The bipartisan centrist political group No Labels announced Thursday it would decline to field a presidential candidate in the 2024 election.
No Labels National Political Director Joe Cunningham, a former Democratic congressman from South Carolina, told Fox News the decision was not made lightly.
"Let me say, it's not for lack of trying," Cunningham said on "Your World." "The short answer is that to field this ticket, No Labels was looking for a hero, and a hero never emerged."
Cunningham reiterated No Labels' rubric for putting forward a candidate for a third-party bid: Americans calling for a third option to President Biden and former President Trump, and the determination their candidate would have a pathway to win the election.
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"That's where we ran into a bit of trouble – at the end of the day, we weren't able to find candidates that we felt had a straightforward path to victory in this," said Cunningham, who himself helmed an upset in a red district near Charleston that had been represented by former South Carolina GOP Gov. Mark Sanford at the time.
On "Your World," host Neil Cavuto noted that some politicians who seemed primed for a No Labels bid, like outgoing Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.V., had seemed to "drop out" of otherwise unstated contention.
Former Maryland Republican Gov. Larry Hogan, a Trump critic whose name had been bandied about as a potential third-party candidate, stepped down from his No Labels post in January, and soon announced a GOP bid in the Maryland U.S. Senate primary against former state Del. Robin Ficker.
Hogan leads in recent polling over his two prospective Democratic opponents, Prince George's County Executive Angela Alsobrooks and Rep. David Trone, D-Md., in what would be a major upset for the Republican Party in November.
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Cavuto also reported former New Jersey Republican Gov. Chris Christie's name had been rumored to be in the mix for a third-party bid, and that there was a chance No Labels could not make it onto enough state ballots.
"I'd respectfully disagree that we had an issue with the ballot access. We were on 21 states as of today. Getting ballot access in all 50 states plus D.C. was not going to be our challenge," Cunningham replied.
He said a major consideration was the political headwind that No Labels faced in the current environment.
"[P]ushing back against your respective political party is difficult in this duopoly, and the establishment does not reward dissent," he said.
"We found it difficult to find the leaders to step up with the courage to be able to say, 'OK, we're putting our country first and, you know, damn the consequences within our respective parties.'"
"At the end of the day, that's essentially what we're running up against… "
"I know that millions of Americans are disappointed to learn about this news," he said. "The common-sense majority that needs a voice, and at No Labels, we're going to continue to be a voice for that common-sense majority."
Cunningham said the group, to his knowledge, was never in talks with independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., and when pressed by Cavuto, said that although No Labels does not advocate for or against other candidates, he personally would choose Biden over Trump at this juncture.
