A Mysterious Third Party Enters the Presidential Race
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Welcome to the New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remnick.

Last week on the program, I talked with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who was best known as a proponent of anti-vaccine conspiracy theories before he launched a presidential campaign. But he is not the only wild card to emerge in the 2024 presidential race so far. No Labels is a would-be political party that you may not have heard of yet. They haven't announced who their candidate is.

But they've secured a considerable amount of funding, and they're working behind the scenes to get on the ballot across the country. No Labels is pitched as a centrist movement to appeal to disaffected voters in both major parties. Now, the history of third-party candidates from Martin Van Buren to Teddy Roosevelt, Horace Greeley to Ross Perot is an interesting one, but no one running from that position has ever won.

And yet third parties can have real consequences. There are many to this day who believe that Ralph Nader cost Al Gore the election in 2000, or that Ross Perot spoiled things for George H.W. Bush in 1992, and that led to the Clinton presidency.

At this early point, Joe Biden and Donald Trump seem the likely nominees for their parties. Yet polls tell us that they are profoundly unpopular with voters. So who knows? A third party could have an outsized impact. One of the leaders of No Labels is Pat McCrory, the former governor of North Carolina. I spoke to him recently to try to understand what role this new party, if that's what it is, intends to play in our political future.

No labels is not planning to stick around as a third permanent political party, nor after we select candidates, we are not going to run the campaign. That will be up to the candidates. Which leads me to ask, which leads me to ask, who is no labels?

I mean, they're volunteers with a very small staff. I'm a volunteer, by the way. I accept no pay. It's a grassroots effort of both grassroots people in all 50 states and also former and current elected officials and community activists working.

like Ben Chavis, who was a big Biden supporter and used to work for Martin Luther King and actually served seven years in prison in North Carolina, in which my predecessor gave him a pardon. It seems to me that overall what this is is a center-right

a center-right impulse. I don't know where you get that. Well, tell me what it is. Where's your juice coming from? Where's your money coming from? What's your view of how you can succeed with this lineup? Well, we're setting up organizations in every state, just like PRO did, just like the parties do. We're

We're brand new. We're starting from scratch. Where the money comes from is from all over the nation. And people are asking us about the money, but the fact of the matter is there are some people who do give money, and they're afraid of retribution for fear if their name is used, there will be retribution from the Democratic and Republican establishment, which will –

will attack them. Give me some examples. And that's why their names are allowed to be protected in the current system. But once the campaign starts...

Everything will be based upon the legality of how campaigns are run in the United States of America. Give me some examples of candidates that might fit the bill for you for no labels. You know, I'm reluctant to mention any names because we haven't started that process yet. I know the media has talked about some names. They have been elected officials that have been involved in our meetings. We have members of our problem-solving caucus that could be, we think, will be very active.

But they're even reluctant, some of them, to get involved in the presidential process until after the primary because of fear of retribution. By the way, our parties have a monopoly on how dare you go against the party structure. We will punish you for that. Okay, but if you don't give me any potential candidates – and obviously the media asks you. It's a logical question –

What is an alternative type of candidate look like? Most likely, we'll have both a Republican and Democrat on the ticket.

That's our goal right now as a Republican and Democratic on a ticket. I anticipate someone who has leadership skills, someone who has a history of compromise, someone who is good on the campaign trail, someone who might come in from military experience, business experience, or leadership in political experience. And we do not think we're going to have a shortage of people who would be interested because if you have 60% of the people dissatisfied,

with what the parties are going to present to us if it stays the same. And again, I hope it doesn't. And then we'll take those names to the convention in Dallas in June. Governor, with respect, with real respect, you're not telling me much. I mean, you're giving me the most generic outline of a candidate somewhere in the giant broad middle who doesn't happen to be Donald Trump,

Or Joe Biden. That's correct. Are you looking for... Yes. Fantastic. Are they really... Are you looking for a conservative? Is overall somebody you're looking for is a conservative? We're looking for people who can work together and understand that when you have a divided country, you have to compromise to get things done. Now, when you've had third-party candidates in the past, they had some kind of ideological purpose or meaning, whether it was...

Ross Perot or Ralph Nader or Jill Stein, we've had them. You're telling me very, very little that's specific about what you want that person to be politically or ideologically. We're going to be coming out with what we call the common sense agenda, where you'll kind of see and potential candidates will kind of see where we want them to take stands on. Nobody runs against

common sense. Common sense is a pretty generalized phrase to be charitable. Where are you on the

Where are you on guns? We will be rolling out our agenda in July as our time goal for doing that. I've played the game. I've been played by the game, and I'm exposing the game. But what we're not going to be doing is trapped by the game and then sabotaged by the game of the two systems that set you up for failure. And that's what's happening right now in the political game of politics. We're doing this –

a very strategic rollout and a very studious rollout of the issues of the day. And then we'll do the same thing and see who's the best fit for the people of America. And we're listening to the people of America. I hear you, but a politician, a statesman, believes in something.

