Three clocks are running. All three can still be won—if we start now.
People ask us a fair question: why start a new party now? Why not wait for a better moment, or let the two parties sort themselves out?
Most of America's problems are serious but chronic. They'd be better solved sooner, but waiting doesn't make them impossible. Three are different. They run on clocks. On each one, the cost of fixing it rises every year we wait, and eventually events stop waiting for us and make the choice on our behalf.
Here's the good news, and we mean it: all three are still very winnable. The fixes are well understood, and America has solved harder problems before. That's exactly why the moment to start is now, while the solutions are still modest instead of painful. And as you'll see below, the political window to do it is open right now, too.
One tangled problem. Interest now tops $1 trillion a year, long-term rates are at 20-plus-year highs, and the dollar's global share is slipping.
China's military has a 2027 target date. Our alliances are the strongest deterrent on Earth, if we don't let them erode.
AI is moving faster than the rules. Get the guardrails right now, and it could be the productivity boom that helps solve everything else.
These are usually discussed as three separate issues. They're really one tangled problem, and pulling on any strand tightens the others.
The deficit. Washington will borrow about $1.9 trillion this year, nearly 6% of the economy, at a time of low unemployment, when deficits are supposed to shrink. The Congressional Budget Office calls that "historically unusual." Debt held by the public is already about the size of the entire economy and is projected to pass its all-time record from 1946 by 2030. (CBO)
The interest. Interest on the debt now tops $1 trillion a year, roughly $3 billion every day, and CBO projects it doubling to $2.1 trillion by 2036. That's money that buys no roads, no troops, no tax relief. It just pays for yesterday. (Fortune)
The bond market is talking. In late September the 30-year Treasury yield climbed above 5.6%, its highest level since 2002. (CNBC) In August, a weak 30-year auction forced dealers to absorb the slack. Higher yields are lenders asking to be paid more to trust Washington's discipline, and every tick up feeds straight back into bigger interest bills. That's the doom loop we've written about.
The dollar. The dollar's share of the world's official reserves has slipped from about 64% a decade ago to about 57% today. (IMF data via Central Banking) It's still number one by a mile, and no rival is close. But that status is what lets America borrow more cheaply than anyone else, and that shows up in lower rates on your mortgage, your car loan, and your small-business loan. Reckless deficits, pressure on the Fed, careless sanctions, and alienated allies all chip at it. Every chip makes borrowing costlier, which makes the deficit worse, which chips at the dollar again.
Debt compounds. Every year we wait, the same fix requires bigger cuts or bigger tax increases. Social Security's main trust fund runs dry in 2032, which would force automatic benefit cuts. And markets move faster than politics: Britain learned that in 2022, when a budget the bond market didn't trust brought down a prime minister in weeks.
Both parties built this. The 2025 Republican reconciliation law adds about $4.7 trillion to deficits over a decade, by CBO's estimate, and Democrats' 2021 relief package added $1.9 trillion of its own. A real fix asks something of both bases: closing loopholes and asking more of those who can afford it, and spending discipline and honest entitlement reform. Neither party can offer that trade without being punished by its own primary voters. A party built for the middle can.
The good news: America has done this before. After World War II, debt fell from a record 106% of the economy to about 23% by the 1970s. In the 1990s, a Democratic President and a Republican Congress balanced the budget and ran four straight surpluses. Nothing here requires a miracle, just discipline started early. Our plan: fiscal responsibility, closing tax loopholes, a balanced budget amendment, No Budget, No Pay, and saving Social Security before 2032.
The Pentagon's latest report on China's military says the People's Liberation Army is making steady progress toward its 2027 goals, including being able to win a war over Taiwan. China already has the world's largest navy, and its nuclear arsenal is projected to reach about 1,500 warheads by 2035. (USNI News)
And China isn't acting alone. Researchers documented 616 instances of security cooperation among China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea between 2019 and 2025: arms transfers, joint exercises, weapons development, intelligence sharing. North Korean shells and troops in Russia's war. Iranian drones. Chinese parts keeping Russia's factories running. The real danger is the "simultaneity problem": being forced to deal with more than one crisis at once. (FDD)
That's exactly what alliances are for. NATO was built in 1949 to deter the Soviet Union, but its core idea, that an attack on one is an attack on all, deters any aggressor. And it's worth remembering that the only time NATO has ever invoked that promise was to defend America, after 9/11. In the Pacific, Japan, South Korea, Australia, and the Philippines are the front line of deterrence. Together, America and its allies account for roughly half of the world's economy. No rival bloc comes close. That's the cheapest, most powerful deterrent ever built, and deterrence costs a tiny fraction of war.
China's own target date is 2027. And trust between allies takes decades to build and moments to lose. Threatening to walk away from NATO, picking tariff fights with friends, and going to war without them all spend down trust we'll need badly. There's a direct link to Clock #1, too: our allies are among the biggest holders of dollars and Treasuries. Push them away, and they'll diversify away from the dollar.
The good news: Our allies want America to lead, and they still answer the phone. When the U.S. and Japan coordinated to steady the yen, it showed what allied strength looks like done right. Repairing these relationships is mostly a matter of showing up, keeping our word, and treating friends like friends. See our foreign policy platform.
Credit where it's due: we're not the only voice here. Researchers, safety teams inside the AI labs themselves, and some lawmakers in both parties have been sounding this alarm, and the White House's voluntary AI accord was a real first step. What we add is the common-sense middle: no doom, no hype, just innovation with guardrails.
The clock here is the pace of the technology itself. In 2026 alone, AI agents at three different leading labs broke out of their test environments, and new research documented models deliberately deceiving the people testing them. One of our best safety tools, being able to read an AI's step-by-step "chain of thought," could disappear as systems change. Rules written before systems get more capable are far easier than rules written after.
The good news, and it's big: AI may also be the best answer to Clock #1. CBO already builds AI-driven productivity gains into its growth projections. Faster growth is the least painful way to shrink a debt burden. Get the guardrails right, and AI could mean faster cures, cheaper services, and a stronger economy. Get them wrong, and we invite shocks we can't afford. Steering it well is how we capture the upside. See our Big Tech, AI & Your Data platform.
The three clocks are why the work is urgent. There's also a reason this is the moment a new party can actually do it: the window is open.
Windows like this don't stay open forever. Eventually the parties re-sort, or the moment passes. The people who show up first, with a real platform and real solutions, get to shape what comes next. That's why we're building now.
All three clocks run on five-to-ten-year timelines. Our two-party system runs on a two-year cycle of short-term gimmicks and the next election. And every one of these fixes asks something of both parties' bases: fiscal discipline and fairer taxes, strong defense and diplomacy, innovation and guardrails.
That's exactly the kind of trade the 80% in the middle has been ready to make for years. It just hasn't had anyone to make it with. That's why we're here, and that's why we're starting now. Read more about why a third party can actually win this time.
• CBO Director's Statement on the Budget and Economic Outlook, 2026–2036
• Fortune: U.S. paying $3 billion a day to service $39 trillion debt
• CNBC: 30-year Treasury yield hits highest level since 2002
• Central Banking: Dollar's share of foreign reserves (IMF COFER)
• USNI News: Pentagon annual report on Chinese military developments
• FDD: Axis of Aggressors military cooperation
• Gallup: New high of 45% identify as political independents