National Convention 2020

2020 Libertarian National Convention
Convention
TANSTAAFL (There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch)
Dates:	May 22—24 (POTUS ticket nomination) July 8—12 (remaining business)
Location:	Online Orlando, Florida
Venue:	Online Rosen Centre, Orange County Convention Center
Media
Website:	Website
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The 2020 Libertarian National Convention was a National Convention of the Libertarian Party. Delegates were selected by the state affiliates. Business included nomination of the LP's national ticket, amendments to the LP's bylaws, and election of members to internal positions. The in-person component of this event also included speaker sessions, meal events, and an exhibition hall.

Minutes

• Minutes of First Sitting, May 22-24, 2020 (info)
• Minutes of Second Sitting, July 9-12, 2020 (info)

Presidential/Vice-Presidential Nomination

On 23 May 2020, Jo Jorgensen was nominated for President on the 4th Presidential ballot with Spike Cohen nominated for Vice-President on the 3rd Vice-Presidential Ballot the next day.

Presidential Nomination

Candidates

Main article: 2020 Libertarian Party Presidential Candidates

The candidates listed below were listed on the convention ballot after receiving nomination tokens from the delegation.

Name	Background	State	Campaign	Announced
Jim Gray (running mate- Larry Sharpe)	former Presiding Judge of the Superior Court of Orange County, California 2012 Libertarian nominee for Vice-President	California	website	13 April 2020
Jacob Hornberger	Future of Freedom Foundation, Founder and President	Virginia	website	2 November 2019
Jo Jorgensen	Psychology Senior Lecturer at Clemson University 1996 Libertarian nominee for Vice-President	South Carolina	website	13 August 2019
Adam Kokesh	Anti-War Activist and Author 2018 Write-in Candidate for U.S. Senate from Arizona	Arizona	website	18 July 2013
John Monds	2014 Libertarian Party of Georgia Nominee for Public Service Commission, District 1 2010 Libertarian Party of Georgia nominee for Governor	Georgia	website	2 February 2020
Vermin Supreme (running mate- Spike Cohen)	Performance Artist and Activist Candidate for President since 1992	Massachusetts	website	28 May 2018

May 21 Debate Participants

The following candidates received enough tokens to participate in the May 21 Presidential debate.

Name	Tokens (out of 915)
Jacob Hornberger	224
Jo Jorgensen	189
John Monds	113
Jim Gray	109
Vermin Supreme	100

1st Ballot

2020 Libertarian Party Nomination for President of the United States

1st Ballot (50% of Delegates needed to win)

Name	Votes	Percent
Jo Jorgensen	248	24.4%
Jacob Hornberger	236	23.2%
Vermin Supreme	171	16.8%
John Monds	147	14.5%
Jim Gray	98	9.6%
Adam Kokesh	77	7.6%
NOTA	8	0.8%
Write-ins (Various)	32	3%

^*Write-Ins 32 (Amash 17, Sarwark 5, Vohra 3, Ardeleanu 2, Snowden 2, Stossel 1, Chafee 1, Boogie 1)

No candidate received a majority of delegate votes on the first ballot, leading to the next round of voting. Adam Kokesh was eliminated from the 2nd ballot.

2nd Ballot

2020 Libertarian Party Nomination for President of the United States

2nd Ballot (50% of Delegates needed to win)

Name	Votes	Percent
Jo Jorgensen	339	32.98%
Jacob Hornberger	257	25%
Vermin Supreme	184	17.90%
John Monds	169	16.44%
Jim Gray	64	6.24%
NOTA	6	0.58%
Adam Kokesh (write-in)	6	0.58%
Write-ins (Various)*	3	0.3%

^* Write-ins 3 (Amash 1, Sarwark 1, Perry 1)

No candidate received a majority of delegate votes on the second ballot, leading to the next round of voting. Jim Gray was eliminated from the 3rd ballot and endorsed Jo Jorgensen.

3rd Ballot

2020 Libertarian Party Nomination for President of the United States

3rd Ballot (50% of Delegates needed to win)

Name	Votes	Percent
Jo Jorgensen	390	38.11%
Jacob Hornberger	264	25.73%
Vermin Supreme	188	18.32%
John Monds	174	16.86%
NOTA	7	0.68%
Write-ins (Various)*	3	0.3%

^*Write-Ins 3 (Sarwark 1, Kokesh 1, Ebke 1)

No candidate received a majority of delegate votes on the third ballot, leading to the next round of voting. John Monds was eliminated from the 4th ballot and endorsed Jo Jorgensen.

