Would it strike you as odd to run for public office in the United States without having ever voted in your entire life? Would it also seem odd to be a professional political commentator and pundit yet to never vote?
Former MSNBC host and Democratic New York congressional candidate Dylan Ratigan manages somehow to check off both boxes.
The former cable news host, who is running to unseat Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., discussed his voting record – or lack thereof – during a radio interview this month with Jeff Graham.
“It’s not a problem,” Ratigan said. “Let’s be honest with each other: the largest voting constituency in America is people who don’t vote. You wanna know why they don’t vote? Because they’re disgusted. Because they’re disgusted by a two-party political system that is running small little media companies that they call campaigns and then producing content that tries to destroy the identity and personal life of the other person.”
His reason for never voting: “Utter disgust.”
Except that has all changed now, says Ratigan, who also once hosted a show on CNBC. He says he was “wrong” not to vote. He’s going to make up for it by becoming a member of the thing that supposedly disgusts him.
“As I did that, you know what happened? It got worse and worse, and the government became less serious and less serious. And the risks of the country got bigger and bigger, and the opportunity to improve the country gets bigger as the risk gets bigger,” Ratigan said. “My indulging, my disgust—my accurate assessment of the dysfunction of the two-party political system is something I can no longer indulge.”
Unsurprisingly, the National Republican Congressional Committee responded to Ratigan’s easy layup with some sharp, and well-deserved, criticism.
“It’s only fitting that Dylan Ratigan would move from New York City and the first vote he casts will be for himself,” NRCC spokesman Chris Martin said. “He’s a liberal talking head with no voting record, and now he’s running for Congress in a desperate grasp for relevance.”
