Libertarian Chase Oliver talks ahead of November election | Full interview

You Chase Oliver. Thank you so much for being here with us. We appreciate it. Thank you for having me look forward to speaking with you and your audience today. So, for the audience, for those who aren't familiar, what does it mean to be a libertarian in 2024? Well, you know, to me, a libertarian, uh, broadly speaking, allows people to live their own life with their own values so long as they do. So in peace, we want to limit the government down to its appropriate size, which is to only be protecting our civil liberties and, and, and, you know, uh from harm, but not, you know, control every aspect of our lives, every decision we make. So I say if you're not harming anybody, uh, your life is your life, your body is your body, your business is your business and your property is your property. It's not mine and it certainly isn't. The government's so small government. Absolutely limited down to size, uh, to, you know, much smaller than what we have today. Certainly at the federal level here. Let me ask you this. Let's take it back to your Senate race, right. Here in your home state of Georgia. Uh, back in 2022 roughly 80,000 votes you were able to get in that race between Rafael Warnock Kersha Walker and yourself 2% of the vote you were able to take there. My question to you is why run for president of the entire country when you were only able to take about 2% of votes in your home state of Georgia for that senate race. Well, I think one of the most important things to be when you're eight, third party or an independent candidate is a true disruptor of the two party system. That's what voters are looking for is to actually disrupt the status quo and to show that there's an alternative option on the ballot that can actually grow, uh in the long term. And we were, of course, as a, as a senate candidate, I disrupted the two party system quite well by forcing that runoff. Uh, you know, encouraging voters to know that they have more than two choices. And, uh, that's why over 80,000 Georgians came out and selected me as their candidate because they wanted to signal both. They support the libertarian message, but also they are not in support of a broken two party system. And as soon as I caused that run off, I started getting calls from across the country saying, you know, you communicate our values really well, you disrupted the two party system really Well, in Georgia, have you ever thought about doing that in the other 50 states? And I thought I was crazy. You know, the first time I got that call, I was like, no, that's, that's crazy after you get about, you know, 20 calls a day uh for a few days after you cause them off. You thought, OK, maybe there's something to build here and we explored that option. We, we did the process with you. We formed an exploratory committee. We got great enthusiasm and won our party's nomination. So, yeah, it, it's all about disrupting the two party system and if you can do that with just 2% of the vote, uh that's a, that is its own kind of win and there's all kinds of victories outside of, of course, winning the White House, we can look to, we'll, we'll absolutely get to those because that's one of my questions. But looking ahead at this race for 2024 is that the goal here to disrupt the two party system or do you realistically think that you can win the White House first off? You have to run to win. If you're not running with the, with the uh with the purpose of winning running as you were going to win, you're not doing it right. You're doing a disservice to your supporters, to your voters, to those who have uh volunteer for your campaign. So I'm absolutely in this to win it. You know, we've already seen all sorts of unique things happen in this election from, uh, people taking shots at candidates, two candidates have now dropped out of the race. Uh And, and one has been replaced. Uh It's a very unique election cycle, so nothing is outside of the realm of possibility. And I'm gonna keep fighting as hard as I can to win this election absent that win. There's a lot of other things we can look to as uh signifiers of victories for the Libertarian Party. So let's talk about that. Um Clearly, it's a long shot to get that seat in the White House. What other wins are you guys going for here as a Libertarian Party? Yeah. So long term, we're looking, how can we build our party up? So, uh there are wins like ballot access, wins here in the State of Georgia. We can win ballot access for future candidates to run statewide. There are other states across the country that rely on this presidential and uh vice presidential vote to earn that ballot access across the country. We wanna make it easier for Libertarians and others to be able to run. Uh Other uh signifier are major party status. When you earn major party status, you get access to say the primary ballot debate, inclusion, more medium and focus. Uh And so that's also a win for our candidates. And of course, we want to elect local Libertarians across the country. I've endorsed uh many libertarians are running uh in New York communities and neighborhoods all across the country when they get elected and they start putting our uh philosophy in a practice. That's the proof of concept we see that's gonna build our bench up in the long term. So it's not just two years or the next financial quarter. I'm thinking about the next quarter century of how can we build a party that challenges Republicans and Democrats. And that was gonna be my next question for you. Clearly, you have taken kind of the national stage, the national phase of the party this election season. But why not run for something? That's a little bit more local here in Georgia where you could potentially enact real change. A