And what we're not talking about in this conversation, other than common sense and the most, most general and generic qualities, is what no labels believes in, other than Donald Trump is untenable.

And I think what I'm getting from you is that Joe Biden is too much to the left and too old. Yeah, it's not what no labels believes in. The American people are saying that they don't want either Donald Trump or Joe Biden. What we're doing right now is setting up the infrastructure in all 50 states, which is very hard because some of the political parties are trying to sabotage our efforts. We're getting on the ballot in hopefully all 50 states. I think we're on seven or eight ballots now. We hope to be on 20 ballots soon.

And by the end of the year, the candidates themselves are going to have to get on 13 or 14 ballots according to the laws because we have different laws in every state. But I'm telling you right now, the political parties want to keep their monopoly or duopoly. And so they're trying to make it hard for a legitimate effort to get on the ballots in a lot of states. And that's where our major priority is because we're wasting our time if we don't have the leverage to

of getting on the ballots to possibly win a race. And that's where we're putting our effort and our money right now. The Republican Party chooses its candidates, a convoluted system, and the Democratic Party also chooses a candidate through a combination of primaries, caucuses, and then a convention. That's correct. And there is at least some measure...

of democratic elevation and choice there. I think we can agree. I've been in that measure before. Well, that's fair. How are you going to choose a candidate? We're going to have a nominations, first a search committee, and then most likely a nominations committee, and then we'll bring names to our convention. And we're going to have convention delegates from every state. Polls tell us certain things about what, in fact, the American people do want.

The American people want abortion rights. I mean, this is the polls. The American people want gun control, and certainly in greater measure that we have now, and a great deal else. What issues would a new labels candidate respond to? We will be speaking on social issues. We will be speaking on financial issues. We will be speaking on foreign policy issues.

What will you say? We aren't going to be in. We are. I know you'll speak on these issues, but what have you got to say? Excuse me. We have to also give some leeway to the candidates that we end up selecting. We're not going to we're not also going to play the game where, you know, each political party has a detailed platform, which then the candidates just ignore. A lot of these issues, people are somewhere in the middle on those. And the problem is the two parties are.

are on the fringes with no compromise because you can't get through a primary if you dare compromise on some of these issues. What are the beliefs that you have that you will not betray? I'm not on your time period. Sorry, because we're putting all our efforts right now. You think I'm rushing you? In getting on the ballot.

You think I'm rushing you and I'm being unfair? No, no, no, not at all. No, I have no problem with you asking the question, but I'm also telling you I'm not on that timeline to be able to answer that question as of yet. Pat McCrory is a leader of the third party called No Labels and a former governor of North Carolina. The group is going to release what they're describing as a common sense agenda on Monday, and it's at an event with Joe Manchin and Governor John Huntsman of Utah.

Joining me now is staff writer Sue Halpern, who recently reported on No Labels for The New Yorker. Sue, I have to admit, I was very frustrated and came away from that conversation not knowing a hell of a lot about what No Labels has on its mind.

Pat McCrory kept pointing out just how unpopular a Trump-Biden rematch is among American voters. And that is true. We've never seen such poor favorability for a presidential race. But where does that leave them? It is true that people don't want to see a rematch. But that doesn't mean people want a third party.

You know, Americans are very fickle when you ask them this question. I mean, you ask people in 2016, you know, do you want Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump as the candidates? And most people said no. When Ronald Reagan was running, only 37% of people thought he should run for a second term. I mean, Americans...

are like that. Now, third party candidates have not done well for a very long time in American politics. Traditionally, what they do is they peel off some votes from one side or another, and they can play a spoiler role in a given election. Certainly Ross Perot did. What do you think is really going on here?

I think that the idea here is that they are really opposed to the Democrats who are interested in public policy that helps the middle class, that helps the poor. I think that they're really interested in blocking Democrats as opposed to electing Republicans. So they can say, you know, we don't like Trump. But in the end, what's the difference? In other words, if a third-party candidacy...

Yes, I totally agree with you. But I think that's why it's completely disingenuous activity that they're engaged in. But...

I really think that it comes out of this idea that they don't want Democrats whose basic ideology is that we need to raise taxes to fund social welfare. I think that's something that they really oppose. And how are they doing in getting on ballots around the country, Sue? You reported in your piece that they're on the ballot in just four states now.

