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Both parties could benefit from backing Independent candidates in tough races—reducing polarization, increasing leverage in Congress, and reshaping U.S. politics.
The Democratic Party sent a strong message to President Trump and the Republican Party in the 2025 elections, but ironically one part of their overall strategy forward should be to support Independents in House and Senate races where the chances of victory for a Democratic candidate are low.
Double irony: Republicans should employ the same strategy. Triple irony: If both parties pursue this strategy, then this would both serve their self-interest and be in the best interest of the country overall.
The reason the Democrats would be wise to support Independents rather than Democrats is that it is to their advantage to have Independents elected rather than Republicans, and the reason the Republicans would be wise to vote for Independents rather than Republicans is that it is to their advantage to have Independents elected rather than Democrats.
Theoretically, we could end up with a Senate which had, say, six Independents and 94 Democrats and Republicans, suppose 47 vs 47. In the House, a similar dynamic could ensue.
States with historic traditions of substantial independent voters and states which have recently seen a rise of independent voters include New Hampshire, Vermont, Nebraska, Connecticut, Minnesota, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Iowa, Nevada, and Arizona.
A case study would be Nebraska, where Dan Osborn, a Union Leader who became an Independent, ran for the Senate in 2024 and came fairly close to winning. He is running for the Senate again in 2026.
Other 2026 races where Independents have a fighting chance include the race for governor in Michigan where Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan, a Democrat, is running as an Independent, Ty Pinkins who is running for the U.S. Senate in Mississippi, and Todd Achilles who is running for the U.S. Senate in Idaho.
Having five to six Independents in the Senate would provide a bloc of members which could get them to the majority where only a majority was needed (e.g., on reconciliation bills) and to sixty votes where major policy bills required sixty votes.
There are many factors which might lead to an Independent winning a seat in the Senate or the House, with support coming from the major parties being only one of the factors. Support from an Independent PAC or Independent voters would also be important.
Apart from serving their self-interest, Republicans and Democrats, ranging from members to voters to major donors, would presumably benefit from a legislative system that was less polarized, hostile, and dysfunctional. Independents would benefit, members and voters and major donors, because they would finally get representation on Capitol Hill. The Independent bloc would not have equal power to the Republicans and Democrats, but it would possess incredible leverage.
Dartmouth economist Charles Wheelan developed "the fulcrum strategy" in The Centrist Manifesto. His important book, however, speaks for Independents as a Third Party. That approach requires that Independents, who are a diverse group, become a unified group. Centrist third parties, though they work on paper, have not been effective in electoral politics.
The approach advocated here follows the "tripartisanship" model I have developed the last few years in a series of previous columns. We need the fulcrum strategy, but it should be used to unite a diverse group of independents.
I do not imagine that they would all vote together all the time. Indeed, four or five Senators joining the majority party and several defectors from the minority party might be sufficient to get sixty votes.
I imagine, though, that the Independents would basically rotate from supporting Democratic or Republican initiatives depending on who, if either party, had majority control of the chamber in question. If the split in the Senate was 53/41/6, then five votes from Independents and two votes from the minority party would get to sixty. This Senate might have to give the minority party some bills, otherwise they might not be able to get defectors from the party line.
Thus, I don't see Independents being centrists on the ideological spectrum. I see them as a diverse group, where pragmatism would be the chief but not only theme that motivates them. These independents would want to keep their seats having made certain ideological commitments to their voters as well as a commitment to end dysfunction on Capitol Hill.
Motivation in human life is often a complex phenomenon that is based on multiple factors. Dysfunction and hostility on Capitol Hill could ultimately be controlled if not eliminated if the two major parties helped to grow the third force in American politics both for their own sake and the sake of the country itself.
Dave Anderson edited "Leveraging: A Political, Economic and Societal Framework," has taught at five universities, and ran for the Democratic nomination for a Maryland congressional seat in 2016.
Both parties could benefit from backing Independent candidates in tough races—reducing polarization, increasing leverage in Congress, and reshaping U.S. politics.
The Democratic Party sent a strong message to President Trump and the Republican Party in the 2025 elections, but ironically one part of their overall strategy forward should be to support Independents in House and Senate races where the chances of victory for a Democratic candidate are low.
Double irony: Republicans should employ the same strategy. Triple irony: If both parties pursue this strategy, then this would both serve their self-interest and be in the best interest of the country overall.
The reason the Democrats would be wise to support Independents rather than Democrats is that it is to their advantage to have Independents elected rather than Republicans, and the reason the Republicans would be wise to vote for Independents rather than Republicans is that it is to their advantage to have Independents elected rather than Democrats.