4th Ballot

2020 Libertarian Party Nomination for President of the United States

4th Ballot (50% of Delegates needed to win)

Name	Votes	Percent
Jo Jorgensen	524	51.07%
Jacob Hornberger	285	27.78%
Vermin Supreme	206	20.08%
NOTA	4	0.39%
Write-ins (Various)*	7	0.70%

^*Write-Ins 7 (Sarwark 1, Kokesh 1, Ardeleanu 1, Monds 1, Graham 1, Ammens 1, Godzilla 1)

Jo Jorgensen was nominated with 51.07% of the ballot.

Vice-Presidential Nomination

Candidates

The Following candidates were nominated to be on the Vice-Presidential Ballot at the convention.

Name	Background	State	Campaign	Announced	Campaign Ended
Spike Cohen (running mate of Vermin Supreme)	Muddied Waters Media Co-Owner	South Carolina	website	14 December 2019	Nominated 24 May 20
John Monds	2014 Libertarian Party of Georgia Nominee for Public Service Commission, District 1 2010 Libertarian Party of Georgia nominee for Governor	Georgia	website	23 May 2020	24 May 2020 eliminated on the 3rd Ballot- endorsed Spike Cohen
Ken Armstrong	Former Executive Former Honolulu County Neighborhood Board	Oregon	website	29 April 2020	24 May 20 eliminated on the 2nd Ballot-endorsed Spike Cohen
Adam Kokesh	Anti-War Activist and Author 2018 Write-in Candidate for U.S. Senate from Arizona	Arizona	website	24 May 20 (nominated)	24 May 2020 eliminated on the 1st Ballot

Other Declared Candidates

Name	Background	State	Campaign	Announced	Campaign Ended
Zoltan Istvan	Transhumanist and Futurist 2020 Candidate for the Republican nomination for President	California	website	9 April 2020	24 May 20
John McAfee (running mate of Adam Kokesh)	Former CEO of McAfee Inc. 2016 Candidate for the Libertarian Presidential nomination	Tennessee	website	4 March 2020	24 May 20
Jeff Wood	Libertarian Party of Michigan District 8 Representative 2018 Candidate for Libertarian Party of Michigan Gubernatorial Nomination	Michigan	website	03 June 2018	24 May 20

Withdrew

Name	Background	State	Campaign	Announced	Withdrew
Larry Sharpe (running mate of Jim Gray)	2018 Libertarian nominee for Governor of New York 2016 Candidate for the Libertarian Vice-Presidential nomination	New York	website	13 April 2020	23 May 2020 withdrew prior to the 1st ballot
Craig Bowden	Author and Activist 2018 Libertarian Party of Utah nominee for United States Senate	Utah	social media page	6 March 2020	28 April 2020 (endorsed Spike Cohen)
John Phillips (running mate of Kim Ruff)	Libertarian National Committee Region 6 Representative Libertarian Party of Macon County Chair	Illinois	website	06 July 2018	11 January 2020

May 21 Vice-Presidential Debate

The following candidates received enough tokens to participate in the May 21 Vice-presidential debate.

Name	Tokens (out of 915)
Larry Sharpe	335
Spike Cohen	247
Ken Armstrong	161
John McAfeea	26
John Mondsab	24

a. Did not participate

b. Running for president

Debates

Date	Host/Moderator	Location	Candidates	Media
21 May 20	Libertarian National Committee Jim Turney (moderator)	Online	Larry Sharpe Ken Armstrong Spike Cohen	video

1st Ballot

2020 Libertarian Party Nomination for Vice-President of the United States 1st Ballot (50% of Delegates needed to win)

Name	Votes	Percent
Spike Cohen	416	40.6%
John Monds	322	31.5%
Ken Armstrong	180	17.6%
Adam Kokesh	87	8.5%
NOTA	7	0.7%
Write-ins (Various)*	12	1.1%

No candidate received a majority of delegate votes on the first ballot, leading to the next round of voting. Adam Kokesh was eliminated from the 2nd ballot.

2nd Ballot

2020 Libertarian Party Nomination for Vice-President of the United States 2nd Ballot (50% of Delegates needed to win)

Name	Votes	Percent
Spike Cohen	474	46.2%
John Monds	432	42.1%
Ken Armstrong	96	0.9%
NOTA	12	0.01%
Write-ins (Various)	11	0.01%

No candidate received a majority of delegate votes on the second ballot, leading to the next round of voting. Ken Armstrong was eliminated from the 3rd ballot, and endorsed Spike Cohen.

