As the 2026 election cycle begins to take shape ahead of the August primaries, a lesser-known political organization is attempting to carve out space in a landscape long dominated by Democrats and Republicans.
Leaders of the Cascade Party, a minor political party officially recognized in Washington state, say their goal is to offer voters an alternative grounded in pragmatism, local economic growth and a break from what they describe as entrenched partisan narratives.
Their efforts are now taking form in Washington’s Third Congressional District — currently represented by U.S. Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, D-Skamania — through Cascade candidate Antony Barran, an oyster farmer and entrepreneur from the Long Beach Peninsula in Pacific County.
In Wahkiakum County, a small rural county of the Third Congressional District on the way to the coast, lives the chair of the Cascade Party, former Nirvana bassist and co-founder Krist Novoselic. Novoselic, having moved into politics in the mid-1990s, founded the Cascade Party in 2024.
The Cascade Party hosted a “mixer” at the Cascade Bar and Grill in Vancouver on Friday, April 10. Novoselic and Barran spoke to a packed house about their views and ambitions with the new political party and in the race for the Third Congressional District.
A different model for political organizing
Both Barran and Novoselic sat down with The Reflector ahead of their event to discuss their views on local issues, provide an introduction to the Cascade Party and more.
“This year, we’re recruiting candidates for the state Legislature,” Novoselic told The Reflector. “We have one congressional candidate, Antony Barran, and it’s important to have more choices on the ballot. Parties in general, they package the issues for voters and so on the ballot, a lot of voters, they’re working, they don’t have the time. They’re taking care of their families and living life and they don’t have the time to really get into all the issues. So they look for cues on the ballot, and so a lot voters depend on, ‘Hey, I’m going to vote for the elephant, or I’m going to vote for the donkey.’”
For the Cascade Party, the mascot is an owl.
“So, maybe, the owl would be a good choice,” Novoselic said. “It depends on the values and the needs of the voters. And another thing we’re doing is we’re just bringing new issues that the major parties are neglecting. And so that’s what minor parties do.”
Unlike traditional party structures, Novoselic emphasized a decentralized approach to political organization. Members join through an internally run social networking platform, which Novoselic described as an open-source alternative to mainstream social media.
“We don’t track our users. We don’t sell our users to advertisers. We’re empowering our users,” he said. “So that’s what is different and really groundbreaking about the Cascade Party is that we fuse political association and social networking.”
To learn more about the Cascade Political Party and its social media platform, visit cascadeparty.org and click “Join The Movement” on the home page.
Novoselic said the party brands itself as a “non-conformist” alternative, rejecting alignment with both conservative and progressive political movements. He added that the Cascade Party is not breaking into the political system, but breaking out of it.
“We’re not MAGA. We’re not into that,” he said. “We’re not the activists left with their narratives.”
Bridging political divides
Both Barran and Novoselic emphasized dissatisfaction with what they described as increasing polarization in the political system during an interview with The Reflector prior to an event in Vancouver.
Barran said his decision to align with the Cascade Party followed time spent engaging with members of both major parties. He explained he spent the first four months of his campaign meeting with Republicans to try and get a good feeling of what the district entailed.
“It really is an us versus them,” he said. “And I think that’s bad for our country, right? But also there was us versus them within the Republican Party. … I saw it intimately at Pacific County where what we now call mainstream Republicans were pushed out for MAGA and America First. Now, the MAGA and America First people are looking around saying we don’t know how to run a party. So the whole thing is in disarray. And as a result, really what I would think, extreme views are becoming more and more prevalent in the party apparatus. And so I looked at it and said, ‘That’s not me.’”
Novoselic echoed that sentiment, pointing to affordability as a key concern.
“Look at the price of diesel. I’ve seen it over $7 a gallon,” Novoselic said. “And that’s a result of just policy decisions in Olympia and in Washington, D.C. So, we have these activist governments and they do these policies and if you drive a Dodge Ram 2500, now you’re feeling it, right?”
Novoselic said the Cascade Party is all about not following the dominant narratives and breaking out and empowering the people.
An entrepreneur as candidate
Barran brings a background in business and entrepreneurship to the race for the Third Congressional seat. He lives in Ocean Park on the Long Beach Peninsula, where he operates multiple ventures. The best known one, he said, is Willapa Wild, which owns Oysterville Sea Farms.
“We are a 300-acre oyster farm with a retail experience in Oysterville, very focused on really looking at how to ensure Willapa Bay itself remains the critical beneficial estuary while also finding ways to work in harmony with that and have a commercially successful business as an oyster farm,” Barran said, adding that has been a venture for five years and counting.
His work extends beyond aquaculture. Barran said his businesses have partnered on environmental initiatives, including a federal grant aimed at improving oyster farming techniques for small producers. The grant with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is now entering its second year and Barran said by the end of next year he hopes to start assisting other farms with the new technology of growing baby oysters.
“So we think that kind of contribution to the community is really important,” he said.
Barran also emphasized involvement in local community efforts, including youth activities and educational opportunities through one of the only actual yacht clubs in the country that is open to the public. Barran and his wife renovated an 1887 building and have stewarded its community gathering status.