Theoretically, we could end up with a Senate which had, say, six Independents and 94 Democrats and Republicans, suppose 47 vs 47. In the House, a similar dynamic could ensue.
States with historic traditions of substantial independent voters and states which have recently seen a rise of independent voters include New Hampshire, Vermont, Nebraska, Connecticut, Minnesota, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Iowa, Nevada, and Arizona.
A case study would be Nebraska, where Dan Osborn, a Union Leader who became an Independent, ran for the Senate in 2024 and came fairly close to winning. He is running for the Senate again in 2026.
Other 2026 races where Independents have a fighting chance include the race for governor in Michigan where Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan, a Democrat, is running as an Independent, Ty Pinkins who is running for the U.S. Senate in Mississippi, and Todd Achilles who is running for the U.S. Senate in Idaho.
Having five to six Independents in the Senate would provide a bloc of members which could get them to the majority where only a majority was needed (e.g., on reconciliation bills) and to sixty votes where major policy bills required sixty votes.
There are many factors which might lead to an Independent winning a seat in the Senate or the House, with support coming from the major parties being only one of the factors. Support from an Independent PAC or Independent voters would also be important.
Apart from serving their self-interest, Republicans and Democrats, ranging from members to voters to major donors, would presumably benefit from a legislative system that was less polarized, hostile, and dysfunctional. Independents would benefit, members and voters and major donors, because they would finally get representation on Capitol Hill. The Independent bloc would not have equal power to the Republicans and Democrats, but it would possess incredible leverage.
Dartmouth economist Charles Wheelan developed "the fulcrum strategy" in The Centrist Manifesto. His important book, however, speaks for Independents as a Third Party. That approach requires that Independents, who are a diverse group, become a unified group. Centrist third parties, though they work on paper, have not been effective in electoral politics.
The approach advocated here follows the "tripartisanship" model I have developed the last few years in a series of previous columns. We need the fulcrum strategy, but it should be used to unite a diverse group of independents.
I do not imagine that they would all vote together all the time. Indeed, four or five Senators joining the majority party and several defectors from the minority party might be sufficient to get sixty votes.
I imagine, though, that the Independents would basically rotate from supporting Democratic or Republican initiatives depending on who, if either party, had majority control of the chamber in question. If the split in the Senate was 53/41/6, then five votes from Independents and two votes from the minority party would get to sixty. This Senate might have to give the minority party some bills, otherwise they might not be able to get defectors from the party line.
Thus, I don't see Independents being centrists on the ideological spectrum. I see them as a diverse group, where pragmatism would be the chief but not only theme that motivates them. These independents would want to keep their seats having made certain ideological commitments to their voters as well as a commitment to end dysfunction on Capitol Hill.
Motivation in human life is often a complex phenomenon that is based on multiple factors. Dysfunction and hostility on Capitol Hill could ultimately be controlled if not eliminated if the two major parties helped to grow the third force in American politics both for their own sake and the sake of the country itself.
Dave Anderson edited "Leveraging: A Political, Economic and Societal Framework," has taught at five universities, and ran for the Democratic nomination for a Maryland congressional seat in 2016.
AI may disrupt the workplace, but with smart investment in workforce transitions and innovation, the economy can bend without breaking—unlocking growth and new opportunities.
Everyone has a stake in keeping the unemployment rate low. A single percentage point increase in unemployment is tied to a jump in the poverty rate of about 0.4 to 0.7 percentage points. Higher rates of unemployment are likewise associated with an increase in rates of depression among the unemployed and, in some cases, reduced mental health among their family members. Based on that finding, it's unsurprising that higher rates of unemployment are also correlated with higher rates of divorce. Finally, and somewhat obviously, unemployment leads to a surge in social safety spending. Everyone benefits when more folks have meaningful, high-paying work.
That’s why everyone needs to pay attention to the very real possibility that AI will lead to at least a temporary surge in unemployment. Economists vary in their estimates of how AI will lead to displacement. Gather three economists together, and they’ll probably offer nine different predictions—they’ll tell you that AI is advancing at different rates in different fields, that professions vary in their willingness to adopt AI, and that a shifting regulatory framework is likely to diminish AI use in some sectors. And, of course, they’re right!
Given that we all have a stake in navigating this uncertain unemployment picture, we need to lean into a bend, but don’t break economy: one in which AI is accepted as a driver of innovation, as well as a disruptor of the status quo, but not a destroyer of economic well-being and opportunity. AI, like waves of prior technology, can spur the sort of productivity gains that are associated with economic growth that benefits us all. A brief by the Penn Wharton Budget Model forecasts productivity gains and related increases in GDP of 1.5% by 2035 and around 3% by 2055.