3rd Ballot

2020 Libertarian Party Nomination for Vice-President of the United States 3rd Ballot (50% of Delegates needed to win)

Name	Votes	Percent
Spike Cohen	533	52.15%
John Monds	472	46.18%
NOTA	10	0.98%
Write-ins (Various)	7	0.69%

Spike Cohen was nominated with 52.15% of the ballot.

LNC Elections

National Chair

First ballot:

Candidate	Votes
Joe Bishop-Henchman	425
Joshua Smith	327
Tony D'Orazio	86
Jacob Lamont	60
Mike Shipley	38
Dulap Nelson (wi)	4
Brandon Nelson (wi)	2
Alex Merced (wi)	1
NOTA	27

Second ballot:

Candidate	Votes
Joe Bishop-Henchman	528
Joshua Smith	379
Tony D'Orazio (wi)	4
Nicholas Sarwark (wi)	1
NOTA	57

National Treasurer

Tim Hagan was re-elected by acclamation.

National Vice-Chair

The election for Vice-Chair was conducted in one ballot using approval voting.

Candidate	Votes
Ken Moellman	434
Richard Longstreth	395
Tony D'Orazio	201
Geoff Neale	185
Jacob Lamont	137
Jeff Wood	37
James Ogle	20
Valerie Sarwark (wi)	9
Rachel Johnson (wi)	4
Vermin Supreme (wi)	2
James Weeks (wi)	1
Brandon Nelson (wi)	1
Trisha Butler (wi)	1
NOTA	30

National Secretary

The election for Secretary was conducted in one ballot using approval voting.

Candidate	Votes
Caryn Ann Harlos	461
Evan McMahon	417
Dave Jones	74
Frankie Mermaid (wi)	3
Andrew Chadderdon (wi)	1
Tim Ferreira (wi)	1
Elon Musk (wi)	1
Emily Salvette (wi)	1
small children in a trenchcoat, 3 (wi)	1
Vermin Supreme (wi)	1
Jeff Wood (wi)	1
NOTA	25

LNC At Large

Five to be elected.

The election was conducted in a single ballot using approval voting and those with the most votes elected, with each delegate able to cast up to five votes.

Candidate	Votes
Laura Ebke	368
Valerie Sarwark	353
Joshua Smith	349
Richard Longstreth	323
Erik Raudsep	298
Jacob Lamont	285
Paige Sexton	277
Bill Redpath	241
Boomer Shannon	219
Brent Olsen	188
Sam Goldstein	146
Keiran O’ Se’	133
Geoff Neale	99
Alicia Mattson	94
Daniel Behrman	90
Caryn Ann Harlos	83
Desarae Lindsey	82
Darryl Perry	74
Omar Recuero	74
Richard Manzo	63
Pat Ford	56
Richard Fast	35
Nathan Weise	35
Pietro Geraci	34
James Weeks	29
Alex Flores	22
Mark Rufio	20
Henry Conoly	19
Andy Jacobs	8
Ken Moellman (wi)	2
Justin Amash (wi)	1
Rick Dawson (wi)	1
Brian Ellison (wi)	1
Tom Markey (wi)	1
Evan McMahon	1
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (wi)	1
Jake Porter (wi)	1
Aaron Starr (wi)	1
Carolyn Wade (wi)	1
Chris Weist (wi)	1
NOTA	4

Judicial Committee

Seven to be elected.

The election was conducted in a single ballot using approval voting and those with the most votes elected, with each delegate able to cast up to seven votes.

Candidate	Votes
Mary Ruwart	494
Tom Arnold	378
Jim Turney	303
D. Frank Robinson	302
Chuck Moulton	293
Vermin Supreme	291
Alicia Mattson	284
Chris Wiest	226
Tricia Sprankle	193
Ruth Bennett	165
Christopher Thrasher	126
Beth Vest	121
Barbara Howe	120
Tyler Smith	114
Mary Gingell	110
Eric Mulder	102
Mike Dixon	92
Mark Tuniewicz	85
Michael Kielsky	76
John Buttrick	75
Matthew Long	67
Roger Roots	67
Phillip Anderson	65
Carolyn Wade	63
Paul Grindle	62
Daniel Lewis	41
Mark Whitney	27
Carla Howell (wi)	7
Nick Sarwark (wi)	2
Justin Amash (wi)	1
Laura Ebke (wi)	1
Jim Fulner (wi)	1
Ken Kaplan (wi)	1
Jacob Lamont (wi)	1
Darryl Perry (wi)	1
Joshua Smith (wi)	1
The Ghost of Benjamin Tucker (wi)	1
Three Dogs in a Trenchcoat (wi)	1
NOTA	29

