No Labels, A Moderate Alternative

The group, championing “the common sense majority,” will give Republicans and Democrats needed competition, says Ryan Clancy, its chief strategist.

“If there were a moderate independent running against Trump and Biden, would you be open to voting for the moderate independent?”

That question is often asked by Ryan Clancy, Chief Strategist at No Labels, a non-profit which promotes bipartisanship in American political discourse. As Clancy explained in a recent interview with The Spectator, “the latest reading says 63% [of voters] would be open to voting for a ticket like that.”

Some might be familiar with No Labels due to its influential role in forming the House Problem Solvers Caucus. More recently, No Labels has received increased attention for its 2024 “insurance plan.” They champion a “Unity” third-party ticket featuring moderate candidates, one Republican and one Democrat, should Biden and Trump remain the presumptive nominees after Super Tuesday, a very real possibility.

Washington and Lee’s Mock Convention is thus not the only organization invested in correctly predicting the outcome of primaries. An important role of No Labels, as Clancy explains, is to monitor “developments in the respective party primaries to see whether there is an opening for a potential No Labels ticket.” While “not involved in either of the presidential primaries,” much of what No Labels does is dictated by the direction of the two main parties.

Within the Republican Party, support continues to mount for Former President Trump, spiting his four indictments. A recent Emerson College poll found that, because of the indictments, 60% of Republicans are now more likely to support Trump. 

Meanwhile, Democrats look certain to again nominate Joe Biden, who is favored as the incumbent president. Despite the recent focus on Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., polls find Biden commanding a majority of Democratic primary voters. 

But while staunch Republicans and Democrats can more easily elect ideologically “based” candidates in a primary setting, these candidates present electability risks in the general election. It’s with this calculation in mind that No Labels sees an opening for their third-party ticket.

Third-party candidates tend to draw very small numbers but can make a difference come November. Clancy described this phenomenon: “In 2016 with Jill Stein, most of the votes she got–she got one percent of the vote–most of those would have probably gone to Hillary.” Given the thin margins of recent elections, some might describe candidates like Jill Stein as a “spoiler candidate.”

Clancy defines a “spoiler candidate” as “a candidate that can’t win” and, secondly, a candidate whose votes “come disproportionately from one of the major party nominees.”

Pundits have been quick to assert that a No Labels ticket featuring someone like Joe Manchin would effectively be putting up a spoiler candidate–a candidate who, by capturing a share of Biden’s voter pool, could propel Trump to victory in the general election. 

Clancy rejected this possibility. No Labels is “never going to put up a [spoiler] ticket,” he said before adding that their unity ticket “is going to be designed to appeal to the vast middle of the electorate.” 

“A lot of people,” Clancy observed, are “very certain when they have no right to be. We are sitting here over a year from the election. We don’t know what condition the country is going to be in. We don’t know who the major party nominees are going to be… We don’t know if No Labels will offer a ticket.”

He has a point. After all, in late 2019, no one was privy to the crucial issues of the 2020 election–the pandemic, economic calamity, crime, and a racial reckoning, all of which heightened partisan divides. Moderate voters have become neglected by both parties, Clancy finds, and No Labels intends to provide them with a new political home.

“There is a huge chunk of our country that our political system basically doesn’t talk to anymore,” Clancy said. "The voices that are elevated and empowered on both sides are the loudest, the angriest, and the most uncompromising.” 

He adds, “There’s this very cynical calculation underway in both parties…they don’t even really feel like they need to offer up good candidates because what they are counting on is, you don’t even need to like us, you just need to hate and fear the other side enough, and in the end, you will come home to us.”

Voters might find the idea of a common sense, moderate candidate appealing in theory but question how a platform could balance the deep ideological divides between today's Republican and Democratic parties. No Labels is mindful of this and has carefully constructed its “Common Sense Policy Playbook,” which was released in July. 

Clancy said that their playbook has thirty ideas which “represent where most Americans want the country to go on” issues, adding that No Labels has been doing “a lot of issues polling.” He expects the policy playbook to be “reflective of where the public landed on those issues.” 

“If there were a ticket,” Clancy caveated, “they would have their own ideas. We have no expectation that any candidate would come along and just take the Policy Playbook lock, stock, and barrel.”

To support an eventual ticket, No Labels must first determine a nomination process and convention model. Clancy said that No Labels is still working on the selection process, adding that they are “doing some focus groups this month [August]” and “will be announcing in the fall how we plan to select a ticket if we ultimately give our ballot line to one.” Summarized, “the idea is nail down a process in the fall…and then put the process into play in that window in between Super Tuesday and the convention,” expected to be held next April in Dallas.

As of August 2023, No Labels has won ballot access in ten states, several of which are key battleground states like Arizona, Nevada, Florida, and North Carolina.

A No Labels convention, in Clancy’s words, “would look and feel like the party conventions you see on TV. We will have delegates from every state across the country. We will have a bunch of people up there talking. If we put forth a ticket, obviously that will be a big launch event for that ticket. If we don’t, that will just be a rallying point for the No Labels movement.”

In the end, the aim of the No Labels convention is “to have a moment that spotlights the common sense majority, that’s who we hope to speak for.”

Even if a No Labels ticket doesn’t win the general election, it can still send an important message to the current two-party structure. 

Clancy characterized the attitude of the two-party system as the following: “Two-thirds of America, you don’t want this election? Too bad. It’s the election you are going to get.”

It’s high time, Clancy thinks, “to send a signal to both parties that if you keep ignoring this common sense majority for long enough, you are going to get some competition.”

Henry is the Republican Party Analyst for the 28th Washington and Lee University Mock Convention.