The number of U.S. voters registered as Libertarian has surged by 92 percent since 2008, reports Ballot Access News in its March 2018 edition. That increase has come at the expense of both Democrats, who are down by 8 percent over the same time period, and Republicans, who are down by 5 percent. The number of voters registered as independent or with other parties has increased by 19 percent.

“This is heartening news,” said Libertarian National Committee Chair Nicholas Sarwark. “In 2016, our presidential candidate Gov. Gary Johnson received a record number of votes for a Libertarian in a presidential election, even surpassing the vote total for Ron Paul in 1988. The grassroots energy we are seeing in 2018 is amazing. The LP has set a national goal of running more than 2,000 candidates for federal, state, and local office this year.”

The list of this year’s Libertarian Party candidates has reached 619 so far, and more are added daily. The LP has already attained ballot access in 39 states.

“Of course, the ultimate goal is to win elective office and to change government policy in a way that benefits all Americans,” Sarwark said. “There are currently 158 Libertarians who hold elective office in state and local governments. We believe that the catalysts are in place for Libertarians to continue surging and surpassing both Democrats and Republicans in terms of voter numbers and elected officials.”

Democrats continue ratcheting up both domestic government spending and taxes. Most voters agree with Libertarians that the problem is not that taxes are too low, it’s that government spending is too high — and taxes wind up rising to pay for it all.

Republicans continue increasing spending for military, intelligence, and police even while they say they want to cut taxes. Most voters agree with Libertarians that you can’t have it both ways; government spending needs to drop along with the tax rate. Furthermore, voters agree with Libertarians that more than half of the government’s military spending is wasted on counterproductive involvement in foreign civil wars. We also waste about half of our law enforcement budget on locking people up for consensual “crimes” like using cannabis.

“Voters sense that government spends too much, both at home and abroad,” Sarwark said. “Voters sense that their retirements are in jeopardy from to the ill-advised Federal Reserve policy of lowering the return on savings. Democrats and Republicans are in denial that we have a problem. Libertarians recognize both the problems and the necessary solutions, and have the courage to ask the American people to let our candidates for public office help restore freedom and sanity.”