US News Metro Long Island Politics

Sports NFL MLB Olympics NBA NHL College Football College Basketball WNBA

Business Personal Finance

Entertainment TV Movies Music Celebrities Awards Theater

Lifestyle Weird But True Sex & Relationships Viral Trends Human Interest Parenting Fashion & Beauty Food & Drink Travel

Health Wellness Fitness Health Care Medicine Men’s Health Women’s Health Mental Health Nutrition

Science Space Environment Wildlife Archaeology

Today’s Paper Covers Columnists Horoscopes Crosswords & Games Sports Odds Podcasts Careers

Email Newsletters Official Store Home Delivery Tips

Switch between CA and NY editions here.

Who’s down with NPP? An increasing number of California voters

I’ve followed politics my whole life, but I never paid much attention to No Party Preference (NPP)candidates.

Why would I? They rarely get a real shot. No big money, no party machinery, no guaranteedseat at the debate table. They exist outside the traditional system and the system tends to act like theydon’t exist at all.

That changed when I began working on an NPP gubernatorial campaign, for candidate Elaine Culotti. For the first time, I saw how significant the political middle actually is, and how aggressively the establishment works to keep it on the sidelines.

The wake-up call came during the now-canceled 2026 California gubernatorial debate, which was meant to be co-hosted by the USC Dornsife Center for the Political Future and ABC/KABC Los Angeles last month.

Culotti — a qualified, independent candidate with real-world experience — was excluded from the debate stage.

Then, almost overnight, the entire event was scrapped. There was no clear explanation grounded in fairness or transparency. The narrative quickly shifted, with blame and counter-blame circulating, but no clear evidence tying the cancellation to any one group.

What was clear, however, was how quickly the conversation became a distraction from the underlying issue: access.

This wasn’t fundamentally about race, as some Democrats alleged, or even about any one candidate. It raised a broader question about who gets a platform and who decides.

For over a decade, California has operated within an increasingly dominant one-party framework. During that time, the state has faced........

© New York Post