Political activist Chase Oliver has won the Libertarian Party presidential nomination over former President Donald Trump and independent 2024 presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. after multiple rounds of voting at the party’s convention.
The Libertarian Party announced on Sunday that its delegates have selected Mr. Oliver as their presidential candidate for the upcoming election in November.
“We did it! I am officially the presidential nominee,” Mr. Oliver stated on the social media platform X. “There is no better unifying ticket in this party than this one. It’s time to unify and move forward for liberty.”
Mr. Oliver also called for the nomination of his running mate, Mike ter Maat. “But the work is not done, please help me nominate my running mate @terMaatMike,” he added.
The 38-year-old activist of Atlanta previously ran for a Senate seat in Georgia in 2022, receiving 2 percent of the vote, which led to a runoff that Republican Herschel Walker lost to Democrat Raphael Warnock.
Mr. Oliver, also known as the first openly gay Senate candidate in Georgia, ran for Congress in Georgia’s 5th district in 2020, where he earned 2 percent of the vote.
His campaign website calls for major cuts to the federal budget with an eye toward balancing the budget, the abolition of the death penalty, the closure of all overseas military bases, and ending military support to Israel and Ukraine.
President Trump, who spoke at the party’s convention on Saturday, said that he did not submit the necessary paperwork for the party’s nomination.
The former president said that he would have “absolutely” secured the Libertarian Party’s nomination if he had not already been the presumptive Republican presidential nominee.
“The reason I didn’t file paperwork for the Libertarian Nomination, which I would have absolutely gotten if I wanted it (as everyone could tell by the enthusiasm of the Crowd last night!), was the fact that, as the Republican Nominee, I am not allowed to have the Nomination of another Party,” he stated on X on May 25.
“Regardless, I believe I will get a Majority of the Libertarian Votes,” the former president added. In a pitch for votes, he also told party members that he would commute the founder of the infamous Silk Road online marketplace during his first day in office.
Mr. Kennedy, who received support from some libertarian delegates but failed to garner enough votes to continue, said that speaking at the party’s convention on May 24 was “a high point” of his campaign.
“While we may not agree on every downstream issue, our core values of peace, free speech, and civil liberties make us natural allies,” Mr. Kennedy stated on X.
“Together we will break the stranglehold of the Uniparty; end the forever wars; pardon Julian Assange, Edward Snowden, and Ross Ulbricht; dismantle wasteful and abusive bureaucracies, and restore the authority of the Bill of Rights,” he added.
Mr. Kennedy said that he would have accepted the Libertarian Party presidential nomination if it had been offered. He left the Democratic Party last year to run for president as an independent.
“What an unexpected honor to wake up this morning to a groundswell in the Libertarian Party seeking to nominate me. I would have accepted the nomination if offered because independents and third parties need to unite right now to reclaim our country from the corrupt two-party system,” he said.
Mr. Kennedy chose to run as an independent after facing multiple roadblocks from the Democratic National Committee and claiming that the organization was “rigging the primary” to favor President Joe Biden and prevent other candidates from competing.
Jeff Louderback and the Associated Press contributed to this report.
From The Epoch Times