10,696 signatures: Jared Young’s new Better Party makes Missouri’s ballot

In the first week of May 2024, Missouri’s Secretary of State confirmed what Jared Young had spent the spring collecting: enough valid signatures to put a brand-new political party, the Better Party, on the November ballot. On Friday, May 3, as the news broke, the independent Senate candidate signed on with Buena to build the brand, the website and the campaign that would carry it. What followed was six months of yard signs, parody websites and baseball games, and 21,111 Missourians who voted for something other than red or blue.

A father of six against two party machines

Jared Young is a Brigham Young University and Harvard Law graduate who ran a benefits company in Joplin and is raising six kids under twelve.² In 2023 he announced he would challenge Senator Josh Hawley as an independent. His pitch fit in three words: we can be better.

“People are exhausted and discouraged by what the two parties are producing right now,” he told the Deseret News.² The polling he cited agreed: 43% of Missouri voters identify as independents, against 33% Republicans and 24% Democrats.

The catch is that Missouri’s ballot isn’t built for that 43%. Instead of paying signature-gathering firms just to get his own name listed, Young decided to petition for a whole new party and invite other candidates to join it.² Its members commit to three rules: treat opponents with respect, consider good ideas wherever they come from, and refuse immoral means to political ends.

Twice the signatures they needed, checked one by one

Young turned in his petitions on April 19. To recognize a new party, Missouri requires 10,000 valid signatures. Election officials checked 21,587 and counted 10,696 that qualified, and the Better Party was certified in early May.¹

“Both parties have become overly obsessed with holding onto or regaining power at all costs,” Young wrote when the count came in. “In their current form, they no longer represent the hopes and beliefs of most Americans.”¹

People over party.

A brand that belongs to neither side

We met Jared and his father, Bob, on April 29. By May 3 we were building. The brief was a candidate who needed to be seen by millions of people without outspending anyone, in a state where every visual cue in politics is either red or blue.

So we left both colors behind. The palette became Better Orange and Better Blue. The Statue of Liberty stands inside the Y of Young. The type is strong and approachable, city and country at once, and a gritty texture runs over everything so it feels like Missouri, not Washington.

Then we wrote lines with a grin. “People over party.” “Be a party pooper.” And our favorite, for a state that takes its barbecue seriously: “Seventy-three BBQ sauces but only two candidates?”

The brand also needed a home that could raise money. We rebuilt votejaredyoung.com around a single question, why vote independent, with a fast donation flow, an issues page, a merch store and a running tally of every dollar raised. Later it gained a Projects page, where each month’s stunt lived alongside the others. By the end of the race, the campaign was calling itself the most funded independent campaign in Missouri history.⁵

The first place it all appeared was a party. On May 30, the campaign threw a Ballot Rally at the Sterling Events Center in Joplin to celebrate making the ballot, streamed live for supporters around the state. The BBQ sauces handout was the invitation.

Young’s plan was targeted online advertising and town-hall meetings, not a TV war.² Joel Searby, who managed Evan McMullin’s 2016 presidential run, joined as senior strategist in April.

“Jared has such a compelling, strong character and set of values,” Searby told the Deseret News.²

A new project every month

With a fraction of his rivals’ money, the campaign skipped the paid-ad arms race and promised voters a bold new project each month instead. We made them. In July came Two Few, a series of parody products for a two-choice country, starting with Twoflix, a streaming service with only two shows. In August came United Seats of America, which sat a Democrat and a Republican side by side behind home plate at Cardinals and Royals games.

In October, former Republican Senator Jack Danforth, Hawley’s onetime mentor, endorsed Young and toured the state with him. “The political system is broken, and my party, both parties, have gravitated toward the fringes,” Danforth told the Missouri Independent.³

What a new party leaves behind

On November 5, 2024, 21,111 Missourians voted for Jared Young.⁴ He didn’t take the seat. He did what independents almost never manage: he put a new party and a new kind of candidate in front of every voter in the state, with a brand built for the people who don’t fit either side.

For us, it was a reminder of why we do this work. The biggest bloc of voters in Missouri has no party of its own. For one election, it had a color.