great question. Well, first and foremost, we have ballot access challenges here in Georgia. Now we have statewide ballot access for the Libertarian Party, but to even run locally for State Senate or State House or, or even for a congressional seat, we require uh tens of thousands of signatures to be gathered. And that is a huge burden for candidates that Republicans and Democrats don't have. It's why you haven't seen a Libertarian running for Congress on your ballot uh really ever other than special elections like I participated in, in 2020 because there's a huge initial cost uh that Republicans and Democrats just don't have to overcome. And so we would see a lot more candidates running locally as Libertarians and independents and third parties all up and down the state. If the Democrats and Republicans would just loosen the ballot access requirements and make it easier. Now, of course, they're not gonna do that because that makes it easier for people to challenge them, particularly in the gerrymander districts where, you know, uh often times you only have one name on your ballot. And is that really democracy? I don't think it is. And so I think we need to challenge our legislature to loosen ballot access restrictions. So every race can truly be competitive here in the state of Georgia. Um Can you give me a policy or principle both on the Republican and Democrat sides that you do agree with? Well, you know, it's a lot about is talking the talk and not walking the walk, like, uh you know, Republicans talk about fiscal conservatism. I'm right there with them. I wanna see a government that's actually, you know, spending less than it's taking in balancing our budget. Uh and actually putting real, you know, uh making it easier to start a small business, easing up the restrictions, uh you know, loosening up the, the, the red tape that makes it hard from new entrepreneurs to enter the space. But when you see Republicans in practice, they just don't get there, they still run debts and deficits and they still, of course, love to have uh red tape and regulatory hurdles that help the people who benefit them, but not maybe the mom and pop business conversely, Democrats, you know, they talk a great game about, you know, civil rights and free speech, but they are uh the same party that is just to find uh you know, pushing information out, pushing people out of uh you know, social media spaces because they say, well, this information isn't correct. And what that does is actually creates more distrust uh in official channels because you're saying, oh, you can only listen to the information that we deem as correct. Uh And there's just a lot of other policies and, and frankly, as uh as far as uh both parties are concerned, it's going to be the status quo if one of them gets elected this November, this is why I don't fear one over the other because I know no matter who wins, we're all gonna kind of lose. I, I wanna ask you something on the social media aspect. Do you, are you in favor of deregulating any type of oversight then for, on social media? Uh So I believe in property rights. You know, I think if you are the head of a social media platform, you should be able to determine for yourself what information you wanna have on your platform based on your algorithm based on what's gonna be profitable for you and your advertisers. Usually that's the kind of the bottom line there, but no, I don't think we need strict government oversight about what's said online, I actually enjoy the freedom of the internet. But you also mentioned that people should have the freedom to do what they want to do as long as it's not harming anybody. If data shows that social media, some aspects of it are harming people shouldn't government step in and try to fix that. Well, the rule to adjudicate those harms would be in the judicial branch. So if you feel like a social media company has harmed you or your reputation or your business, for instance, that's when you take them to court and you can prove that out in front of a jury, a jury can adjudicate whether in fact there is guilt or innocence there. And then, uh, award damages based on that. That's exactly where those realms belong, which is why I'm a big believer in removing tort caps all together in civil litigation because right now in far too many industries, uh, we've actually written in a cap for what you can sue for and, uh, you know, companies, especially these giant multinationals, they just build that in their cost of doing business. I think if we remove those caps, you'd see a lot more citizen juries handing out a lot more stiffer penalties. And that would be an incentive for businesses, social media companies included to do better by their consumers. And that one on the topic of social media, let me ask you about this, um, former President Donald Trump, he had a conversation with Elon Musk where he on, I believe it was on X where he mentioned that he wanted to potentially take steps to abolish the Department of Education. Uh That's also a policy that is listed on your site, your campaign site. Can you talk about if you were elected president? What, what does it mean to abolish the Department of Education? Because some voters hear that and say, oh my gosh, like even that was part of the Heritage Foundation's project 2025. And that's something that Democrats have really seized on. So, what would your plan be there? Well, first, uh we need to understand that the Department of Education has been around since the Carter administration, we put uh billions and billions in billions of dollars into that department and we've not seen an increase in the reading and writing scores that have correlated with that spending. And so to me, it's putting good tax money after bad. Uh and instead of putting good money after