While GDP is not a measure of human well-being nor economic security among the public, it’s a signal of growth and economic opportunity that at least presents us with the opportunity to invest more in our communities, institutions, and innovators. Those eager to put AI back in the bottle risk depriving Americans of the chance to help build the future by learning new skills and starting new ventures. As summarized by Robert D. Atkinson, “Without productivity growth to create a ‘bigger pie’ there is no way for living standards to increase, especially given that the worker-to-retiree ratio will decline over the next two decades as baby boomers retire.”
The key is that we invest more in the transition period between the jobs of today and those of tomorrow. Our track record on this front is sorely lacking. Retraining programs tend not to lead to long-term increases in earnings. Focused on helping displaced workers find “in-demand” jobs, these programs are more focused on the immediate needs of employers rather than the future well-being of the employee. For example, many programs direct participants into low-wage, high-turnover roles such as certified nursing assistant positions and long-haul trucking.
A clearer, more reliable path toward economic security in the Age of AI is necessary so that people do not fear technology but rather embrace it and the growth it may bring about. A few policy proposals can move us in that direction. For one, we should replicate and scale up the Investing in Manufacturing Communities Partnership (IMCP) program. This effort may have saved more than 1,000 jobs through investments in novel projects across the country. A similar approach—private-public efforts that invest in emerging opportunities in regional economic hubs—could be applied across several sectors.
Second, it's time to reauthorize and expand the Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer programs. Developed as part of America's Seed Feed, these programs target U.S. small businesses as engines of innovation and new jobs. Over the course of 1995-2017, support for small businesses resulted in an average of 65,000 jobs per year. That’s an incredible record of success that deserves ongoing support.
In sum, fear-mongering about the economic disruptions posed by AI is at odds with historical precedent and is unproductive. “Historically,” based on research by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), “the income-generating effects of new technologies have proved more powerful than the labor-displacing effects: technological progress has been accompanied not only by higher output and productivity, but also by higher overall employment.” Speculative reports and exaggerated headlines deny this reality and undermine efforts to invest in transition programs.
The progress forecasted by the OECD will only be paired with societal progress if we take the creation of economic bridges seriously—let’s help people connect to the jobs of the future rather than rile them up in defense of the status quo.
Kevin Frazier is an AI Innovation and Law Fellow at Texas Law and author of the Appleseed AI substack.
In October, Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-NJ) introduced federal legislation to establish a federal guaranteed income pilot program.
In 2018, Moriah Rodriguez was in a car accident that left her with a traumatic brain injury and unable to work. A few years later, she and her four children were on the brink of homelessness when she enrolled in the Denver Basic Income Project.
Rodriguez, who now serves on the DBIP Board of Directors, used the unconditional cash transfers provided through the program to find a place to live and pay off debt. She believes that, if not for the program, her life would be fundamentally different.
“I don’t believe that the way that the system is set up is giving people the opportunity to be successful,” Rodriguez said.
The Denver Basic Income Project is one of many city- and county-wide guaranteed income pilot programs throughout the country. These initiatives, which gained popularity during the COVID-19 pandemic, are experimental and provide cash payments to specific groups for a limited time to study their effects.
In October, Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-NJ) introduced federal legislation to establish a guaranteed-income pilot program. The congresswoman has advocated for the initiative in past legislative sessions, citing rising economic inequality as proof of the program’s necessity.
“The greedy are getting the majority and the needy are becoming even more needy,” Watson Coleman said. “That’s un-American as far as I'm concerned.”
Watson Coleman said that guaranteed income can lessen economic struggle by plainly distributing resources and avoiding government bureaucracy.
Researchers echoed this sentiment. They say cash is flexible, non-paternalistic, and efficient.
“People want guaranteed income to do all the things, right? And that’s really because cash can do all the things,” said Misuzu Schexnider, who works at UChicago’s Inclusive Economy Lab. “It’s really one of the few interventions that can help people achieve their goals, regardless of what the goal is.”
However, Schexnider said that this versatility can make the impact of these programs difficult to measure.
Benjamin Henwood, the director of the Center for Homelessness, Housing and Health Equity Research at USC, expressed a similar concern. In a study exploring the impact of cash distributions to people experiencing homelessness in San Francisco and Los Angeles, Henwood found that while recipients of the transfer were more likely to report not being unhoused, there was no statistically significant change that could be attributed to the cash transfer.
Henwood described the cash transfers as “incremental, not transformational” and said the small amount of money transferred and the short duration of the program might have limited the intervention's statistical efficacy.
Still, the Denver Basic Income Project, which to date has deployed $10.8 million to over 800 families and individuals, found that almost half of participants reported moving into stable independent housing within a year, a decisive success.
