Common Sense Party of California

The Common Sense Party of California was a political party in the U.S. state of California. It was founded in 2019 under the chairmanship of Tom Campbell, and sought to acquire enough voter registrations to qualify as a state-recognized political party.^[2][3][4] As of March 2026, it had no media coverage, had apparently not progressed towards obtaining signatures to support state-recognition, and appeared to have no plans for participating in the 2026 midterm elections.

The Common Sense Party was founded in 2019 by former Republican representative Tom Campbell, former Independent state Senator Quentin Kopp, former political consultant Dan Schnur, and former state Commerce Secretary Julie Meier Wright. Coming with multi-partisan experiences in California politics, these politicians collaborated to create a new political party that supports governance reform and multi-party representation.^[2][5]

On January 27, 2023, the Common Sense Party and the Forward Party announced a coalition in California with the goal of achieving the necessary 73,000 registered voters to gain qualified political party status in the state.^[6] As of March 2026, the Common Sense Party website seems to lapsed into permanent inaction, with the long unchanged statement about its registered voters remaining "We’re more than 1/3rd of our way to that goal!."

The Common Sense Party focused primarily on reform of the political system rather than specific issues, concentrating on the state level.^[7][8]

The Common Sense Party advocated legislative transparency and accountability (a possible example being to "require a recorded vote on every bill in committee"). It also supported alternative voting systems, for instance proposing "ranked choice voting" as a "potential solution" to limited choices of candidates."^[4][7]

The Common Sense Party supported campaign finance reform, for instance suggesting democracy vouchers aimed at reducing the financial influence of PACs, special interest groups, and lobbies.^[7] It was also critical of the Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United v. FEC, which prohibited the government from restricting independent expenditures for political campaigns by corporations and other associations.^[9]

On his "position papers" web page, Tom Campbell explained that the "Common Sense Party stand[s] for...candidates who think for themselves,” and offers an extensive set of "possible beliefs such a candidate might hold," on issues including "compassionate and moderate" immigration reform, climate change ("global carbon tax"), and affordable housing (for example, "built-out" cities financially helping non-built-out cities in the region provide additional affordable housing).^[10] According to the Wikipedia page for long-time member of the U.S. Congress, political candidate, and Common Sense Party co-founder Tom Campbell, as of March 2026, the last state and national election in which he publicly participated appears to have been in 2020.