“We do community events during the school year,” Barran said. “We do Dungeons and Dragons and Magic The Gathering in the evening because there’s not a lot for teenagers to do in our area and it gives them a face-to-face non-screen driven interaction that I think is really important.”
Along with community gatherings at the Shoalwater Bay Yacht Club in Ocean Park, Barran and a couple of other members volunteer to help students at a local high school in a maritime-focused shop class.
“We teach boat building in the shop class,” he said. “Because we’re a maritime community and so I think having them understand how boats work and are built is really important and we try to be good members of our community.”
Barran and his wife moved up to Ocean Park 11 years ago after a background in advertising in Los Angeles, working for a major holding company and also having his own agency.
“My son is our farm director and my daughter lives in Birmingham,” he said. “They’re 29 and 30, and it is sort of one of those things I feel almost apologetic that somebody like me needs to run for office.”
A focus on jobs and economic growth
Central to Barran’s campaign is a focus on job creation and economic development across the district, which stretches from Pacific County through to Skamania County, north through Lewis County and into the southern reaches of Thurston County.
Barran noted a disparity between rising incomes and rapidly increasing housing costs in the district.
“We’ve seen a 14 percent increase in incomes and a 52 percent increase in housing costs,” he said. “We’re falling behind and it’s not just this district, right? It’s all over, but we need to rethink how the government operates. We need to ensure that we’re focused on creating jobs and have security.”
Barran proposed a range of ideas aimed at increasing housing access and economic mobility, including reforms to retirement account rules to be able to pull money with no penalty for first-time home buyers.
Barran also touched on a focus for AI to perform tasks for opportunity, not workforce-reducing efficiency. He explained that companies need to look at how AI can be used to allow the workforce to spend more time on the things that drive value for a company.
To help an economy grow, Barran said the conversations should not be focused on taxes, but about money left over at the end of the month.
“It’s not about taxes. It’s about how much money you have at the end of the month,” he said. “Anybody who has run a company knows the easiest way to fix the bottom line is to increase the top line first, grow the revenue, and expenses will take care of themselves, right? And so the way to get people saving more, the way to get people having a better life, the way to give people a better future is to bring jobs here that are meaningful, that are valuable and that are stable.”
Barran described the Third Congressional District as economically diverse, with different regions facing distinct challenges. In Pacific and Skamania counties, he noted population loss among younger residents.
“The biggest exports from those counties are 18- to 35-year olds,” Barran said. “They leave and don’t come back because there’s no opportunity.”
Barran said that his long-term vision includes attracting billions of dollars in private investment to rural areas like Pacific County, the I-5 corridor through the district, Skamania County and other areas.
“My goal is to bring $10 billion of private equity into Pacific County over 10 years,” he said, adding that would create over a thousand high-paying, sustainable jobs.
Frustrations with government systems
Barran said his decision to run for Congress stems largely from his experiences navigating regulatory systems.
“Owning a number of businesses we deal with 14 different regulatory agencies and that experience taught me a few things, right?” Barran said. “The first thing is that the government, if it ever had it, has lost whatever sense of urgency about everything they feel. I’ve heard numerous stories, whether it’s dealing with the Army Corps of Engineers, whether it’s dealing with local counties, whether it’s dealing with state regulatory agencies. It takes years to get something done and take something through, and I think the rest of the world is focused on results. They’re focused on activities”
Barran criticized the rising cost of large-scale infrastructure projects, such as the Interstate Bridge Replacement project. Barran expressed concerns over the money trail on the 15 billion-plus dollar bridge replacement.
“The only people making money off of this are consultants,” he said. “... And they have no incentive not to drag it out because they’re paid by the hour, right? They have no incentive to come in with a low-cost project because the higher the cost of the project, the more their fee looks small by comparison.”
Barran, and the Cascade Party, argues for a more business-oriented approach to government decision-making in the bridge project. Barran said the ultimate goal is to get people across the river, reduce travel times, improve commerce and simply build a bridge for that and invest the rest of the dollars elsewhere.
“We’ve been really vocal on the Interstate Bridge and that’s just been a shame what’s happened,” Novoselic said. “We should have had a bridge by now. We’re proposing to just build a bridge with enough lanes for autonomous vehicles, HOV, freight. And then we’re proposing to build a bridge east of the 205 bridge. And so those are like real, real things and that’ll be really good for freight to just get out of the Portland bottleneck — freight that’s going east. It’s those practical things that we could have jobs and infrastructure and then let’s just do it. So, I’m really excited about that.”
Barran also pointed to infrastructure and permitting delays as examples of inefficiency, including dredging projects that can take years to approve.
“I think there needs to be a fundamental shift in how the government operates and we need to get to a place where they’re focused on results, you know,” Barran said. “For instance, the Port of Ilwaco has been trying to get an Army Corps permit for three years to remove dredge spoils that have already been dredged from the Columbia River in their harbor. And it takes three years to get a permit to remove those that have already been drenched, right? It’s something that should take six weeks.”
