America's "Third Party" pays for media's marginalization in elections

Washington: America's independent parties, "third party", are finding it hard to attract the media's attention, especially that the Commission on Presidential Debate determined a 15% polling threshold for any candidate to be included in the debates.

Another factor that marginalizes the third party is the history that both the Democratic and Republican party have due to the big role they played since the 1850s until today.

The current elections see two prominent independent candidates representing the Green and the Libertarian parties. Even though the American voters are familiar with the two parties, the media did not shed the light on their respective programmes.

The Green party was formed in 1984 with the goal of promoting ecological politics and social justice. The Green Party came in the spotlight in 2000 when his candidate Ralph Nader was third in the presidential elections, gaining over 97,000 votes. Due to similarities in the programmes of Nader and Al Gore and given that the latter lost in Florida to George W. Bush by 537 votes, some argued that Nader affected the chances of Al Gore winning the Presidency.

The current elections see Jill Stein representing the Green Party in the elections, although it is clear that Stein doesn't have the strong media campaigns that both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton have. Stein is a physician by profession. Her presidential programme is focused on the climate change issue in particular. She is also promoting the New Green Deal; a $500 billion plan that would create millions of jobs by transitioning to renewable energy by 2030. It also adopts a single-payer public health insurance program. Qatar News Agency (QNA) tried to cover the American voters' reaction to the campaigns of Stein and Johnson. Many of the answers were either sarcastic or surprised that there were more than two candidates running. Others questioned why were both Stein and Johnson still in the race. 

Polls concur and the highest figure either candidate got in any poll was 10%, which Johnson received. Supporters of the Libertarian party told QNA that the 15% threshold enforced Commission on Presidential Debate was unjust. This led them to demonstrate ahead of the last presidential debate, as the condition was not stated in the constitution. They said the condition was enforced by both the Democratic and Republican Party to prevent any third party to compete in the presidential race by allowing other candidates to take part in the debate and attract voter attention. These conditions prevent the American voter from getting to know other candidates outside the Republican and the Democratic nominees, they added. 

Both the Democratic and Republican parties have taken a hold over political life in the US and the two-party system has made it difficult for other parties to compete for many reasons that includes the way the elections are run, lobbyists who play in the hand of the two biggest parties.