise a dead heat between incumbent Republican Nathan Deal and Democratic state Sen. Jason Carter. In North Carolina, the headlines have focused on the Thom Tillis-Sen. Kay Hagan face-off in November, but quietly amassing 11 percent in the contest is Sean Haugh, the Libertarian candidate running on an anti-war agenda. And in Florida, Adrian Wyllie will be on the November ballot with Gov. Rick Scott and former governor Charlie Crist. Although Wyllie is polling at 4 percent, he’s at 10 percent with Florida’s all-important independent voters and will be on the same November ballot as a proposed constitutional amendment to legalize medical marijuana....

"'I think it’s more of a positive identification with Libertarian ideas more than just a willingness to try something different,' Haugh said of his race this time around. 'The word is not new anymore. They know it’s out there and they know what it means.'

"All three Libertarian campaigns said they see the rest of the country coming around to longtime Libertarian positions on federal spending, gay marriage, the war on drugs, privacy, and ending wars overseas. But it is the disgust with both major parties that seems to be animating many of their new voters."

Read more: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/06/05/southern-fried-freedom-lovers-propel-libertarian-candidates.html
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NC Libertarian polling at 11% in close Senate race

PPP: Hagan, Tillis a Toss-up, With Third-Party Spoiler - Chapelboro.com - Danny Hooley:

May 13, 2014 - "A new poll conducted by Raleigh-based Public Policy Polling finds that, overall, voters aren’t too happy with either of North Carolina’s candidates for U.S. Senate.

"As a result, a surprising number of voters are leaning Libertarian.

"Here’s Director of Public Policy Polling Tom Jensen:

"'Our first general-election poll finds Kay Hagan leading Thom Tillis 38-to-36,' says Jensen. 'And the Libertarian candidate, Sean Haugh, is getting 11 percent. And that’s a pretty unusually high level of support for a third-party candidate.'

"Jensen points out that Hagan, the Democratic incumbent, has a 38 percent approval rating, while 49 percent of voters disapprove....'And Tillis doesn’t do any better,' says Jensen. 'Thirty percent of voters see him favorably; 46 percent, unfavorably.'"

Read more: http://chapelboro.com/news/election/ppp-hagan-tillis-toss-third-party-spoiler/
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Sean Haugh wins Libertarian Senate primary in NC

NC Libertarians hold Senate primary election, Haugh wins - Charlotte Libertarian news | Examiner.com - Matthew Reece:

May 6, 2014 - "On May 6, the Libertarian Party of North Carolina held a primary election in a US Senate race. It was the second statewide Libertarian primary in North Carolina history.

"There were two candidates on the primary ballot: Sean Haugh, a pizza delivery man from Durham, and Tim D'Annunzio, a businessman from Raeford.

"Haugh is a longtime Libertarian Party activist who also ran for US Senate in 2002.... D'Annunzio is a former Republican who ran unsuccessfully for the 4th Congressional District in 2012 and the 8th Congressional District in 2010....

"With all precincts reporting, Haugh won the primary election by a margin of 1,215 votes (60.69 percent) to 787 votes (39.31 percent). Haugh moves on to face incumbent Democrat Kay Hagan as well as Republican Thom Tillis in November."

Read more: http://www.examiner.com/article/nc-libertarians-hold-senate-primary-election-haugh-wins
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NC Libertarians hold primary for U.S. Senate seat

NC Libertarians hold unusual primary for US Senate - fayobserver.com: Election:

April 15, 2014 - "North Carolina Libertarians are in the unusual position of getting to pick from two of their own in the May primary for the U.S. Senate race.

"Former Senate candidate Sean Haugh of Durham and previous Republican congressional candidate Tim D'Annunzio of Raeford each filed for the Libertarian Party nomination. It marks just the second time in its short history that the party committed to minimal government intervention and personal freedom had a primary - the other primary came in 2000 in the race for governor.

"Libertarian primaries have been few because only one member filed for elected office or the state party sometimes wasn't recognized as an official state party because their top candidates previously failed to reach minimum thresholds of support. D'Annunzio and Haugh planned to participate in three forums before the primary, party spokesman Brian Irving said."

Read more: http://www.fayobserver.com/news/election/article_e974d5a2-fbdd-5f93-b7cb-abf89837b77e.html

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