Elon Musk considers a new political party to challenge US duopoly. Photo / the Washington Post
For the moment, let’s take seriously Elon Musk’s talk about trying to start a new United States political party to compete with the Republican and Democratic parties.
He sounds deeply frustrated with this historically dominant duopoly.
The good news for him is that lots of Americans share his frustration.
Let’s also take seriously the question of whether Musk has the wherewithal (other than money, of which he has lots and lots) to pull off this feat in more than name only.
Is it even possible to do what he says he’ll do?
Lots of history, about Musk and about politics more broadly, would say, “Elon, save your money”.
Musk’s claim that he wants to start a new party is the latest iteration of his recent feud with President Donald Trump.
What triggered their falling out, in part, was Musk’s attack on Trump’s prime legislative initiative, the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act”. He called it “utterly insane and destructive”.
Musk hated the bill because it would balloon the national debt by at least US$3 trillion. He said Congress should not pass it.
Republicans ignored him and sent the measure to Trump for a July Fourth signing ceremony. So the scoreboard shows: Trump 1, Musk 0.
Public opinion agrees with Musk about the need for a third major political party.
Gallup has done an annual survey on this question since 2003. Only once – that first year – did a majority say that the Republican and Democratic parties were doing an adequate job representing the American people.
Last October, 58% said the two parties “do such a poor job” representing people that a third major party was needed.
That was slightly lower than in 2023 but in line with a two-decade trend.
For years, most self-identified independents have said a third major party is needed. Last year, it was 69%.
Republicans and Democrats tend to be more optimistic about the two-party system when their party has the White House, but overall, they too generally say there is a need for another party.
That independents solidly favour a third major party squares with another trend in politics, which is the rising percentage of Americans who label themselves as independents.
Last year, 43% told Gallup they identified as independents, compared with 28% each for Democrats and Republicans.
When pushed to say whether they lean towards one of the two parties, or when in the voting booth in recent elections in the country’s deeply polarised environment, many of those independents quickly pick sides.
Absent real options, they have no choice. Who wants to waste a vote?
Would-be independent candidates have been searching for what they say is a sensible centre of the electorate for a long time. No one has found it.
Howard Schultz, the former Starbucks chief executive, is a recent example. He started a campaign for president in the 2020 cycle but quit months later.
Former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg explored a third-party candidacy and eventually concluded there was no path to victory.
In 2020, he ran unsuccessfully for the Democratic nomination after spending about a billion dollars.
Trump could have gone the independent route, given his money and celebrity status. He was smart enough to hijack the Republican Party.
Not that there haven’t been some independent candidates for president who got a good share of the vote.
Ross Perot is the most recent example. In 1992, he captured 19% of the popular vote but not a single electoral vote.
In 1968, Alabama Governor George C. Wallace won five Southern states but only about 14% of the popular vote.
In 1912, Theodore Roosevelt, as a former president, carried six states and captured 27% of the vote running on the Bull Moose ticket. In splitting the Republican vote, he doomed incumbent William Howard Taft and helped to elect Democrat Woodrow Wilson.
The Green Party and the Libertarian Party are well-established and have regularly run candidates for president, but they have scant support. At the state and local levels, those small parties have made minimal impact.
What could make Musk’s effort different from past attempts?
The obvious answer is money. He’s the world’s richest person, with a net worth variously estimated near or above US$400 billion. He spent more than US$250 million helping Trump get elected last year.
But just how much is Musk willing to invest to build a party capable of running serious elections up and down the ballot?
Kamala Harris, in her 107-day campaign for president, spent north of a billion dollars.
How many billions would Musk need to spend to create a party with viability and durability?
This isn’t a one-time investment. Party-building is a day-in, day-out, year-in, year-out proposition.
Perot thought it was possible to create a party, as did many of those who voted for him. They tried after his campaign in 1992 and made serious efforts after his 1996 campaign. Their efforts came to naught as the Perot movement splintered over personality differences and lack of consensus on an agenda.
Musk faces important questions as he thinks about creating a new party.
One is what the party stands for. Is it all about deficits and debt? A recent Washington Post-Ipsos poll about the new legislation found that 63% of Americans said it was unacceptable to add another US$3t to a national debt that already is US$36t. So that suggests one area upon which to build.
But when the Pew Research Centre asked people to rank issues in order of priority at the beginning of the 2024 election year, deficits sat squarely in the middle, after the economy, immigration, healthcare costs and – take note, Mr Musk – reducing the influence of money in politics.
So would people vote for a candidate for the House or Senate whose principal, or even sole, issue is dealing with the debt, which would entail tackling the issues of Social Security and Medicare?
And is that enough of a foundation for a new party to attract enough people to win elections?
Musk has suggested his goal is to target some vulnerable representatives or senators in 2026 to produce a small cadre of lawmakers who would constitute the swing vote in either chamber.
To do that, he could flood a few races with money – though he would have to channel it through a super PAC, given the limits on individual contributions to candidates.
Money is important, but it’s not everything. A major challenge would be finding quality candidates willing to join Musk in his undertaking.
How would he build the infrastructure needed to identify, recruit and arm the people capable of running effective challenges to the existing parties?
Another obstacle is gaining access to ballots. If his goal is to create a national party, that’s a cumbersome process.
Each state has different rules, so it would take a small army of lawyers and paid petition gatherers. That is not impossible but potentially difficult to do in time for next year’s midterm elections.
It would be easier, if Musk’s real goal is to capture a relatively small number of House or Senate seats, to run candidates as independents.
There’s another problem for Musk. He’s an imperfect symbol for a new party, given how unpopular he has become since he decided to get into the political arena.
Not only is he unpopular, so is the tech industry, according to a new poll conducted for the Institute of Governmental Studies at the University of California at Berkeley.
The poll asked people how much they trusted various entities “to act in the best interests of the California public”. Of nine listed, tech companies and their leaders came in last, with 79% saying “a little” or “not at all”.
When there was talk that he might seek the presidency in 1996, former secretary of state Colin Powell was asked whether it would be easier to run as an independent or as the nominee of a third party.
He responded, “It depends on the nature of this third party. Does it have structure [and] funding? Does it bring something to a candidacy?”
Those are questions Musk and those around him will need to answer before he moves forward. In time, it will become clear whether this is something serious or merely frivolous.