Just two minor-party presidential candidates will be on the Oregon ballot this year. That’s the smallest number here since 1988.
[series: election-2016,left,56f47da999429c0031c62036] The most popular alternatives to Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton qualified for the Oregon ballot before Tuesday’s deadline. They are Libertarian nominee Gary Johnson and Green Party nominee Jill Stein.
Johnson is the former governor of New Mexico. He has some of the strongest polling numbers of any third-party candidate since Ralph Nader in 2000. Real Clear Politics puts his average support at 7.8 percent. Stein, a physician, is averaging just over 3 percent.
Johnson and Stein both ran in 2012 but are getting a boost this year because many voters dislike both Clinton and Trump. Meanwhile, leaders of the Oregon Constitution Party decided to keep its ballot line blank this year. They say some members didn’t want to take votes away from Trump.
No unaffiliated candidate qualified for the Oregon ballot. Evan McMullin, an ex-CIA agent from Utah is running as an independent with the support of many Republican insiders opposed to Trump. But he did not appear to mount an effort to win a spot on Oregon's ballot.