Location

This convention was initially scheduled to be held on Memorial Day weekend (21-25 May) in Austin, Texas, but due to the coronavirus pandemic, it was held in two "sittings" and partially online. The first sitting, which dealt with the presidential/vice-presidential nomination, was held 22-24 May online. The second sitting took place 9-12 July, in a hybrid format with some delegates participating in person at the Rosen Centre Hotel and Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, Florida, while others participated online.

Original Plan

Criteria for the location were outlined in the Request for Proposal. The three finalist cities for the original convention location were:

• Atlanta, Georgia
• Austin, Texas
• Phoenix, Arizona.

The location chosen was the Austin JW Marriott.

On April 26, 2020, the JW Marriott canceled the convention's reservation due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. On May 9, 2020, the LNC invoked an "emergency" situation allowing the bifurcation of the convention into two sittings. The emergency comprised candidate filing deadlines which would occur prior to any time at which an in-person convention could be conducted. There was a schism in the LNC between a consistent majority of LNC members and party chair Nicholas Sarwark with the latter in consistent disagreement with the decision to have any in-person component.

Delegate Allocation

The following are the number of delegates that were allocated to each affiliate for the 2020 Libertarian National Convention. The affiliates are listed in groups according to the LNC regions which were in effect through this convention; region groupings for the upcoming term may be different.

2020 Libertarian National Convention delegate count by state.

LNC Region 1 Delegates

Affiliate	Delegate Allocation
Alaska	6
Arizona	24
Colorado	35
Hawaii	5
Kansas	11
Montana	7
New Mexico	13
Oregon	15
Utah	9
Washington	35
Wyoming	3

LNC Region 2 Delegates

Affiliate	Delegate Allocation
Florida	54
Georgia	29
Tennessee	23

LNC Region 3 Delegates

Affiliate	Delegate Allocation
Indiana	30
Kentucky	11
Michigan	34
Ohio	45

LNC Region 4 Delegates

Affiliate	Delegate Allocation
California	107
Nevada	13

LNC Region 5 Delegates

Affiliate	Delegate Allocation
Delaware	4
Maryland	20
North Carolina	29
Pennsylvania	40
South Carolina	17
Virginia	35
Washington D.C.	3
West Virginia	6

LNC Region 6 Delegates

Affiliate	Delegate Allocation
Illinois	37
Iowa	11
Minnesota	20
Missouri	19
Nebraska	8
North Dakota	4
South Dakota	5
Wisconsin	20

LNC Region 7 Delegates

Affiliate	Delegate Allocation
Alabama	13
Arkansas	6
Louisiana	13
Oklamhoma	14
Texas	73

LNC Region 8 Delegates

Affiliate	Delegate Allocation
Connecticut	13
Maine	8
Massachusetts	22
New Hampshire	11
New Jersey	20
New York	48
Vermont	3

States without Regions Delegates

Affiliate	Delegate Allocation
Idaho	6
Mississippi	6

Supporting Reports and Documents

• Document: National Convention 2020 Notification of Delegate Alllocations
• 2020 Region Formation Manual
• Master Delegate List
• Recommendations for remote participation by the Convention Oversight Committee
• E-Convention Delegation Chair Manual
• Delegation Chair's Manual
• E-Convention Delegate Instructions
• 2020 Treasurer's Report
• Presidential Debate Tokens Accounting
• Vice-Presidential Debate Tokens Accounting
• Platform Committee Report
• Bylaws and Rules Committee Final Report
• Parliamentary Opinion written by Jonathan R. Jacobs for the Mises Caucus regarding the Porcupine voting software (info)

National Platform Committee

• see Platform Committee 2020

National Bylaws Committee

• see Bylaws and Rules Committee (2020)

Convention Videos

May 22, 2020
May 23, 2020 Part One
May 23, 2020 Part Two
May 24, 2020 Part One
May 24, 2020 Part Two
July 8
July 9
July 10
July 11