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DIRECTORY OF U.S. POLITICAL PARTIES
THE TWO MAJOR PARTIES: DEMOCRATIC PARTY (DNC)
- The Democrats regained the White House in 2020, but barely maintained majority
REPUBLICAN PARTY (RNC) - Republicans
lost the Presidency and US Senate control in 2020. The Republican narrowly recaptured the US House in 2022, but the Dems held the Senate, and unexpectedly gained governorships. The
THE THIRD PARTIES: THE
"BIG TWO" THIRD PARTIES: GREEN PARTY OF THE UNITED STATES - The
Green Party -- the informal US-affiliate of the leftist, environmentalist
European Greens movement
-- is one of the two largest third parties in the nation. The Greens support strict environmental protection laws, stronger labor rights, expanded social programs, and higher taxes on the wealthy and corporations. The
party regularly fields candidates for local, state and federal
offices in many states, and has established active state
affiliate parties in nearly all states. The Greens scored
a major political points when it convinced prominent consumer
advocate Ralph Nader to run
as their first Presidential nominee in 1996. Spending LIBERTARIAN PARTY - The LP, founded in
1971, bills itself as "America's largest third party." The Libertarians are neither left nor right: they
believe in total individual liberty (pro-drug legalization, pro-gay marriage, pro-home schooling, pro-gun rights,
etc.), total economic freedom (anti-welfare, anti-government regulation
of business, anti-minimum wage, anti-income tax, pro-free trade), elimination of most government agencies, a greatly reduced US military, and a foreign policy of free trade and isolationism.
SMALLER THIRD PARTIES: ALLIANCE PARTY - The Alliance Party launched in 2018, formed by fiscally conservative/socially moderate centrists who had been Democrats, Republicans, independents, and third party members (the Modern Whig Party, American Moderates Party and the South Carolina American Party folded into it) who were upset with the dysfucntion caused by status quo political gridlock and the toxic national political divide. They explained: "Americans need not be adversaries or combatants. In reality, we are all pursuing a personal American Dream, and we are allies in our collective pursuit of a more perfect Union." The party supports free trade, reducing the national debt, a strong military, affordable health care, initiatives to combat climate change, gay equality, immigration, gun rights (with limited, constitutionally reasonable regulation), better care for veterans an emphasis on renewable energy, and term-limits. While still very small, the party has active affiliates in many states and fielded candidates in 2020. The NY Independence Party and Florida Reform Party in 2020 became state affiliates of the Alliance Party. Frequent candidate and wealthy businessman Rocky de la Fuente - who has run over the years under many different party banners - was Alliance's 2020 presidential nominee (5th place - 88,200 votes). AMERICAN INDEPENDENT PARTY - Segregationist Governor
George Wallace
(D-AL) founded the AIP as a vehicle for his 1968 presidential run. AMERICAN SOLIDARITY PARTY - The American Solidarity Party is founded upon Catholic social teachings. The party is pro-life, anti-death penalty, pro-welfare, anti-gay marriage, anti-war, pro-universal health care, pro-immigrant, and pro-environmental protection. The ASP also wants to cut income taxes on earned wages, while increasing taxes on investment income and corporations. The ASP supports increased banking regulation, wants to end energy and agricultural subsidies, supports clean energy, backs tougher environmental protections, opposes military intervenionism, opposes US arms sales to foreign governments, is anti-pornography, supports a focus on rehabilitation versus arrests for narcotics, and is pro-labor unions. The ASP's 2016 presidential nominee, Mike Maturen, achieved ballot status in one state and write-in status in several others (16th place - 4,655 votes). Retired teacher Brian Carroll was the ASP's 2020 presidential nominee and achieved ballot access in nine states (10th place - 38,600 votes). The ASP is now working to establish a few state affiliates, and also has a Facebook page. COMMUNIST PARTY USA - The CPUSA --
once the slavish propaganda tool and spy network for the Soviet
Central Committee -- experienced a forced transformation in recent
years. Highly classified Soviet Politburo records, made public
after the fall of Soviet communism in the 1990s, revealed the
Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) illegally CONSTITUTION PARTY
- The Constitution Party is strongly pro-life, anti-gun control,
anti-tax, anti-immigration, trade protectionist, "anti-New World
Order," anti-United Nations, anti-gay rights, anti-welfare, and
pro-school prayer. The late Conservative
Coalition chair Howard Phillips founded this party, originally named the US Taxpayers Party
(USTP), in 1992. The
