Dan McCready and Mark Harris will debate again Wednesday night, this time on Spectrum News, allowing voters in North Carolina’s 9th Congressional District (with cable) a chance to see both candidates answer — or tiptoe around — questions regarding national and foreign policies.
However, one candidate in the race won’t be there.
Libertarian Jeff Scott announced at the Richmond Young Professionals’ Pints and Politics forum last week that he was not invited to the debates, the first sponsored by the Charlotte Observer and WBTV-TV.
If Scott hadn’t been invited to the forum, it’s unlikely many people would have known there was a third choice until they got a peek at the ballot.
Third-party candidates always have an uphill battle in elections. The campaign war chests are nowhere near as large as those sponsored by the Republican and Democratic parties, so they don’t have a lot to spend on advertising to get their messages out to the public.
When it comes to debates, third-party candidates are often excluded because of rules set up by the debate host.
A spokesperson for Charter, parent company of Spectrum News, said leading candidates are invited based on predetermined criteria including polling percentage, evidence of campaigning and ballot eligibility.
But it’s hard to increase poll percentage when you’re not included.
A poll earlier this month from the conservative North Carolina-based Civitas Institute showed 3 percent of the 556 voters surveyed favored Scott in the race. However, a recent New York Times poll failed to mention the Libertarian at all.
The mainstream media has also been complacent toward third parties, often failing to mention candidates or relegating them to a single mention at the bottom of a story, thus maintaining the left-right, two-party paradigm.
Ballot access has been a challenge, but North Carolina now recognizes the Libertarian, Green and Constitution parties, and two of those have candidates in Richmond County races. Justin Miller of the Green Party is running for Ken Goodman’s N.C. House of Representatives seat against the incumbent and Republican Joey Davis.
We think that if a candidate is on the ballot, then they should be allowed to debate.
Excluding third-party candidates is not only unfair to them, it’s also a disservice to voters by not allowing them to hear from all the choices.
