U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley’s confrontation with Democratic rival Lucas Kunce at the Missouri State Fair got a lot of media attention earlier this month — and perhaps set the tone for what could be an expensive and contentious general election matchup.
But standing roughly 20 feet from Kunce and Hawley was Jared Young. The Webb City businessman is also seeking Missouri’s U.S. Senate seat. He isn’t running as a Republican or Democrat, but rather as a member of the newly formed Better Party.
Young said that the Hawley-Kunce clash embodies why he decided to run outside the two-party system.
“What we saw here today is exactly why I’m running as an independent,” Young said. “If people would just sit down and actually talk to each other, they would recognize they have tons in common. They're worried about the same things, and we just need folks who can actually do that: Sit down, disagree productively, and work to solve problems. And you can't do that within the parties anymore.”
Whether Young is able to get traction in the U.S. Senate race is an open question, especially since Missouri doesn’t have a particularly robust history of supporting third party or independent candidates. St. Louis Board of Aldermen President Megan Green and state Sen. Tracy McCreery won election as independents, but they ultimately won races as Democrats. They were running without the party label because party leaders chose someone else to be the nominee in a special election.
During an episode of the Politically Speaking Hour on St. Louis on the Air, St. Louis University professor Christopher Duncan noted that third parties often face financial barriers to competing with Republicans or Democrats.
Third parties in the United States also face structural issues compared to countries like Canada or the United Kingdom, places where third parties or regional parties routinely win seats in parliament.
In some countries, Duncan said, political parties get a certain percentage of seats based on how much of the vote they won. And that means that if a party receives 40% of the vote and needs more than 50% to join a government, it may have to form a coalition with a smaller party that received a smaller percentage.
“The simple answer from a political science perspective is the structure of American elections,” Duncan said. “They make it notoriously difficult to think about third parties because it's so hard for them to actually get any seats or electoral votes.”
One place where third-party candidates have found success is in municipal elections. For instance: Nick Kasoff, who has run for a number of offices as a Libertarian, won election recently to the Ferguson City Council. Since candidates for city council and mayor typically run as nonpartisan candidates, Kasoff’s party affiliation likely played little role in whether he won or lost.
“A lot of other people don't usually have a really good idea even who's running for those elections, unless they've seen a TV commercial here or there or a sign on their way to work,” Duncan said.
Young hopes to break trend
While Young is likely an underdog in his race against Kunce or Hawley, he is running a much more well-funded campaign than other independent or third-party candidates.
According to the Federal Elections Commission, Young loaned himself $765,000 to kick-start his campaign. When donations from others were added to the mix, Young’s campaign received a total of about $930,000.
That’s not going to be nearly enough to match the millions of dollars Kunce or Hawley will spend or raise up until November. But if he can get more than 2% of the vote, Young’s Better Party will have ballot access in the 2026 election.
“If I was going to step up and run for office, I had to do it in such a way that I could stay true to my values and actually accomplish the thing that I think needs to be accomplished,” Young said. “And I just don't think that can be done as a Republican or Democrat right now.”
Young was also a guest on St. Louis Public Radio's Politically Speaking podcast.
“St. Louis on the Air” brings you the stories of St. Louis and the people who live, work and create in our region. The show is produced by Ulaa Kuziez, Miya Norfleet, Emily Woodbury, Danny Wicentowski, Elaine Cha and Alex Heuer. The audio engineer is Aaron Doerr. Send questions and comments about this story to talk@stlpr.org.