USTP renamed itself the Constitution FORWARD PARTY - Founded in 2021 by '20 Dem presidential hopeful Andrew Yang - immediately after Yang lost his 2021 race for NYC Mayor in the Dem primary - the Forward Party vows to "support candidates for office who align with our core principles so that we can reform the system and make it more responsive to the American people." The party supports Yang's signature issue - Universal Basic Income (guaranteed minimum monthly payments to all Americans to ensure none are below the poverty line) - along with ranked choice voting, open/nonpartisan primaries, federal term limits (18 years for House and Senate), independent redistricting commissions, and recognizing online data as an individual property right. Beyond that, the party has no platform and espouses no set beliefs. Several candidates announced for political office in 2022 as Forward Party candidates, but none secured ballot status. In Summer 2022, the Reagan-Bush alumni group Renew America Movement (RAM) and the independent Serve America Movement Party both folded into the Forward Party. As part of the merger, ex-Gov. Christine Todd Whitman (R-NJ) joined Yang as co-chair of the Forward Party. FREEDOM SOCIALIST PARTY - The FSP was formed in 1966 by a splinter group of dissident feminist Trotskyists who broke away from the Socialist Workers Party to create a new party in the "tradition of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotsky." The FSP has always emphasized "black liberation and social feminsm" -- thus the reason Radical Women is an official alternate name used by the FSP. The FSP describe themselves as a revolutionary, Trotskyist feminist organization, "dedicated to the replacement of capitalist rule." The FSP occasionally fields a handful of local candidates in Washington, California, and New York (often in non-partisan elections). The FSP also fielded their first Presidential candidate in 2012: socialist activist Stephen Durham, who ran as a write-in when he failed to achieve ballot status in any state. No presidential candidate in 2016 or 2020. Official FSP links include the Freedom Socialist newspaper and Red Letter Press (book publishers). THE INDEPENDENT PARTY - This small, centrist party was founded in 1976, although they showed no political footprint before 2010. The TIP claim to be affinity descendents of the small Toleration Party of the early 1800s. Their stances are largely platitudes. Example: "We work and advocate for progress on political and social issues, have adopted policies and the platform that effect positive change, insist on free, open, and equal access to the ballot, media, and vote, equal representation by our elected officials, demand fiscal responsibility, and transparency by our SERVANTS of the people!" TIP's party platform is short but rather incomprehensible. The party fielded roughly a dozen federal and state candidates in six states in 2018, and ran Terry Wheelock for President as a write-in candidate in 2020. PARTY
FOR SOCIALISM AND LIBERATION - The Party
of Socialism & Liberation PEACE AND FREEDOM PARTY
- Founded in the 1960s as a left-wing party opposed to the Vietnam War, the
party reached its peak of support in 1968 when it nominated Black
Panther leader Eldridge Cleaver for President. PEOPLE'S PARTY - The Movement for a People’s Party - which evolved into the People's Party - was created in 2020 by progressive activists who had been involved in the 2016 and 2020 Bernie Sanders presidential campaigns. The PP supports Medicare for All, social justice programs, anti-militarism, police reforms and restorative justice, anti-Wall Street regulations, pro-organized labor, etc. They believe the Democratic Party is too dominated by corporate interests and billionaires, and want to use this vehicle for influencing policy and moving the national debate leftward. The first three state chapters - Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Ohio - were launched immediately after their founding national convention (7,600 people participated in the online convention). The party plans to expand with more state and local chapters before the 2022 elections. The PP already registered as a formal party in Maine, and plans to field candidates there in 2022. PIRATE PARTY - The PROHIBITION PARTY - "If
you are a reform-minded conservative and a non-drinker, the REFORM PARTY - Once a rapidly
growing and populist third party, the Reform Party first shifted far
to the right during 1999-2002, before imploding due to factional in-fighting. After the shift, it quickly experienced
massive waves of conservative defections away into other right-wing parties in 2002, before withering into
an insignificant shadow of its former glory years. First, some history:
after running as an Independent in 1992, SOCIALIST PARTY USA - The
SPUSA are true democratic socialists -- advocating left-wing electoral
change versus militant revolutionary change. Many of the SP members
