Three third party candidates, Jill Stein, Evan McMullin and Vermin Supreme, appeared on campus Monday, Sept. 26, for the first presidential debate of 2016, each aiming to spread awareness of their campaigns and fairness of the Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD).
Their presence was reflected through protests off campus. Many of those demonstrating on Hempstead Turnpike came not to advocate on behalf of the major party candidates, but to show support for the third party players in this election’s political game.
“If I had the opportunity and honor to get arrested with Jill Stein, then I would,” a demonstrator who asked to remain nameless, said.
Executive Director of the Long Island Alliance for Peaceful Alternatives Margaret Melkonian shared similar views on Stein’s legitimacy in this election.
“She does present an alternative perspective and view and it’s too bad that the whole country could not hear her tonight, but only a small number of people know about what she’s really saying. The fact that it’s a closed debate, that’s a problem,” Melkonian said.
Both Hofstra University and the CPD have received backlash on social media for only permitting the candidates of the two major political parties – Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton – to participate in the debate Monday night (although the university has no say in who can or cannot debate).
As the two front-running third party candidates together share about 15 percent of support nationally according to NBC News, millions of supporters are beginning to feel as though their voice is not being heard in this election.
“It’s really unfortunate that they’re only letting the two candidates from the Democratic and Republican Part[ies] participate,” Emile Beck a junior global studies and sociology major and a member of the non-partisan campaign, Peace Action said. “Even though they have the quota for percent of voters needed to participate, I still think that 10 percent is a lot, even two percent is millions of people.”
Lou Jasikoff, a Hofstra alumnus, exercised his free speech on the turnpike Monday to show his support for Libertarian nominee Gary Johnson. “This issue might be the most important issue of the day as far as I’m concerned anyway,” Jasikoff said of the bipartisan system.
“We can disagree on issues, but we must have open debate. It was Kennedy who warned us back in ‘61 that in order to survive in a democracy, we need to have open and honest debate,” Jasikoff said. He takes issue with the fact that the two major parties comprise the leadership of the CPD, and argued that Johnson has a lot to bring to the executive table.
On the other hand, many people feel as though the third parties are irrelevant. The question now is how would a multiparty system work, as a winning candidate has the potential to disappoint the majority of Americans in a four-way election.
“I think third party candidates are detrimental to the country, especially for this election because they are taking votes away from the candidates that matter,” Julian Martin-Poteet, a sophomore and film major said.
Of course, a large portion of people and organizations who involved themselves in Debate Day activities were strong supporters of the major party candidates, including the Planned Parenthood demonstrators who support Clinton, the Democratic nominee.
A group of young Trump supporters decked out in red hats and Trump attire seemed to be pleased with the outcome of the democratic process, thus far.
Joe Chiaravalle, a senior rhetoric major said, “Ideally, it would be better to have more than two parties. However, no matter what, if you look at Game Theory it will always come back down to two parties because people are going to keep joining together until there are only two parties. I do think that this is a debate where third parties are the most relevant. However, I’m still on the Trump train.”