From LPNY’s post-election release:
The Election is Over. Now What?
Fellow Libertarians:
The 2022 election is now over and behind us. Unfortunately, our statewide candidates were not on the ballot, but Larry Sharpe continued to run a write-in campaign to give voters another choice. At the present time, we do not have the full results of the write-in campaign as the Board of Elections will be working to tally and certify the results over the next few weeks. As soon as we have some numbers, we will notify everyone.
This election season has been one of the most trying in the Libertarian Party of New York’s history: the increase of the ballot access thresholds for parties in 2020, the lockdowns hindering the ground campaign of our Presidential and Vice Presidential candidates in 2020, and legal challenges lost from the decisions of duopoly appointees.
In addition, there was a bill introduced in the state legislature to reduce the thresholds back to pre-2020, but it failed to reach the floor for discussion and consideration. Assemblyman John Salka and Senator Phil Boyle should be applauded for their efforts to bring this to the legislature. Unfortunately, neither will be in office next session.
This year, our statewide slate of candidates led by Larry Sharpe amassed over 42,000 signatures, less than 3,000 shy of the necessary 45,000 signatures needed. Kathy Hochul, who won the election, required 0 signatures to get on the ballot. Not counting Zeldin’s attempt at third-party lines, he only needed 0 signatures to get on the Republican and Conservative Party lines. Of the 11 candidates who ran for Governor this year, including Hochul and Zeldin, Larry Sharpe received the most signatures in the petitioning drive, and yet was not allowed on the ballot.
Through our efforts to fight within the system, through the judicial process, the meeting the arbitrary petitioning thresholds, and lobbying for legislation, the political machine in New York State is stronger than ever and was successful at keeping third parties off the ballot this year for the first time since 1946.
While we will continue to fight all on avenues, it is time to turn our efforts to promoting a state of defiance, which refers to methods of political activism that offers a change in strategy from conventional politics that shifts our reliance on politicians, judges, lawyers, and the state to individuals through mobilizing a grassroots movement that goes beyond electoral politics and promotes non-compliance, non-enforcement, repeal, and removing oneself from reliance on government through networking, coalition building, and promoting ideas such as homeschooling, homesteading and self-sufficiency, defense training, volunteerism, and more.
Building this new strategy is going to take time. At the present time, we are working on establishing an infrastructure and a leadership team. There will be more updates as we progress over the next several months. Elections only last less than two years; but we need to play the long game, and setting the Libertarian Party of New York for success for the long term is essential and is going to take time. We will be reaching out on next steps over the next few months and calling for volunteers for new initiatives.
Thank you for your continued support for the LPNY and for liberty.
In Liberty,
Andrew Martin Kolstee
Chair, Libertarian Party of New York