The Forward Party, a new political entity led by former presidential candidate Andrew Yang and former New Jersey Gov. Christine Todd Whitman, is planning to announce its first round of election endorsements this week.
While Yang and Whitman would not confirm the list of candidates the party will endorse, Yang did acknowledge it will be weighing in on at least one particular Senate race.
“I will likely be heading to Utah to help Evan McMullin,” Yang said, referring to the Republican turned independent who is challenging the GOP incumbent, Sen. Mike Lee.
The Forward Party’s support for McMullin is not a surprise given that Yang previously announced his personal support for McMullin – and that McMullin founded one of the three organizations that merged to become the new party.
The current iteration of the Forward Party is the result of combining the original version formed by Yang, the Serve America Movement and the Renew America Movement. SAM was created by Republicans, Democrats and independents, and it is led by former Republican Rep. David Jolly. RAM, which started out as Stand Up Republic, was founded by McMullin, a former Republican who ran for president as an independent in 2016, and Miles Taylor, who served in Donald Trump’s administration. Its leadership team includes a number of other former GOP leaders.
According to Yang and Whitman, the Forward Party is going to endorse candidates in federal, state and local races, and the list will include Republicans, Democrats and independents.
The top priority on McMullin’s campaign website covers strengthening democracy and reducing extremism. He has been endorsed by the state Democracy Party, which decided to throw its support to him rather than running a long-shot candidate of their own. Recent polling shows Lee with a 7-point lead.
“Where we see an extreme candidate versus one leaning in our direction, that’s where we put our efforts,” Whitman said, explaining that they are looking for candidates who support two specific proposals to reform the political system: open primaries and ranked-choice voting.
Unlike the Democratic and Republican parties, which usually develop platforms on policy issues (health care, the economy, immigration, etc.), the Forward Party is instead focused on electing “solutions oriented” candidates who support three concepts it has identified as “free people,” “thriving communities” and “vibrant democracy.”
“Tens of millions of Americans want a positive unifying third party movement in the country,” Yang said.
The data backs up Yang’s claim. Last week, Gallup released its last survey on third parties, finding that more than half (56 percent) of Americans believe a third major political party is necessary because the Democratic and Republican parties do a poor job representing the people.
That includes 75 percent of self-described independents, 45 percent of Republicans and 40 percent of Democrats.
“We have dozens of conversations with people of both parties who are fed up,” Yang said. “Many are in conversations with us to join or work together.”
Since announcing the formation of the party in July, Whitman, Yang and the other leaders have relied on a grassroots effort to build support.
So far, the Forward Party has enlisted 25,000 activists across all 50 states, and “10 times that number” on the party’s mailing list or engaged in some other way, according to Yang.
Whitman believes that early growth, coupled with media coverage and events, has generated momentum that could accelerate with this week’s endorsements.
“Once we show them we’re real and the commitment we have and the spread we have, people will come to it,” she said, stressing that a small number can make a big difference. “But remember, we don’t have to get them all. You can make change .. with just 5 percent or 7 percent” of the electorate.
(Joe Biden won the popular vote in 2020 by less than 5 percentage points. Hillary Clinton won the popular vote in 2016 by 2 points.)
In addition to engaging in the midterm elections and growing the party base, Forward leaders are continuing the work necessary to qualify for ballots around the country. Their goal is to be on the ballot in 15 states by the end of this year, double that by the end of 2023 and in every state by 2024. They intend to hold a national convention next summer.
“This sort of movement cannot succeed without thousands of us and eventually millions of us who want something better for our country than we can get with a dysfunctional two-party system that represents fewer people each passing day,” Yang said.
But they realize it’s going to take time to build the party.
“This isn’t going to happen overnight,” Whitman said. “But we’re committed to it.”
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
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Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.