In one of those states, they're being challenged. And in another state, in Maine, they got a cease and desist letter from the Secretary of State. They were telling people if they just sign this petition to get on the ballot, that was all that they were doing. But in fact, what they were doing was giving up their party affiliation, which meant that they couldn't vote in either the Democratic or the Republican primary. And the people who are signing it did not know that.

So that was a little underhanded. Now, in my, I have to admit, very frustrating interview with the former governor of North Carolina,

He wouldn't fess up to being interested in anybody in particular as a possible third-party candidate, but Joe Manchin has reportedly expressed interest in seeking the presidency, even though his own Senate seat is in eternal jeopardy because of the nature of the state he's from, from West Virginia. Joe Manchin has been floated as a possibility. Kristen Sinema has been floated as a possibility. Larry Hogan, but maybe only as the vice president, I guess.

Manchin and Sinema are interesting characters. You know, they are the most conservative Democrats. They kind of represent the ideology of no labels better than anybody else. They are people who take a lot of money from the fossil fuel industry, for instance. They take a lot of money from private equity. You know, after Sinema died,

was basically responsible for tanking Biden's Build Back Better program policy. She got a great infusion of cash from private equity. She was kind of playing hardball for them and making sure that the Democrats' idea of taxing the wealthy didn't go forward. So where is their money coming from? Ah, okay.

There's the $70 million question. They are funded primarily by people in private equity, by people in finance. They have a lot of billionaires funding them, including people like Nelson Peltz, who was a big Trump funder, including Harlan Crowe. The billionaire who was so generous to Clarence Thomas, as ProPublica has uncovered. Yes, he is very generous.

It's really being driven a lot by this woman named Nancy Jacobson, who's married to a guy named Mark Penn. Mark Penn used to be a pollster and advisor to Bill Clinton, kind of got shut out from Hillary Clinton and certainly from Obama, and got kind of, you know, like a little angry, I think, at the Democratic Party for not

embracing him. And also moved well to the right of where he even was as a centrist. Exactly. And, you know, during Trump's impeachment hearings, Mark Penn was one of his advisors, and he was seen going in and out of the White House. What's the connection between the Harris poll and no labels?

The Harris Poll is a company that was purchased by Mark Penn's kind of holding company. It's a very, very large, very lucrative company. It's called Stagwell.

And Stagwell owns Harris Polls. Harris Polls is the pollster for No Labels. So that's kind of an insider, you know, little family dealing there. But, you know, some people think the whole, you know, like the Lincoln Project folks, Rick Wilson, thinks the whole thing is some kind of grift that, you know, that Mark Penn is pulling. You know, the No Labels people have raised something like $70 million to do this. They're going to have a nominating convention. They're going to do all sorts of things.

But the one reason why I think that they haven't put forward a candidate is once they do that, then they are required to do all the things that political parties do. At the moment, they're operating as like a pack, essentially. They don't have to say who their donors are, for instance. And it does end up looking very much like a grift. But I really do think that it has more to do with the kinds of policies that a mansion and a cinema have.

have tried to block. Maybe it's possible that in an earlier day, we would call no-labels people who are kind of fiscally conservative and socially liberal, but I'm not even convinced that they're socially liberal. They're certainly more socially liberal than, you know, people who are against abortion and people who want to see public schools funded and public libraries funded, but they're definitely fiscal conservatives. I mean, that's just a given. ♪

Sue Halpern, thanks so much. Thank you, David. Sue Halpern is a staff writer, and you can find her piece, What Is No Labels Trying To Do, at NewYorker.com. This is the New Yorker Radio Hour. More to come.

I'm Maria Konnikova. And I'm Nate Silver. And our new podcast, Risky Business, is a show about making better decisions. We're both journalists whom we light as poker players, and that's the lens we're going to use to approach this entire show. We're going to be discussing everything from high-stakes poker to personal questions. Like whether I should call a plumber or fix my shower myself. And of course, we'll be talking about the election, too. Listen to Risky Business wherever you get your podcasts. This is the New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Ramnick.

Recently, a few of our critics sat down to talk about something they've been seeing more and more of on TV. A huge number of shows, both scripted dramas and reality shows, make psychotherapy a central plot point. The conversation ranged widely, going all the way back to the Bob Newhart show, touching on Ted Lasso, In Treatment, and more.

And of course, they spend some time on couples therapy, the reality show that films actual couples working with an actual New York City psychoanalyst named Orna Gorelnik. There's a moment of identification where you are really drawn to the human drama of the couple. And then there's also the moment where, you know, the camera flips and we're looking at Orna and we want to experience identification with her.