bad, what we need to do is realize that if we uh remove the Department of Education, we block grant that money back to the States. We're gonna create 50 laboratories of innovation across each state, be being able to determine how best to educate their young people, create critical thinkers and lifelong learners. And what we're gonna see is the best practices being adopted across the nation. The worst practices will be falling by the wayside and they will adapt to what's best practices. Uh This uh also allows for regional development of education. You know, what's good for a student in Georgia might not be what's best for a student in Montana or California or New England. And so when we deregulate this and decentralize this from this uh kind of department of education, it's been centrally planned, we can see, you know, more innovation in the education space that will ultimately be better for students in the long run. Uh It's not that I don't want students to get a great education is that I feel like centralizing this through the Department of Education has been a failure. If we look at the statistics, it's just not working. Uh And I think it's better to localize that education as much as possible and particularly give more power to parents and students to determine the type of schools they have in their neighborhood uh based on, you know, let's fund a student uh zip code for instance, if we're gonna be funding uh education. So you do agree with that specific policy. Yes, absolutely. I think actually, uh if you were to look at the uh Republicans, they probably took that idea from Libertarians who since our founding, well, since the Department of Education came about have been saying that this is probably a necessary department we don't need. Um And, you know, I'm actually gonna get to that. Let's, let's skip to that part. Uh because you, you mentioned when we're talking about inflation and cost of living, we know that that is a crisis for so many people today. Uh you said by slashing spending and balancing the budget, we can crush inflation, ignite a stronger, more vibrant economy that works for everyone. What would you slash first? Well, first and foremost, uh it's one of the largest drivers of our debt and deficit is our Pentagon spending. Uh We spend hundreds of billions of dollars around the world, trillions of dollars a year uh to, to fund a military that we don't have to have this footprint around the world to keep ourselves safe. That's the purpose of our military is to defend the people of the United States from being invaded, from being attacked. Uh an outside force. What we are doing right now is spending uh you know, trillions of dollars over my lifetime fighting wars overseas that we don't need to be fighting. Uh And if you care about the environment, by the way, the Pentagon, the dod is the largest contributor to carbon uh in our government. So if you want to actually like help fight the environment, you know, the environmental damage also bring people home, create more peace around the world. You slash the Pentagon, uh you also have slashing the Pentagon also. I mean, is that also slashing military spending or? Oh yeah, that would be slashing military spending, but you don't have to stop there. There are departments that are completely redundant all through the federal, uh, you know, the federal government that either there's already another department that does that job or there's no need for the federal government to be doing that job altogether. That's gonna be blocked granted back to the States or back to localities. Uh, you go line by line through the budget and, yeah, you do also have to touch the third re of American politics, which is the entitlement, Social Security Medicare Medicaid, uh particularly for younger workers like myself, we know that even if we pay into social security, that trust is bankrupt. Uh And we're not gonna see those benefits. So uh we need to find a way to transition younger workers like myself away from a centrally planned retirement plan like social security uh and remove that into the private marketplace. We're gonna get better returns. If you just put your money in the S and P 500 you get better returns than you would from Social Security. So, but to older voters who might hear that they might say, wait a second, you wanna take away what I have been working up to. What, what is your answer to that? Well, my answer to that is uh check out my website and the policy because you know, for older voters, people like my parents, they live on a fixed income. I don't want to remove them from that first off, raise your hand. If you're a millennial, who can take care of your parents if their fixed income is removed right now, no millennials hands are going up. And so we have to recognize the reality. We're in. Those who are living on a fixed income should be able to, those who are near retirement should be able to retire. But younger workers like me who are four year younger, we should recognize the reality that's ahead of us and start planning for it because otherwise we're just kicking the can down the road and that misery is gonna be a lot worse. The pain will be a lot worse. If we try to rip the mandate off in 20 years, then we try to do it right now. Let's talk about just back to the, the run for president. We spoke about kind of the goal of what you would like to achieve. You are on the ballot in much of the nation, including right here in Georgia, including several swing states. Going back to that, disrupting the balance. What, what's your goal? Well, my goal is to provide voters a true choice on the ballot. They can feel good about voting for so many people don't even get out to vote, uh, because they just don't see a choice that represents them. And that's a true, uh, travesty