could easily be members SOCIALIST ACTION - Socialist Action is a Trotskyist political party of "revolutionary socialists" originally founded in 1983 by expelled members of the Socialist Workers Party. While the SA shares the SWP's pro-Cuba views, the SA still tries to retain its Trotskyist ideological roots (versus the SWP, which has drifted away from Trotskyism towards a Soviet authoritarian communist ideology). The SA states that they "oppose the Democrats and Republicans, all capitalist political parties, and all capitalist governments and their representatives everywhere ... [and] Stalinist and neo-Stalinist regimes from the ex-Soviet Union to China." This communist party has fielded some local political candidates in the San Francisco Bay area over the years, and ran its first congressional candidate in 2010 (in Connecticut). The party fielded SA National Secretary Jeff Mackler as the 2016 and 2020 presidential nominee, but he was just a write-in hopeful both times. Other official sites: Youth for Socialist Action and VoteSocialistAction. SOCIALIST EQUALITY PARTY - The Socialist Equality Party (SEP) was originally named the Workers League (WL). The WL was founded in 1966 as a Trotskyist communist group closely associated with the electoral campaigns of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP). The goal of these Trotskyist groups was a build a working-class labor party in the US affiliated with the International Committee of the Fourth International (the global Trotskyist umbrella network). They believe that "the egalitarian and internationalist legacy of the Russian Revolution" could have succeeded, but was "betrayed by Stalinism" and its progeny. When the SWP drifted away from Trotskyism in the early 1980s, the WL broke with the SWP and began fielding its own candidates. The WL fielded its first Presidential ticket in 1984. The WL later renamed itself as the Socialist Equality Party in 1994. The Michigan-based SEP regularly fields Congressional and local candidates, mainly in Michigan and Ohio. The SEP is very realistic about its candidates, acknowledging a campaign is an opportunity to "present a socialist alternative to the demagogy and lies of the establishment parties and the mass media." SEP activist Joseph Kishore was the party's nominee in 2020 (30th place - 351 votes). The SEP's news site -- the World Socialist Web Site (WSWS) -- is updated daily with articles, analysis, history, etc., written with a hardcore internationalist, Trotskyist perspective.
UNITED STATES PACIFIST PARTY - This
tiny political party fielded party founder Bradford Lyttle as
a write-in candidate for President in 1996, 2000, 2004, 2012 and 2020
(and ran a US Senate candidate in Colorado in 1998). In 2008,
for the first time, Lyttle achieved ballot status in one state
(110 votes), a feat he again matched in 2016 (382 votes). The USPP opposes military actions in all circumstances
and wants to transform the US military into "a non-violent defense
and humanitarian service corps." The USPP platform advocates generally
left-wing political stances and slashing the military budget to
"zero." UNITY PARTY OF AMERICA - This small centrist political party was founded after the 2004 elections. For the first decade the party was only active in Colorado, and began fielding candidates there starting in 2006. In 2016, the party began expanding and launched some state affiiates. In 2020, they fielded party founder Bill Hammons for President, and he achieved ballot access in three states (13th place - 6,647 votes). The party also fielded candidates for office in several states. The party supports a balanced budget constitutional amendment, federal term limits, replacing the federal income tax with other reveue sources, development of clean alternative energy sources, and ending gerrymandering by having all election districts drawn by nonpartisan panels of judges. WORKERS WORLD PARTY - The WWP
was formed in 1959 by a pro-Chinese communist faction that split
from the Socialist Workers Party. Although the WWP theoretically
supports worker revolutions, the WWP supported the Soviet actions
that crushed worker uprisings in Hungary in the 1950s, WORKING CLASS PARTY - The WCP was founded in 2016 as a socialist, anti-capitalist, anti-racist party which asserts "working people need our own party, a party of our whole class, built around the conviction that the working class and the employing class have nothing in common." The party looks at the late socialist Eugene Debs as a hero of their movement, although they seem to express a more radical view that disdains elections. "The working class cannot solve its problems through elections, not in a society where the capitalist class controls all the levels of power. Elections were not the end goal of these candidates, only the beginning," they explain. The WCP wants to have militant unions to fight both "the bosses" and capitalism, and have the WCP act as the political entity to carry on the fight in the electoral venue. The WCP has active chapters and routinely fields congressional and state candidates in Michigan and Maryland.