That's Doreen Sanfelix talking with her colleagues Alexandra Schwartz and Ingu Kang. And that is, I think, the first television show that I've watched about therapy. Really heavy scare quotes there. That did not leave me with, you know, a really slick feeling. A feeling that I had participated in something that was, if not unethical, then at least slimy.

Slimy. What about you, Alex? I went deep on couples therapy last year when I profiled Orna Gronick. And in one of my reporting sessions, I had been in attendance during a couple on that show who appears in the current season getting therapy. And I had seen the full hour. In that case, it was an hour plus session. And

It did give me occasion to think about how nice it must be not to have to stare at the clock wondering where your dollars are going when Showtime is footing the bill for your therapy and you can just go over because a big revelation is happening.

So to kind of see both sides of it, to see one real session and how it happens and to see how the showrunners and the editors end up shaping that was absolutely fascinating. And I thought this was the best season of the show so far for a few reasons.

One is that the couples are fascinating. They always are. And I mean, it's a show that makes you think there is no such thing as a boring couple. Surely there must be people who get cut, who are considered just too dull and their problems too banal for the rest of us. You know, what keeps me coming back to the show is that real work gets done. It's so interesting to see real therapeutic work getting done.

A lot of characters who are getting therapy, Tony Soprano, whatever, it's the whole point is that they don't know what therapy is and they're not used to it and it's stigmatized in their communities and it's weird. And now we're in a situation where everybody loves therapy and it's on TV and it's seen as like the quickest path to healing and you're like absolutely unreconstructed and unreformed if you resist it at all. So in couples therapy...

Sometimes, to me, the most interesting couples are the ones who are the most open and yet come up against problems that are not so easily solved.

discussions of mental health has really entered the mainstream. Celebrities have sort of become mental health influencers almost. I think you have shows that are very specifically about therapists like Apple's Shrinking or The Patient. Some of my favorites actually have been animated like Harley Quinn or Tuca and Bertie.

And so you not only have like a huge quantity of therapy depictions on TV, but also like a really varied number. You know, one of the first therapists on TV was in the Bob Newhart show. And this is in the 70s when I would say, I don't think...

A, therapy as a good for the bourgeoisie was something that was prevalent but not spoken about, hidden within the economy of the suburban house or whatever. And then B, there's this idea that the therapist becomes a plot engine, that because everyone's lay idea of therapy

is about having a problem, addressing it and fixing it, it would hew really well to the structure of a sitcom. My idea of therapy before ever having done anything like it in real life was shaped by the sitcom structure. You have 22 minutes, you call into a radio show, you deliver a problem, you receive a pithy response, and then you're fixed.

And I think that what we're seeing maybe in the television shows that exist today is like shows that look like they're elaborating on that model. Ted Lasso looks like it's complex. It looks like it might be like more in the prestige end of things, although I don't even know what prestige means anymore. And yet is very much conforming to those bones. So there's like this

weird on like um slippage that's happening ideas about what therapy is supposed to do are then sort of like pasted on to what a sitcom is supposed to do um i think this right this this redemption arc which has become almost oppressive uh in in a in a show like ted lasso i might venture to say um you know broken people hurting but by gosh the

They have soul and spirit and they'll get where they need to go. You know, would I want this for every person in the world? Sure. Do I want to watch this as a dramatic journey that is accurately reflective of the human condition?

It's cheesy. And right, the therapist's role in kind of digging into those truths and handing you your better self seems weird to refer to a real person as a character. So that person on couples therapy as well, it's such a fascinating thing because you really see the limits of the therapist's power. And, you know, the show begins with a bit of a red herring, but the show begins with

saying that she can't work with this couple anymore because she simply can't find a way to reach this man. And it is so interesting to watch that deep resistance happen and to watch his...

almost fascinating rhetorical evasion of straight and direct questions. And, you know, spoiler alert, she does find a way to reach him. You know, to what end? We will not know unless we go and follow up, you know, with like a couples therapy reunion episode, which just throwing that out there is a great idea for the producers. Alexandra Schwartz, Ingu Kang, and Doreen Sanfulix.

Their full conversation is at newyorker.com, and it's part of a special edition we're calling The Therapy Issue, including Gia Tolentino on eco-anxiety and much more. That's all at newyorker.com. I'm David Remnick, and that's our program for today. Thanks for joining us. I hope you'll join us next time.

The New Yorker Radio Hour is a co-production of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker. Our theme music was composed and performed by Meryl Garbess of Tune Yards with additional music by Louis Mitchell. This episode was produced by Max Balton, Frida Green, Adam Howard, Kalalia,

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