of our, of our republic is that, you know, like four in 10 voters just don't feel represented and I want voters to know that they can get out and support somebody without having to say, well, I'm voting for this because I don't like the other person, which is all you're getting from Republicans and Democrats. Many of these voters who are voting for Trump or voting for Harris are doing so because they don't like the, the alternative Trump or Harris. What do you say? And I don't mean to cut you off, but just on that point, what do you say to people who say even if they vote for a chase Oliver, that it's kind of a throwaway vote because you're likely not going to win the presidency. Well, if you live in one of the states that have ballot access requirements or major party status, you're actually creating the building blocks for further success on down the line. You're actually building something up foundation. Uh And so there's a success there also. So you're letting your voice be heard about the issues that most matter to you. And so if you get out and vote libertarian in this election, perhaps the Democrats and Republicans adopt policy strategies that align more with you. They say, hey, this is what these people wanted to see. That's why I'm going to support this in the future. And again, uh if we can even change the way we vote to something like a rank choice, voting an instant runoff, so we don't have to wait weeks to see who wins the runoff. Uh Voters could feel comfortable selecting a Libertarian first. And Democrats and Republicans would come to those independent or libertarian voters and say here's why you put a second on the ballot because we're gonna give you A B and C. So not only do we need to expand who can get on the ballot, we need to change the way we vote. So we have a more rep uh responsive and representative democracy to have more influence. It sounds like let's talk about some policy here. Um We talked about inflation, the cost of living. I wanna ask you about war. You mentioned that diplomacy is better than war. Um This week we saw several hostages killed in Gaza. Um a very hard situation for anybody, especially um those who are living in the Middle East right now as president of the United States. If elected, what would you do to end this war? And are you in favor of an arms embargo to Israel? So I'm in favor of not providing military aid really to anybody. So it's not just Israel specific, but yes, I would like to see a drawback of military aid around the world, but I do think we need to take a lead in pressuring a for a release of the hostages and yes, a true and lasting cease fire. So we can see Gaza rebuilt and so we can see Palestinians and Israelis coming to the table for a peaceful solution, whether it's one state or two state, they need to be leading the way there. And the biggest travesty of this conflict that we see is that both Palestinians and Israelis have been let down by the people who purport to represent them. They're purported governments, whether it's Hamas and Gaza, which has done horrible terrorism has, has prevented the growth of society in Gaza and has basically held innocent people hostages themselves to a government that's not responsible and none of these people voted for, you know, the average age of a Gazan. You know, a lot of these people are Children that were not around when Hamas was quote unquote, elected into power. Conversely, the Netanyahu government is letting down Israel in its response to the October 7th attacks being so heavy handed killing so many innocent people, uh, that has turned international goodwill against, uh, people who should be responding to a terrorist attack in a way that is more, more surgical and leading to less civilian deaths. Um And so I think both these populations are being let down by their governments and it's gonna take both of these populations to reject the violence that their governments are putting forward to forge a peaceful way forward. It's gonna be regular Israelis and regular Palestinians, not their government, that's gonna have to get that done. Um And sadly, sadly, no matter when we see a cease fire, I don't think that's really on the horizon but the United States should be taking the lead diplomatically there. We should be saying, you know, this isn't a military solution here. This is going to have to require people coming to a table, extending hands and finding a peaceful solution that doesn't involve the continued killing. And I continue to call for that cease fire. Do you think that Netanyahu should step down? Yes, for several reasons. First and foremost, he claimed he was to keep the people of Israel safe. And October 7th happened on his watch and we still haven't had a proper investigation as to why those failures happened, that allowed that attack to happen in the first place. And I think there were already questions of corruption and other things before October 7th. So yes, I do think Netanyahu should step down and allow for more leadership uh new leadership in Israel to lead a peaceful path forward. Um We spoke a little bit about education. Um We could, we can expand on it just a little bit more. You say when you create a one size fits all, you create cracks that students fall through. Let's talk, bring it back to Georgia because this is where you live. You, you've seen the, the education system here. What would you change specifically on a local level in Georgia when it comes to our kids? Yeah. So I think if we're gonna be using taxpayer funds to fund schools, uh I believe in the fund the student, not the system model, instead of funding a centralized, you know, uh public school system that comes out of a county seat, you, you uh, earmark that money directly to every uh child for their parent to determine where their