The 2024 election results, which saw Trump absorb a significant portion of Libertarian voters while official candidate Chase Oliver struggled, reflect a deeper crisis within the Libertarian Party. While some might view this absorption into the Republican coalition as inevitable, the roots of this decline trace back to specific decisions and structural changes within the party.
The transformation began at the 2022 Reno convention, where the Mises Caucus (MC) takeover laid the groundwork for abandoning the party’s traditional method of candidate selection. This system, though fragile, served a crucial purpose. As former chair Nick Sarwark often noted through his self-deprecating joke about being “the least important person at the convention,” the delegate preference system was designed to be binding and foster unity through a process of elimination voting. Successive rounds of voting is a format to allow delegates to adjust their expectations as candidates with limited support are dropped.
The traditional convention process encouraged camaraderie and courtesy rather than intransigence. It was a preference voting system that discouraged “my way or the highway” attitudes that alienated supporters of consensus nominees. When candidates reject this process or become sore losers, they undermine the very foundation of intra-party politics. Coalition building is critical, as Trump’s winning unity ticket has demonstrated.
The MC’s influence proved particularly destructive. Rather than courting unifying figures like Justin Amash or Spike Cohen, they pinned their hopes on comedian Dave Smith, who ultimately declined to run after teasing a potential candidacy. Michael Heise, whose energy was initially welcomed in 2018, steered the process inflexibly, while Angela McArdle and Dave Smith’s actions — supporting Trump and raising money for RFK Jr — undermined traditional party governance.
In North Carolina, the MC ousted state chair Joe Garcia of Union County, a move solely motivated by the desire to take over the party and install their own caucus members to the executive committee. After I interviewed Joe and several other state party members, I concluded the MC was a malign force. No one wants to work with unprofessional, untrustworthy people and I ended my six-year chairmanship of the Mecklenburg LP.
Perhaps this destruction at the national and state level was inevitable, or even necessary, after 50 years of minimal electoral success. The party’s previous impact was mainly as a spoiler — Jo Jorgenson in several swing states in 2020; Shane Hazel in the Georgia Senate race; and, of course, me, in the Congressional District 9 race of 2018 that disgraced Mark Harris.
Maybe the traditional convention system is ill-suited for modern political dynamics. Chase Oliver, for all his hard work, did not have the star power to tap into voter rage and did not do as well as the LP governor candidate Mike Ross running against a weakened Mark Robinson. The current alternatives are bleak — big money, backroom selection, and celebrity podcasters — and raise serious concerns about the party’s future direction.
The broader question remains whether to trust Trump’s absorption of libertarian elements into his coalition. His stated intentions remain inconsistent on major issues, and his choices of allies — from Bobby Kennedy to Vivek Ramaswamy to Ron Paul — seem more opportunistic than ideological. His positions on mass deportations and foreign entanglements, particularly regarding Iran and Russia, offer little comfort to traditional libertarians.
The party’s decline was exacerbated by the treatment of Chase Oliver’s candidacy, where culture-war motives and subtle bigotry against his sexuality played an unfortunate role. When party leaders abandoned agreed-upon processes and norms, whether through contract breaches or insulting tweets justified by claims of this being “the most important election ever,” they undermined the very principles of libertarian governance. Libertarians are supposed to be the smart partisans that deliberate, not fanatics that fearfully abandon their senses during election season.
Organizations that confuse their motto (“a world set free in our lifetime”) with their plan of execution are doomed to misguided actions. The form of an organization should reflect its function — whether as a political party, a PAC, or a caucus. When these lines blur, effectiveness suffers. The consequences are clear: the party is experiencing falling membership and donations.
Looking forward, perhaps the solution lies outside traditional party politics. If the LP fades away, a thousand independent podcasters and media voices critiquing power might prove more effective than a unified but compromised party structure. These independent voices could serve as watchdogs against the influence of various power centers, from Big Oil to BlackRock to Bomb Signers.
For now, many libertarians find themselves hoping for small victories — like a potential pardon for Ross Ulbricht — while contemplating their place in an increasingly oligarchical political landscape. The era of the “two-percenters” might be ending, but the principles of liberty endure, seeking new vessels for expression in our realigning political environment.
The lesson here isn’t just about the LP’s decline but about the challenges of maintaining principled organizational structures in an age of personality politics, social media influence, and powerful national party committees. If party officers aspire to be influencers rather than builders of political infrastructure, perhaps they should indeed form PACs and support viable candidates rather than undermining the institutional foundations of their own party.