Why Georgia voters are looking to third-party candidates ahead of the debate

A new focus group of Georgia voters who are seriously considering a third-party candidate this fall reveals how some of President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump's onetime supporters in the key battleground are slipping away — and what, if anything, they can do to win them back.

Independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was the clear favorite among the participants in an NBC News Deciders Focus Group, produced in collaboration with Engagious, Syracuse University and Sago. While all 10 voters voted for either Biden or Trump in 2020, not one said they currently plan to do so again: Seven currently back Kennedy, two back independent professor and activist Cornel West and one backs Libertarian Party nominee Chase Oliver.

For many, their decision isn’t just a protest vote, but one that's emblematic of deep disdain for both major-party nominees, an exhaustion with the country’s political system and a desire for something different.

“I can’t in good conscience vote for either one of them. ... I’ve seen each of them as president and I don’t want to see either of them in the next four years,” said Sherri D., a 50-year-old from Roswell who backed Trump in 2020.

“So many people are voting against the other one, they’re voting for the lesser of two evils and I just don’t want to be that person," she added later. "I want to actually research and learn and I want to vote for the person, in my conscience, I truly want to win, even if they don’t have a chance or even if people think that they don’t have a chance.”

In 2020, Biden became the first Democratic presidential candidate to win Georgia since 1992. Among the six voters in the focus group who backed Biden four years ago, four said they’re planning to vote for Kennedy and two said they plan to vote for West.

Asked why Biden lost their vote, these voters said he didn't follow through on his campaign promises or had governed as more of a liberal than they expected. One voter criticized his support for Israel in its war against Hamas and another questioned his capacity to govern.

“I don’t believe he showed to be as moderate as the Joe Biden that I thought that I was voting for. He seems to be controlled by the party, and if the party wants far-left policies, then they’re getting it with Joe,” said Ashley M., a 45-year-old from Fayetteville.

“He’s just a shell of himself. So it’s like I’m just voting for just the party itself and not even really the president,” Charles P., a 41-year-old from Ellenwood, said.

The sentiment lines up with how the 10 voters described Biden — not one volunteered a positive sentiment when asked for a word association about the president, with most comments centering around his age, 81. Despite Trump being just a few years younger than Biden at 78, there was little discussion among the participants about the Republican's age.

None of the 10 described Trump in a positive way either, with responses that almost unanimously criticized his character. As for the four focus group participants that voted for Trump in 2020 (three now support Kennedy and one supports Oliver, the libertarian), there was a deep disdain for his personality and conduct as president.

“It’s almost like he ran the country like the TV show that he was a part of. ‘You’re fired, you’re fired.’ Just very much a character and one I didn’t really like,” said Sherri D.

“I lost a lot of respect for him over the Jan. 6 scenario, and coming from Georgia and the way that he bullied people in our state for the outcome of the election, just being, in my opinion, a sore loser and going after people," she added.

Careasa C., a 36-year-old from Atlanta who voted for Trump in 2020 and now supports Kennedy, said that she thinks Trump would only focus on “payback” and won’t “care about the citizens” if he’s elected again.

“I know this time around Trump’s going to be on a revenge tour,” she said.

RFK Jr.'s campaign resonates

But for how negatively these voters feel about both candidates — which was not a surprise given they were selected specifically because of their disinterest in backing the Republican and Democratic nominees — they didn't unilaterally view backing or considering a third option as a protest vote. In many cases, Kennedy and others affirmatively resonated with these voters.

Sherri D. said she viewed Kennedy as “more in touch with the middle class” than the other two candidates and added that the fact he is “not tied to one of the two major parties and would be more of a unifying force for our country.”

Janely C., a 29-year-old from Kennesaw, argued that Kennedy is “trying to focus more on minorities” and make “everyone equal and have the same opportunities.”

Ashley M. noted Kennedy’s background as a lawyer to argue that he is “willing to take on corporations and not allow them to dominate the economy.”

David S. similarly brought up Kennedy's work as an environmental lawyer, while also showing some sympathy to the candidate's skeptical positions on vaccines.

"We’ve been asking our focus group participants about RFK each month, and most until now have seen him as an alternative to Biden or Trump or know the Kennedy name, but admit they don’t know much about his record or platform. The Georgia voters seemed different," said Margaret Talev, the director of Syracuse University’s Institute for Democracy, Journalism & Citizenship in Washington.

