3 third-party candidates for governor to watch

ALBANY — While Democrats and Republicans continue to be the dominant party designations in New York, third parties also play a pivotal role in the state's political structure.

Actress and activist Cynthia Nixon has been nominated by the Working Families Party and is seeking the Democratic line this fall, while Dutchess County Executive Marc Molinaro is the Conservative Party's pick and appears close to clinching the Republican nod. The grassroots Green Party has tapped Howie Hawkins as their candidate for governor for the third time.

While Nixon and Molinaro were competing for headlines and Hawkins was in the news after he was  arrested protesting a gas storage facility on Seneca Lake, a number of intriguing figures seeking to unseat Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo have slipped under the radar, getting little or no press coverage so far in this election cycle.

Third-party candidates have virtually no chance of winning a statewide election, but their parties are uniquely positioned in New York to survive and thrive since by cross-endorsing candidates running on major-party lines.

The minor parties often gain influence by leveraging their endorsement for ideological support or patronage, according to Robert J. Spitzer, a professor at SUNY Cortland who has written about the state's third parties.

"These parties are not going to become major parties, but they don't have to come in first in an election, to come away with something," Spitzer said.

Smaller parties' participation in a statewide election draws intrigue, which may boost voter engagement and draw focus to a particular ideology, according to Spitzer.

Among the little known third party candidates running against Cuomo are Libertarian candidate Larry Sharpe of Queens, Grigory Kravtsov, a Westchester County resident who started his own party called USA Jobs, and Reform Party candidate Joel Giambra of Buffalo. 

Larry Sharpe

This Libertarian businessman and Marine Corps veteran with an unmistakable Bronx accent has has charisma that transmits through phone lines. That quality may be useful for his other roles as executive coach for Fortune 500 companies and guest lecturer at universities like Columbia and Yale - and also as a candidate for governor.

Sharpe, who lives in Astoria with his wife and two daughters, sought the Libertarian Party nomination for vice president of the United States in 2016, but lost to William Weld by a handful of votes.

In his bid for governor, Sharpe has called for ending unfunded mandates and contends that licensing for small businesses "punishes the poor."

He believes New Yorkers are ready for a Libertarian candidate, which he says provides the best of the Republican and Democratic parties. On education he wants high school to end at 10th grade and testing to be curtailed.

"Everyone should be able to opt out of testing at any time," he said. "It puts kids who have special needs at a huge disadvantage. Kids who do not test well are labeled as dumb."

 Grigory Kravtsov

Manufacturer and inventor Grigory Kravtsov, who opened a campaign account in January, said he envisions that the expansion of American manufacturing, guaranteeing jobs for all, as a cure-all for societal ills

His plan to "grow industrial manufacturing and high-tech jobs through enforcement of intellectual property and enforcement of the is standing order for compliance with federal sanctions against products from other countries like China," can potentially end poverty, crime, the heroin epidemic, and even the Syrian refugee crisis, Kravtsov said.

The married father of three is a gadfly in his hometown of Yorktown Heights in Westchester County. A regular face at town board meetings, Kravtsov takes credit for preventing Costco, which he claims wrongfully sells products made out of Chinese-manufactured materials, from coming to the town. (Town officials say the main opposition to Costco came from gas station owners, who feared the competition.) Kravtsov rallied for the town's museum to become self-sustaining instead of burdening taxpayers - an effort he acknowledges was less successful.

Kravtsov, who grew up in Ukraine in the Soviet Union, which provided him with a free education and a guaranteed job, came to this country in 1980 in a wave of Soviet Jewish emigres. He cites Oskar Schindler, made famous in the film "Shindler's List" about a industrialist in Nazi Germany who save Jewish lives, and the movie "Titanic" as inspiration for his  ideas. Other politicians running for the statewide seat, he said, are like an "orchestra entertaining passengers on a sinking Titanic, while I am proposing a complete redesign of the Titanic."

For someone who is singularly focused on expanding industry and technological innovation, Kravtsov is a bit of a Luddite, shunning email and social media.  But he believes his platform of guaranteeing jobs  for all will be enough to persuade voters.

"The only that voters are interested in is jobs," he said. "Everything else is derivative of whether a voter has a job or job prospect or doesn't have a job or job prospect."

Joel Giambra

While he has spent his life in politics, former Erie County Executive Joel Giambra says he has never felt a strong loyalty to Republican or Democratic parties.

He ran as Democrat for the first half of his career in Buffalo city government and as a Republican for the second half. After failing to secure support for the GOP nomination for governor, Giambra said he was happy to get the Reform Party line in the November election, as voters were no longer interested in polarized two-party system.

"I am convinced that most New Yorkers like me have had it with both parties," said Giambra.

While serving as Erie County executive from 2000 to 2008, he reduced property taxes and county spending and fought for regional governance.

His platform emphasizes lowering taxes and creating business opportunities and consolidating school districts to reduce the cost of local government. Giambra also supports legalizing marijuana and has been critical of the governor's handling of New York City's transportation crisis.