A centrist group’s threat to elect a third party candidate for president in 2024 has already caused panic among Democratic strategists.

A group called No Labels qualified to vote in Arizona earlier this week, laying the groundwork for a presidential race that Democrats believe will almost certainly siphon votes from President Joe Biden’s reelection bid. Progressives and Democratic strategists in the state are hustling about the possibility that Cinema, which has long worked with the group, will seek re-election on the No Labels ballot line.

A spokesperson for Cinema never returned a request for comment, and a statement from No Labels never responded to questions about whether Cinema could run on its voting line. Preparing for re-election would be much easier, the number of signatures that would need to be collected to participate in the vote would be greatly reduced, and much of that work would be left to groups well-funded by corporate interests. It is outsourced.

“Just as an unlabeled presidential candidate threatens President Biden’s re-election, an unlabeled Senate ticket will threaten the Democrats who hold Senate seats in Arizona,” said Cinema in 2018. wrestled the first Senate elections in , now replacing Cinema PAC. “But even with millions of black money from No Labels’ corporate profits, there is no way for cinema to get re-elected. She’s a spoiler, nothing more.”

Cinema has yet to announce whether it plans to run for re-election after that. leave the Democratic Party In the wake of the 2022 midterm elections. Rep. Ruben Gallego, a progressive Marine Corps veteran, has announced that he will run for the Democratic Senate nomination for Arizona.

Republicans are not officially running for office, but former newscaster and MAGA favorite Kari Lake and businesswoman Karin Taylor-Robson, who are frontrunners for the 2022 gubernatorial race, are the Pinal County Sheriff’s Office. Like Mr. Mark Lamb, he is considering running for the Senate. (Lake defeated Robson in the Republican primary before losing to Democratic Governor Katie Hobbs in November.)

too fast public survey Potential contest results showed a close race between Gallego and the Republicans, with Cinema coming in third. Local Democrats, by and large, lined up behind Gallego, portraying cinema as a spoiler that had no choice but to tip the election GOP, where opposition to key policies of the Biden administration helped shrink the president’s legislative agenda. .

National Democratic Party officially remained neutral The contest fears angering either Gallego’s progressive foundation or cinema, which hopes to continue to support most of Biden’s agendas and candidates.

The biggest barrier to cinema execution may be the process of collecting signatures. If she were to run as an independent, she would need to collect around 60,000 signatures. (The exact requirements are based on the number of registered voters in the state and won’t be known until next year. Base.

But if Cinema ran on the unlabeled party line, she would only need to collect about 6,000 signatures. This is a much easier task.

Collecting signatures may seem like a political encyclopedia, but collecting a large number of signatures is difficult. An independent Cinema campaign would likely need to amass nearly 80,000 of his to get 60,000 eligible signatures. This is because many will be disqualified for one reason or another. Collecting signatures has led to unsuccessful bids for multiple statewide offices in recent years, including the current Sen. Todd Young (R-Ind.) first run in 2016 top candidate 2022 Michigan governor.

Sinema has a long history with No Labels and shares her centrism and familiarity with big business. The group has made 10 different videos of her praising her over the past two years, praising her decision to leave the Democratic Party, calling her “one of her most loyal allies in Congress.” Did. A review of FEC records shows that she has received at least her $100,000 donation from the group’s board members, her PAC associated, and her donors.

No Labels has not revealed their donors, but some have been leaked. 2018 Stories from The Daily Beastmany of them were investors and investors, including the then-CEO of Bain Capital and a hedge fund manager who would later host a fundraiser for the re-election of former President Donald Trump. I was a private equity executive.

Supporting cinema is unlikely to make No Labels look good to Democrats in Arizona, but Democrats across the country warn that the group’s plans threaten Biden’s re-election. An organization that shares No Labels’ moderate policy outlook but does not share its nonpartisan position. Published the report on Tuesday Warning No Labels’ efforts to recruit and run centrist presidential candidates are almost certain to support Republican candidates in 2024.

No Labels is often considered a joke in Washington circles.The group, with a handful of wealthy donors editorial columnist But that’s a tiny fraction of the actual electorate. Also, the chances of a third-party candidate actually winning the presidency are slim.

But Third Way warns that the No Labels effort is well-funded and well-organized, and could change the outcome of the election. No Labels claims he has raised more than $45 million so far, and even participated in a poll in Colorado.

“The best-case scenario is that they make no difference,” said Jim Kessler, co-founder of The Third Way and the group’s vice president of policy. To flip it red, and it doesn’t take too many states for it to be a big deal, which is a direct threat to Biden’s re-election, either intentionally or accidentally.”

At this time, it’s unclear who the actual No Labels contenders will be. Cinema and her fellow centrist Senator Joe Manchin (DW.Va.) are often mentioned, former Maryland Governor Larry Hogan (Republican) did not exclude When asked earlier this week, he ran as a third-party presidential candidate.

No Labels claims its candidates don’t serve as spoilers, saying its polls show potential independent candidates with equal voting from Democratic and Republican voters. increase.

“If two major political parties nominate a candidate that the majority of Americans don’t want to vote for in 2024, No Labels will give an independent candidate a once-in-a-generation chance to run the White House and win. We think there is,” Ryan Clancy, the group’s strategist, wrote in an emailed statement to the Huffington Post.

“From the beginning, No Labels has not said that our vote access efforts are insurance if both parties refuse to appeal to America’s common-sense majority,” he said. He continued. “If the public doesn’t want an independent ticket and there is no way to win, No Labels will provide a voting line for any ticket. No one at No Labels has an interest in furthering the spoiler effort.” there is no.”

Third Way and other Democrats remain skeptical. They note that his No Labels own map, which shows the route to 270 electoral votes, robs Biden of his two-thirds of that number from his 2020 winning states. I’m paying attention.