And, while the quantitative data from these pilot studies can be a mixed bag, the qualitative stories that these studies gather from participants, like Rodriguez, are “overwhelmingly positive,” Schexnider said.
Both Schexnider and Henwood also emphasized that their findings run counter to the stigma often associated with welfare programs.
Welfare is often mired in a societal belief that equates receiving assistance with personal failure, like laziness or irresponsibility. Some assume that participants will spend the additional money on what Henwood calls “temptation goods,” like drugs or alcohol.
The researchers said these beliefs are simply not true. In fact, Henwood noted that his study was just as much about proving that basic income did not lead to an increase in the purchase of temptation goods as it was about demonstrating the intervention's success.
Meanwhile, in a basic income study conducted by the non-profit OpenResearch, Schexnider said recipients worked fewer hours, but only by a few hours each week. She noted that most spent the additional time on childcare, transportation, or much-needed rest.
“For some in our country and globally, it’s a bit of a convenient myth — convenient for some — to paint people with low income as somehow lazy and deficient. And the data doesn’t bear that out,” said Elizabeth Crowe, the coordinator of the Elevate Boulder Guaranteed Income Program.
These researchers all welcomed the idea of a federal program, but highlighted the necessity for concrete, outcome-driven details in the project’s proposal.
Under the proposed legislation, the federal pilot program would last 3 years, and 10,000 participants would receive a monthly cash payment equal to the fair market rent for a 2-bedroom home in the ZIP Code where they reside. Watson Coleman said she would leave the details, such as who is eligible for the program, to “authentic technicians” or experts in the field.
Part of the researchers’ support stems from the fact that the program is not novel. Aside from initiatives like the Denver Basic Income Project, cash transfers are often considered the standard in charitable giving. And Schexnider said there are already successful federal programs that are essentially cash transfers, such as the Child Tax Credit.
For Gwen Battis, the project manager for the DBIP, the federal pilot program is an “inevitable need.”
“As AI takes jobs, we’re going to need a way to participate in the economy and pay for things,” she said.
In highlighting the effect of AI on employment, Battis hits upon a key driver in the movement for basic income.
Not only is the country experiencing record income inequality, but there are also questions about how artificial intelligence will negatively impact the job market.
Technology executives have indicated that they aspire to create artificial general intelligence, a machine capable of performing all the economically valuable work humans do on a day-to-day basis.
Dario Amodei, the CEO of AI start-up Anthropic, told Axios that AI could soon wipe out half of all entry-level white-collar jobs.
“Most [lawmakers] are unaware that this is about to happen," Amodei said. “It sounds crazy, and people just don’t believe it."
In recent years, Republican lawmakers at the state level have pushed back against guaranteed-income pilot programs.
Legislators in states like Arizona, Iowa, South Dakota, Texas, and Wisconsin have all introduced bills to ban income programs. They say such programs make participants overly reliant on the government.
State Rep. John Gillette of Arizona told Business Insider last year that guaranteed income programs are “socialist” and a “killer for the economy.”
“Is money a birthright now?” Gillette asked. “Do we just get born and get money from the government? Because I think the Founding Fathers would say that is very contrary to our capitalist system and encouraging people to work.”
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton sued a county in his state to block a basic income program. In the legal filing, he called the initiative a “socialist experiment” that was an “illegal and illegitimate government overreach.”
While their Republican counterparts in the U.S. Congress have yet to comment directly on the federal basic income bill, they have shown reticence toward more expansive welfare policies.
The House resoundingly passed a resolution on Nov. 21 that denounced the “horrors of socialism.” No Republican lawmaker voted against the measure, and 86 Democrats joined Republicans to approve it.
Some are also skeptical about the practical reality of the basic income proposal and other expansive welfare policies.
In his home state, Grady Lowery, a lecturer at the University of Tennessee, said politicians are actively presenting their state as a haven for those escaping the “socialist” New York and its mayor-elect, Zohran Mamdani.
“Not only is there not support for Mamdani here, there’s active fear and hostility towards this kind of socialist dictatorial figure that he represents,” Lowery said.
Lowery said the bill might have potential if the legislators could avoid the “socialist pejorative label,” which they have already garnered.
Watson Coleman is undeterred. The bill is now pending in the House Ways and Means Committee.
“I don't care if we're in this administration that didn't want to shelter, didn't want to feed, and didn't want to give health care to (people),” Watson-Coleman said. “I’m still going to advance my legislation that I think is legitimate work for the federal government to do.”
Sophie Baker covers politics for Medill on the Hill. She is a sophomore from Utah studying journalism and political science at Northwestern University. On campus, she writes for The Daily Northwestern, where she has served as an assistant city editor.
