Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump have battled for the White House in recent months, and experts say votes for third-party candidates could be a deciding factor in who becomes the next president of the United States.

With the latest polls showing Harris and Trump deadlocked in battleground states across the country, the ballots for third-party candidates Jill Stein of the Green Party, independent Cornel West and Libertarian Chase Oliver could be enough to tip the scales. give.

VOA Persian spoke to all three. Their answers have been edited for length and clarity.

Jill Stein, Green Party candidate

VOA: At one of his last campaign rallies in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, former President Donald Trump praised you, saying he loved the Green Party and that you might be one of his favorite politicians. What do you think about this?

Jill Stein: I think about that about as much as I think about Donald Trump’s assessment of climate change, which is that he believes more or less the opposite of reality. I’m in this race to provide an alternative to the two bought and paid for parties that serve Wall Street and the war contractors and certainly not the American people. So I don’t have much appreciation for Donald Trump’s political strategies or values.

VOA: How much support do you expect to receive in battleground states like Michigan? There were some polls that suggested you have the support of more than 40% of the Arab-American population there.

Stone: What the exact numbers will be depends on how many people vote. It depends on how strong the voice is of not only the Muslim population, but also of many African Americans, Hispanics and young people who feel like they have no future under Kamala Harris, and they don’t have a future under Donald Trump. At this point it’s too early to tell. We do not work strictly on the basis of polls. We really do this on principle and for the long term. We would be very happy if we hit the 5% cut in the national poll in the national results, but that is very difficult to say at the moment.

VOA: What would be your position towards the government of Iran?

Stone: I think we should open the door to negotiations with Iran. Iran has elected a new president, who is reportedly moderate and interested in improving relations with the West, and we need to investigate that. I think the most crucial issue in the Middle East right now is resolving this expanding war, and Bibi (Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu’s intention to create a broader war and involve the US in it. I believe this is the greatest threat to peace in the Middle East today and has the potential to become a conflict even bigger than the Middle East.

Independent candidate Cornel West

VOA: How many states had your name on the ballot and why not?

Cornel West: We have 16 states where we have direct access to ballots. We have 24 states where we have write access, and that required petitions and signatures. So that required a lot of work from great volunteers. But it was very difficult. There has been a huge struggle, but we are coming out swinging.

VOA: How different will your policies be compared to what we hear from Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump?

West: Martin Luther King (Jr.) said that militarism, racism, poverty and materialism are the four forces sucking the democratic energy from the American social experiment. I take his criticism of militarism very seriously. I see that as a criticism of American foreign policy, where we are so eager to create these deadly forces instead of engaging in sensible diplomatic processes. And so there would be no genocide. I would have placed an embargo on any form of military or financial support to Israel, because it was very clear that they were exposing this kind of mass slaughter of innocent people, especially innocent children, women and men.

The same would apply when it comes to ending the war in Ukraine. The same would apply when it comes to dealing more diplomatically with China. I see Kamala Harris as a militaristic black woman. This means that she is not only prepared to provoke Putin, but also to put pressure on him. And I think that Putin himself is still a gangster and a war criminal in his own way, but he has the right: Russia has the right to security. And the same goes for China. There is too much provocation, and I think this is moving us toward World War III, the same way Trump is moving us toward World War II at home. And that was one reason why I wanted to offer some kind of alternative to Trump and (US President Joe) Biden.

And when Biden had his LBJ moment (referring to Biden’s poor debate performance), something we talked about many, many months ago, we just predicted that Harris is now pushing the same militarism in Gaza. And of course genocide, the crime of genocide, is a litmus test for the morality of any country, and if you deny it, if you enable it, it is a sign that you have no moral force in your military. policy.

VOA: Many people in the occupied West Bank are alarmed by Tehran’s support for militants in Gaza. How do you see this, given the moral aspects of your vision, your doctrine and your policies?

West: Malcolm People can really only support movements for motivations that are themselves highly suspect. When the French supported the American revolutionaries, when Lafayette came to the United States, it was partly because the French were opposed to the British in Europe. They didn’t have much solidarity with these colonists who were reacting to the British Empire. …The Soviet Union supported the freedom struggle in Africa. It wasn’t always because they loved Africans so much. It was anti-United States. There was a Cold War going on and their policies in that regard were strategic and tactical. The same would apply to Iran vis-à-vis the Palestinians.

So I think we have to be very honest about the ways in which the motives may not always be attractive, but if you’re a people like the Palestinians right now, whose backs are against the wall, they need help from whoever, and that is very bad. It is important that people raise awareness of their plight so that their babies are not crushed. But that doesn’t mean those who support them always have the right motives, and so we can still be critical of what those motives are.

Chase Oliver, candidate for the Libertarian Party

VOA: In your platform you said that libertarians seek peace with the world in the United States. How different will your foreign policy be?

Chase Oliver: It would be a drastic difference from what has been the status quo, especially since I became an adult. Since I’ve grown up, let’s just call it the post-9/11 War on Terror type foreign policy mentality that we’ve had, which I think is rooted in ideas that are very black and white. You’re either with us or you’re with the terrorists.

The best way to solve a problem is through preventive war or by increasing our military presence in the region, to increase our muscle power. And what that has done, I think, is actually created even more instability, especially in the Middle East, which I don’t think has been a success, despite the trillions of dollars that we’ve spent in both Iraq and Afghanistan. I don’t think you can say that any of these countries are a particular stronghold of democracy, or that the region itself is more stable now than before.

And so for me I would say, let’s take away our military footprint and start using our diplomatic power. Let’s meet world leaders directly, one on one. Let’s start building coalitions around peaceful ideas, free trade and voluntary exchange to break down the barriers between our nations so we can have cultural exchanges with each other. I think these are the ideas we really need to encourage, not a militarized foreign policy that destroys the idea that the United States should be the enforcer of the world.

VOA: So you don’t see America as the leader of the free world with its responsibilities?

Oliver: I absolutely see America as a leader in terms of the markets of the world, the economic engine of the world, the diplomatic arm of the world. But it doesn’t have to come using the world’s military might. Teddy Roosevelt said, “Speak softly and carry a big stick.” We have a very powerful military that can defend ourselves, and ultimately, if necessary and if Congress were to declare war, could wage war anywhere in the world with absolute certainty that we could dominate our opponent. But you don’t flex your muscles like that everywhere in the world. That is not a strong position. If you use military power to push your agenda, that’s actually a weak position, because good ideas don’t require violence, and you should be able to work diplomatically all over the world.

And I recognize that the world is not perfect. The world does not lack violence. The world does not lack bad people, especially governments around the world that represent good people. And Iran is no different. The government of Iran is disgusting. They insult their people. They limit their rights. But the people of Iran are good, innocent people who don’t deserve to have things like airstrikes and missiles rained down on them because of the evil of their government. And I hope that eventually we can liberalize the world more towards more liberalized things like freedom of speech, freedom of movement and freedom of religion. But that’s not just because we knock people down.

VOA: How difficult is it to run as a third party candidate?

Oliver: Running for office as an alternative party comes with many challenges because the two mainstream parties have a lot of built-in power, both in terms of the number of elected officials they have and things like taxpayer-funded primaries. So they’re essentially taking taxes out of my pocket to fund primaries that help promote the candidates who are Republicans and Democrats.

And as libertarians we are a bit stuck there. So there are a lot of challenges, especially around things like access to ballots. There are many solutions. And actually, a big part of my platform is something called the Voter Act, which will open up this process, not just to libertarians like me, but to all kinds of other alternative parties that really need to make their voices heard.