How many candidates in a US election?

Question

I'm from Australia and I'm curious as we have recently held an election. Here we have an opposition leader who is the only other candidate for the position of Prime Minister. There are many more candidates in the US presidential election and I'm wondering how they are narrowed down to two candidates by the time the election arrives.

Answer 1

This site lists all of the candidates for each party. The list is ridiculous! There are over 100 candidates running at this time.

http://www.votesmart.org/
1. Presidential Election Resources; including each candidate's voting record and position on all issues.
2. State Presidential Primary Dates
3. How Does the Primary Process Work?
4. Electoral College Votes per State
5. What is the Electoral College?
6. Political Party Information
7. Other Internet Resources

Answer 2

SHORT VERSION:
Any American that meets the required criteria (U.S. citizen, over 35 years old, etc) can run for president but every party in the U.S. can only have one nominee to represent their party.

Starting in January of an election year, the candidates start campaigning to win votes in the primaries and caucuses, which are held in every state. The number of votes cast in each primary/caucus determines how many delegates are awarded to each candidate. Candidates who do not earn any delegates (or very few) in the early primaries often drop out, thus narrowing the number of candidates.

Each party holds a national convention, the delegates formally cast their votes, and a candidate is officially chosen as the nominee for that party. She/He then runs against the nominees of the other parties. In the U.S. there are two main parties and that is why there are often only two candidates left to run for the president.

LONG VERSION AND MORE INFO:
http://www.declareyourself.com/voting_faq/voting_faq.html
http://www.whytuesday.org/
http://www.factmonster.com/ipka/A0878225.html

Answer 3

Here we have to main political parties, the Democrats and Republicans. As many candidates, as think they have a chance, can run for the nomination of the party...that's our Primary process. We have Primaries to select the leader of the party and those two will face off in the General Election.
In the General Election however, other, smaller parties can join if they have a nominee (such as the Independent Party or the Green Party).
Our system is pretty much designed for two parties and many states make it difficult for a 3rd party to join the race.

Answer 4

You can have as many as the political party allows that are legally registered by the registration deadline in the party that is opposing the incumbent who is running for re-election. By our policy, no other candidates oppose the incumbent in his or her own party.

If the current candidate is not running for re-election, both parties can have as many candidates as each party allows as long as they are registered to run before the registration deadline.

One can also run as an Independent with no party affiliation and can even run in some instances as a "write-in" candidate.

UPDATE: I guess I should have added that Primaries and Run-Off elections narrow the field, but we can still have more than two finalists. Independents are still allowed to run, as well as properly qualified write-in's. Anyone who said it is narrowed down to two is woefully wrong!

Answer 5

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Answer 6

There are normally many listed, however there are usually only two that have any real chance. There are 18 candiates that received votes in 2004. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election%2C_2004

Answer 7

the pretend there are many. actually there is one party and the party leaders choose the one who stands for nothing, actually. the two wings of The Party are the so-called democratic party and the so-called republican party, one is a jackass and the other an elephant. the elephants claim to be the labour people and the republicans claim to be the antitax party. that is all bovine scatology. they are all funded by the banking, health and global corporations. they have clear track records but american voters are fat and lazy and allow eager mexican workers to flood in by the millions and help degenerate entreprenueurs sock up little fortunes and the truly bone-idle citizens to live in squalor and live on beer and hot dogs.

the working class in america are, indeed, fat, lazy and poorly educated. they are like the mushrooms, they are kept in the dark and fed bull manure by politicians and tv media. tv media keeps them down. and the banking industry own the media. they are doomed until a world war or complete melt down of the debt heavy us economy comes to bear. the trainwreck of the century awaits them.

don't care. i live in the great yellow submarine.

Answer 8

Well, it starts with a lot of different people running and most aim for either republicans or democrats.

then, it is usally narrowed to like eight people from each party. then, many debates occur and much campaigning happens until it narrows down again.

one from the democaratic party and one from the republican party. those people choose their vice presidents (which are usualy chosen from people orignally running as president) and then the fight to win begins

hope that helps =]