kid can go to school. Now, if you're a place that has great public schools, those schools will still stay open, people will continue to fund those buildings, fund the logistics. They already got the bus routes, the teachers, everything. But if you're saying in the city of Atlanta where the schools where we had a cheating scandal where teachers and administrators got caught cheating on tests. Maybe as a parent in Atlanta, you want better options for your kids and guess who's gonna step in that space when we have a fun student, not systems model as educational entrepreneurs to open up new schools. And let's say your kid is great at science or technology or engineering. Let's find a stem school that we can fund for that kid to go to a school that's gonna push exactly what they wanna do uh and help them grow and thrive there, maybe your kid is the next performing artist. They're gonna perform at Juilliard or on the next Broadway stage. Well, let them go to a performing arts school that's gonna stress the areas of education they find to be important for them as a student. This provides more diversity and also actually helps teachers too because teachers right now, many great teachers they got in the profession because they wanna help students and guess what? They get stuck in the public school model and go, wow. The curriculum here is so stilted. It's broken. I could teach better if I could do this wanna fund students. Not citizens model, teachers could find a school that's going to allow them to spread their wings and teach the best of their ability to create more critical thinkers, lifelong learners in our students. And that's what we really need. We don't need to be uh beholden to a government model of education. We need to be beholden to our students to have a better way to educate them and create better standards for them going forward. Thank you. Uh two more topics for us here. Uh Immigration, what does a 21st century Ellis Island look like? Well, very much kind of uh a modern version of what the 19th century Ellis Island looked like. You would come off of a ship. You would declare who you were submit yourself basic to a basic background check into a medical check. That's what we need to be having at ports of entry along our southern border is allowing people who want to come here to work to do so we can properly process people a lot more quickly than we are right now. And right now it's just gumming up the asylum system because there is no legal avenue for people to quickly come here to work. And so you're either entering the country illegally or you're gumming up the asylum system. I think it would be much better to say, hey, come through a port of entry, declare who you are. Submit to the background check, submit to a health check. If you're good to go, you're good to go. This would also lead lead to seasonal employees, uh agricultural workers coming when they're needed, going back home when they're not as opposed to staying here stuck. Uh And it would also, you know, prevent human exploitation for uh from Coyotes of the border as well. What do you say to those who are coming because they feel like they cannot go back home. Well, I want them to know that if they just wanna come here and work and start their American dream, they should be welcomed with open arms here. And in fact, if we look at the statistics, uh immigrants help build this country up, they help provide the labor that we need. They help create businesses that create jobs in this country. Uh Statistically speaking, they actually uh Children of immigrants or immigrants themselves create jobs at a greater rate, uh create businesses at a greater rate rather than native born American citizens. Uh This is a work ethic that we should be wanting in this country. It helped build us up through the 20th century. Uh because of Ellis Island immigration, that's why we had the Italian American, Irish American, Polish American German American uh communities that came through the last great wave. Uh And we need to be celebrating the next group of people who are gonna come here at the American uh patchwork quilt, the American melting pot. And I look forward to that. I enjoy living in Atlanta because we're such a diverse city. And uh I don't fear my immigrant neighbor. I fear those who would wanna do harm to somebody because they came here from somewhere else seeking a better life because that's where most of us came here from is from somewhere else seeking a better life. And, uh I wouldn't wanna stop that just because, uh, I've had a history here. I don't wanna pull a ladder up behind me. And so, uh, immigrants make this country strong and we should support them. And when you describe your policy of, hey, you come to the border port of entry, do a background check. You're good to go, go work. You make it kind of sound very, very simple. Should the process be that simple? And why doesn't it seem so simple right now? Well, I think the process certainly should be more simple than what it is. And if you want to look at the greatest example of bad government and red tape and regulation, uh just look at the process of becoming a worker here or even worse, becoming a citizen here, uh, the time it takes the expense. That's all because government likes to put barriers in the way they like to centrally plan these things. I trust the free hand of the market to determine labor that needs to come here. Uh, if there are jobs here and that people need to work, people will come here to work those jobs, uh, you know, absent, you know, uh, a welfare system that will attract people, which, of course, libertarians, we oppose a, a giant welfare system as well. Uh You know, the market will act as it needs to. We don't have to have this complicated system. And in fact, the complicated system