[EL] Third Party Effects

One congressional race where the presence of a third party candidate may have been decisive is in my home district of Indiana-2. The incumbent Democrat, Joe Donnelly, won by about two thousand, five hundred votes out of approximately 190,000 cast, narrowly edging out the Republican candidate. A Libertarian candidate received almost 9,445 votes, or almost four times the margin of victory. For exact figures, see http://64.255.123.76/indiana.htm.

Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer

Associate Professor

Notre Dame Law School

P.O. Box 780

Notre Dame, IN 46556-0780

Phone: (574) 631-8057

Fax: (574) 631-4197

Web Bio: http://law.nd.edu/faculty/lloyd-hitoshi-mayer

SSRN Author Page: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=504775

Questions for Tomorrow

How did Independents and third party candidates do, did their presence affect any D-R races, and what of "none of the above" in Nevada? What we know now is that independent Chafee won the R.I. gubernatorial race, Tancredo lost in Colorado, None of the above is polling under two percent in the Reid-Angle race, but it is doing much better than the "Tea Party" candidate in that race (who some allege was put there by Democrats to take votes away from Angle.)

Posted by Rick Hasen at 09:07 PM