OTHER
PARTIES AMERICAN PATRIOT PARTY - The APP, established in 2003, was "founded on the basic principals set forth by our founding fathers, that the federal government should only have the powers set forth in the framework of the Constitution and all other power to be delegated back to the states. Although everyone has their own opinions on all issues, we believe it is up to the states to decide what should and should not be mandated, banned or regulated." The APP supports a crackdown on illegal immigration, making English fluency a requirement of US citizenship, abolishing the IRS and repealing the federal income tax, imposing steeper taxes and tariffs on imported goods ... oh, and they want every county in the US to become a separate state. They endorsed Donald Trump in 2016 and 2020 - and already endorsed Trump again for 2024 - but did not nominate any candidates on their own to date. CANARY
PARTY - Founded in 2011, this party is solely
focused upon health care -- particularly their anti-vaccination beliefs. CONSERVATIVE PARTY USA - Founded in 2009, this conservative party has yet to field any candidates. The party's mission statement reads as follows: "To re-establish the limits and boundaries of Government as framed in the Constitution." They claim they were formed as a new party because the GOP cannot be trusted ("The Republican Party has consistently failed to uphold conservative principles ... Trying to change the GOP is like drilling holes in water because they dont stand for anything except getting elected"). This is how the party describes their agenda: "The primary duty of the President is to protect America from its enemies, both foreign and domestic; Veterans must be honored and supported for their sacrifices; Marriage is between one man and one woman; Life begins at conception; Budget Earmarks must be eliminated and fiscal discipline restored; Illegal immigration must be stopped; Healthcare must include meaningful Tort Reform." Note: This party has no affiliation with the well-established Conservative Party of New York State.
NO LABELS PARTY - No Labels has been a bipartisan, centrist, 501(c)4 political group on the DC scene in recent years, founded by Dem fundraiser Nancy Jacobson after the 2010 elections. The group created the Problem Solvers Caucus in Congress, and has attracted a broad range of members including Josh Gottheimer, Kyrsten Sinema, Joe Manchin, Bill Cassidy, Susan Collins, and others. The group is co-chaired by former US Sen Joe Lieberman (D-CT), former Gov Larry Hogan (R-MD), and veteran civil rights leader Ben Chavis. No Labels over the years created and used various SuperPACs to help advance centrist candidates affiliated with their agenda. In 2022, the group announced it was forming an affiliated No Labels Party in order to give the voters a centrist presidential option in 2024 if the major party nominees are again Biden and Trump. The NLP launched ballot petition drives and already earned 2024 presidential ballot status in several states ... if they field a nominee. Polling data seems to show a centrist NLP nominee would largely splinter anti-Trump votes away from Biden, thus helping Trump. PROGRESSIVE
LABOR PARTY - The PLP REVOLUTIONARY
COMMUNIST PARTY USA - The UNITED AMERICA PARTY - The UAP is a social conservative party that splintered off from the Constitution Party in 2021. No candidates fielded to date. WORKERS PARTY, USA - The WP-USA is a hardcore Marxist-Leninist political party founded in 1992 by the late Michael Thorburn. The party was established to "bring the working class out as an independent class force." The WP-USA shares much of the CPUSA's ideology. While the WP-USA has yet to field any candidates, the Chicago-based party publishes a bi-weekly newspaper named The Worker and a quarterly theoretical journal named -- not surprisingly -- The Worker Magazine. The WP-USA site features an extensive on-line archive of dogmatic screeds largely denouncing "monopoly capitalists," Western imperialism, the USA, etc. -- and praising the working class and "revolutionary politics." Thorburn's Anti-Imperialist News Service ("assisting the people's struggles against war and militarism") is also affiliated with the WP-USA. |
control of the US House, and won narrow control of the US Senate. The 2022 midterms were much better for the Democrats than was predicted and historically expected: they narrowly lost the House, gained a Senate seat and gained three governorships. Democrats now hold several key governorships (MI, WI, IL, NC, NY, CA, PA, AZ, others). Democrats run the wide gamut from the
near Euro-style democratic-socialist left (
However, the GOP
holds several key Governorships, including TX, OH, FL, GA,
MO, and VA. Pre-Trump, the Republicans could generally be classified
into several different sub-sets: traditional establishment conservatives
(
just over $5,000, Nader was on the ballot
in 22 states and carried over 700,000 votes (4th place - 0.8%).