"They indicated they’re learning details about his positions from vaccines to foreign policy and having opportunities to listen to or see more of him," she continued. "It bears watching whether this was an outlier group or whether RFK Jr. is succeeding at reaching large numbers of independent-minded voters via podcasts and social media."

Kennedy’s promotion of vaccine-related conspiracy theories has been one major reason his campaign has been controversial. Some of the Kennedy supporters in the focus group displayed some comfort with his comments about vaccines, but even as others said they largely disagreed with him on the issue, it wasn’t enough to prompt them to choose someone else.

West’s two supporters praised his work as a professor and progressive activist.

“I love that he’s an activist, that he seeks to make the disparity less between gender and race and class,” Carrie S., a 41-year-old from Canton who backed Biden in 2020, said, adding she likes West’s criticisms of capitalism.

Fadila O., a 42-year-old from Lawrenceville who backed Biden in 2020, added she liked West’s support for protests against Israel’s war in Gaza.

Asked to reconcile their vote with the reality that no minor-party or independent candidate has won the presidency in the modern era, the voters said that wouldn't affect their decision.

“Just because some people might feel like it’s not a realistic chance doesn’t mean that I’m still not going to let my vote be heard,” Cereasa C. said.

“You don’t know how many millions of people out there might want to see a difference in this country, and our votes are going to matter, period,” she added.

“Despite all the noise of competing presidential campaigns, what’s often underappreciated is how much the two major-party candidates still leave unaddressed. For voters who want to see wealth inequality reduced, vaccine mandates questioned and a more bipartisan governing style implemented, Kennedy scratches the itches they think Biden and Trump ignore,” said Rich Thau, the president of Engagious, who moderated the sessions.

“These disaffected voters told us they have little clue what Biden or Trump would try to accomplish in a second term," he continued. "If either can present himself as a cogent problem-solver, with plans to combat inflation, secure the border, and end overseas conflicts, he will likely gain the upper hand.”

One eye on the debate

All of these voters shared another similarity aside from their disinterest in voting for Trump or Biden — their preferred candidate won’t be on stage for Thursday’s night’s first presidential debate. CNN announced last week that only Trump and Biden qualified under its polling and ballot access thresholds.

Among the focus group participants, there was near universal frustration that Kennedy wouldn't be participating.

“We had four years of people complaining about democracy and one side not supporting democracy ... and then you get an opportunity and a news network says no to democracy, and the parties seem to be colluding together to make sure that we don’t actually have a democracy in its fullest,” Ashley M. said.

While eight of the 10 voters said they’d still watch the debate, only two said the debate could possibly change their mind.

“The debate will matter coming up for me, if I do decide to vote for either of those two, just to see how competent Trump is versus Biden, if Biden can even hold his own in a debate,” Ashley M. added.

Charles P. noted that he’s interested in seeing Trump debate because the presumptive Republican nominee skipped every primary debate this cycle.

“I guess by some miracle, maybe they could convince me to vote for one or the other,” Sherri D. said, before sighing.

“This is going to sound awful but it might be slightly entertaining," she added. "I probably know how it’s going to go, right? But, I just, I don’t know. I want to see it.”

Talev, the Syracuse Institute for Democracy, Journalism & Citizenship in Washington director, added that a clear theme among these voters was frustration "not just with Biden and Trump but with the two-party system and its impact on gridlock and policies."

"These voters were really angry RFK won’t be on the debate stage and saw it as a collusion between the major parties and mainstream media," Talev said. "Several believe his independence from both parties makes him more likely to make or get deals. In 2008, [Barack] Obama was the outsider. In 2016 Trump was the outsider. These voters see RFK as this year’s version of that."

Convictions aren’t moving the needle

These also made clear that they’re not moved by Trump’s felony conviction on 34 counts in the New York hush money trial, nor by Biden’s son Hunter’s conviction on felony gun charges.

The voters who had backed Trump in the past didn’t believe the charges against him were serious, but about half of the voters overall thought the New York case was motivated in part by politics.

None of the voters said either guilty verdict changed their opinion about whom to vote for, and there was little appetite for sending either man to jail.

“I don’t know where jail rehabilitates either one of these guys for the crime that they committed,” Ashley M. said.