creates much of the misery that we're seeing uh both in terms of uh what we're seeing at the border as well as, you know, creates shadow communities all across this country. Why is there uh increased crime in some of these areas? Because if you're an immigrant, you maybe don't for a crime because you're fearing put your name on paper and someone realizing you're an immigrant and wanting to deport you back home. Let's move these people out of the shadows. Why are wages being driven down? Well, because if you're an immigrant, someone can say you're gonna take the wage, I'm going to offer you or I'm gonna report you or get you deported. And so you settle for less. But if we had these people having true documentation, they wouldn't be driving the wages down. They'd be competing in a free market for wages, they would actually hold wages uh or help grow wages. Uh And so much of the process that we have is broken and it's broken because there are people who intend for it to stay broken because it either provides them cheap wages or provides them a political football to kick the can down the road uh to fight for votes. And uh I think it's just better to solve the problem and solving the problem is what you would think most politicians want to do that are vying for votes to get elected. Let's say you won president of the United States and we'll just stick to immigration. So, since we were just talking about that, how could you convince Congress to pass something like this? We saw a bipartisan immigration bill that was struck down and it seemed as if that was kind of the closest that they've gotten to um fixing this issue. How would you convince Congress to fix it? Well, I think uh part of why we need to elect more libertarians is because we do need to have more, uh you know, quote unquote adults in the room when the Democrats or Republicans are just slinging mud at one another. You need to have a third player, a broker in the business who's saying, you know, I'm not interested in either one of you. Uh having a political win here. I'm, I'm interested in having a political win for the country. Uh And, and so I think even having a third voice period will help the process along. Uh But it's gonna require you to sit down with Democrats and republicans to say, you know, here's the brass tax, here's the thing that's going to benefit the people in your states and your communities if we get this done. And here's the, and here's the things that will be to the detriment of your communities if we don't get this done. Uh And we have to be serious, you know, uh that, you know, you can't let the perfect be the enemy of the good either. Uh A as much as I would like to be a political North star and wave a magic wand and have everything happen exactly the way I would want to. Uh that's just not realistic, that's even less realistic than the idea, you know, that the people call me a long shot. The true long shot would be if I got elected and I just got everything that I wanted. Uh And so you have to know that if you're going in the chair, if you're gonna be the guy that's behind the desk, uh you're gonna have to be willing to negotiate and work with people that maybe you'd, maybe you don't agree with on everything but find the areas of agreement, find those neuro paths and make it happen. And if you do that one step at a time we can make our country more free and more prosperous than it is today. The final topic I wanna talk to you about is division in the country. First, I wanna start the question by asking. Have you ever voted Democrat or Republican? Yeah, I actually was a democrat, uh, up until 2008. Uh, because I opposed the Bush wars and then, uh, I supported Barack Obama. He got elected and, uh, didn't end the wars. So it kind of pushed me out of the two party system, but I voted for Democrats, Republicans and, and most, you know, of course, libertarians uh throughout my life. So when you look at a two party system, you have said, and other people have said that it just creates division by having another third party come in. Would it not just divide the country into three or would it unify the country? Well, what you would see is you would see coalition building, uh if you had three or more parties in government, you know, most of the nations of Europe have like four or five political parties and what they have to do is they have to go uh coalition government, they have to find areas of agreement, you know, say, hey, I agree with Republicans on this area. Let's work together with them or hey, maybe there's Democrats who have this idea that I support, let's work across a coalition to get that happening. Hey, there's some greens or there's some libertarians, there's some independence, let's find those areas of agreement. And that's where you get real consensus building and that's where you can over the long term, uh, pass legislation and, and govern in a way that's more representative of the total population as opposed to two sides that are constantly be driven further away from each other. Like, uh, you know, like, uh, when you try to put a magnet just repels each other. That's what we have with the two party system. And when that's to do is push our politics further and further apart, more partisanship, more polarization. And of course, who is that serving the people who pay for those people, the lobbyists and the corporate people who boss those lobbyists around, they're not fighting for you and me and they're being traded like auction at ac yard. And that is a problem that we have in our democracy. And the only way to fix that is have a true, more representative democracy, add more people to the ballot change the way we vote so we can have more choices and more voices in our politics. Mr Oliver, thank you so much for coming in. We appreciate it.