In 2000, Nader raised millions of dollars, mobilized leftist activists
and grabbed national headlines with his anti-corporate campaign
message. Nader ignored pleas from liberal Democrats that he abandon
the race because he was siphoning essential votes away from Al
Gore's campaign. In the end, Nader was on the ballot in 44 states and
finished third with 2,878,000 votes (2.7%). Until
2001, the Greens were largely a collection of fairly autonomous
state/local based political entities with only a weak (and sometimes
splintered) national leadership structure that largely served
to coordinate electoral activities. In 2001, the party officially converted into a formal, unified national party organization. Green Party co-founder and socialist activist 
Over 400 LP members currently hold various -- though fairly low
level -- government offices (including lots of minor appointed
officials like "School District Facilities Task Force Member"
and "Town Recycling Committee Member"). In 2020, retiring GOP Congressman 
Running on a fiery economic populist,
anti-Washington, anti-racial integration, anti-communist platform,
Wallace carried nearly 10 million votes (14%) and won five Southern
states. Although Wallace returned to the Democratic Party by 1970,
remnants of the AIP live on -- but moved even further to the
right. The 1972 AIP nominee, 
funneled
millions of dollars to the CPUSA to finance its activities from
the 1920s to the 1980s. The flow of Soviet dollars to the CPUSA
came to an abrupt halt when the Soviet communists were ousted
from power in 1991 -- ultimately causing a total overhaul of CPUSA
activities. Founded in 1924, the CPUSA reached its peak vote total
in 1932 with nominee 
Party in 1999. This party has fielded presidential tickets since 1992 and congressional and state candidates since 1994 (but only in a small number of states). The party received
a brief boost in the media when conservative US Senator Bob Smith
of New Hampshire -- an announced GOP Presidential hopeful -- bolted
from the Republican Party to seek the Constitution Party nomination
in 2000 (but the erratic Smith quit the Constitution Party race
a few weeks later and rejoined the GOP).
In 2012, former
GOP Congressman Virgil Goode was the party's Presidential nominee
(5th place - 0.09% - 122,000 votes). Longtime party activist and attorney Darrell Castle was the CP's 2016 Presidential nominee (6th place - 0.15% - 203,000 votes). Controversial coal mining magnate 
(PSL) is alternatately called "a revolutionary Marxist
party" created "to be a vehicle for the multinational
working class in the struggle for socialism ... Only a multinational
party can create the unity necessary to defeat the most powerful
capitalist class the world has ever seen ... We aim for revolution
in the United States ... We want a revolution; and, we work hard
to make it happen." Additionally, the PSL explains that "the
most crucial requirement for [PSL] membership is the dedication
to undertake this most important and most necessary of all tasks:
building a new revolutionary workers party in the heart of world
imperialism." The PSL was founded in 2006 by a breakaway
faction of the communist revolutionary wing of the Workers World
Party. The PSL espouses a pro-Cuba/pro-China view, and the iconic
Che Guevarra's call for continual world revolution against capitalism.
The PSL fielded its first candidates in 2008: a Presidential ticket
and Congressional candidates. Longtime Marxist revolutionary activist Gloria LaRiva
was again the PSL presidential nominee in 2020 (6th place - 85,500 votes), marking her 8th time on a presidential ticket. The
PSL also sponsors and/or directs numerous popular front groups
including 
Although a convicted
felon, Cleaver captured nearly 37,000
votes (ironically, Cleaver ultimately became a Reagan Republican
in the early 1980s, and was later a crack cocaine addict in the
late 1980s, before emerging as an environmental activist in the
late 1990s). Famed "baby doctor" 
US Pirate Party is the US affiliate of the European-based 
Prohibition
Party wants you," exclaimed an official party message in 2002.
The Prohibition Party -- founded in 1869 and billing themselves
as "America's Oldest Third Party" -- espouses a generally ultra-conservative
Christian social agenda mixed with anti-drug and international
anti-communist views. The party's strongest showing was in 1892,
when former Congressman 
billionaire Texas businessman
of
the left-wing faction of the Democratic Party. Unlike most of
the other political parties on this page with "Socialist" in their
names, the SP has always been staunchly anti-communist. The original
Socialist Party USA was founded by labor union leader, ex-Democratic
elected official and pacifist 
Czechoslovakia
in the 1960s and Poland in the early 1980s. The WWP was largely
an issue-oriented revolutionary party until they fielded their
first candidate for president in 1980. The militant WWP believes
that "capitalist democracy produces nothing but hot air" and that
"the power of the workers and the oppressed is in the streets,
not in Washington." FBI Director Louis Freeh attacked the WWP
in his May 2001 remarks before a US Senate committee: "Anarchists
and extremist socialist groups -- many of which, such as the Workers
World Party -- have an international presence and, at times, also
represent a potential threat in the United States" of rioting
and street violence. The more revoltionary wing of the WWP broke
away in 2006 to form the Party of Socialism & Liberation (PSL).
After the WWP-PSL split, the WWP failed to field a Presidential ticket in 2008 and 2012. In 2016, the party nominated longtime party activist Monica Moorhead for President (18th place - 4,250 votes). Moorhead was previously the WWP presidential nominee in 1996 and 2000. The WWP failed to field any presidential ticket in 2020. Official news site: 
They explain they were
founded by "a group of parents of children who were suffering
from neurological and autoimmune disorders, and who had been active
for years in their efforts to get mainstream medicine to address
the causes of, and find treatments for, their children's poor
health, faced the realization that while they had been earnest
in their engagement of both the private medical industry and government
public health officials, the medical establishment was not working
in good faith with them." This party essentially believes vaccines and other medicines cause autism (note: something widely debunked by decades of scientific studies). This single-issue party
wants to address these anti-vaxx concerns with federal government action.
is a
New York-based, militant, Stalinist-style communist party dedicated
to bringing about a world-wide, armed, communist revolution. The
party was formed in 1961 by members of the CPUSA who felt the
Soviet Union had betrayed communism and become revisionist and
state capitalist. Founders also felt the CPUSA had adopted unforgivable
reformist positions such as "peaceful coexistence" with
the US, turning to electoral politics, and hiding communist views
behind a veneer of reform-oriented front groups. In the 1960s,
the PLP heavily infiltrated the radical Students for a Democratic
Society (SDS) group. Today, the PLP still abhors democracy, elections,
freedom of nearly any sort, capitalism and religion -- and praises
dictator Joseph Stalin's Soviet Union as their role model. Because
they denounce all elections as "frauds," the PLP vows to never
field any candidates for public office (for these guys, its either
armed victory or nothing at all). Lots and lots of online ideological
articles written in the typical dogmatic communist style ... with
titles like "The Hoax of the 1932-33 Ukraine Fasmine," "Fascism
Grows In The Auto Industry," "The Road to Revolution." Articles
in English, Spanish, Russian, German, etc.
RCP
is based upon the teachings of the late Chinese Communist Party
Chairman Mao Zedong -- a form of rigid communism derivative
of Leninist-Stalinist Marxism. The party strongly denounces capitalism
and advocates a "Marxist-Leninist-Maoist Programme" as "a battle
plan for destroying the old and creating the new [and] is a kind
of road map for how to win the revolution." Even the RCP's logo
is consistent with the proletarian revolutionary theme (i.e.,
note the red flag flying from a rifle bayonet). The RCP clearly
advocates change through revolution (and various popular front
groups), not elections -- so don't look for any RCP candidates
on the ballot. The RCP's most visible activity is running several
branches of a store called
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1997 et seq - by Ron Gunzburger. All rights reserved. Contents can be quoted with attribution.