The Last Election

A gripping, intricately plotted political thriller set on the campaign trail of the USA’s next―and because of crucial flaws in the electoral system―its last election; from former presidential candidate Andrew Yang and author Stephen Marche

“In former presidential candidate Yang’s first novel, doomsday looms for American democracy in the months leading up to the 2024 election . . . zinging broadsides make for lively and unsettling reading.” ―Kirkus Reviews

The Last Election is a unique political thriller about an outlandish yet frighteningly possible―even probable―scenario in America’s near future, during the crucial 2024 presidential election. Though it is fiction, it is informed by Andrew Yang’s insider’s view from his run deep into the Democratic primaries in 2020. It is also a wake-up call to an America tearing itself apart.

The story focuses on two characters: Mikey Ricci, a political operative who has lost faith in the system, and Martha Kass, a journalist for the New York Times. In 2023, Ricci becomes the campaign manager of a third-party candidate who runs on a popular, centrist platform and whose frank and honest manner begins to gain ground. As it begins to appear that Ricci’s candidate might win enough electoral votes to upset the delicate balance of America’s two-party system, Kass stumbles upon a plot by the current Joint Chiefs of Staff to seize power in the anticipated chaos of the coming election.

Events unfold at the frenetic pace of the campaign trail, and as the electoral totals are tallied, it becomes more and more evident that no one will accrue the coveted majority of 270 electoral votes. If this happens, who wins? Will the electoral system collapse? What is Congress’s role in certification, and how will congressional leaders behave with their unprecedented individual power?

Will the American experiment end?

ANDREW YANG is an entrepreneur and former 2020 Democratic presidential candidate whose campaign outlasted over a dozen established political officeholders and attracted support from hundreds of thousands of everyday Americans, dubbed “the Yang Gang.” His best-selling books The War on Normal People and Forward: Notes on the Future of Our Democracy helped introduce the ideas of Universal Basic Income and ranked-choice voting into the mainstream. He is also the author of the essay collection Hey Yang, Where’s My Thousand Bucks? and coauthor of the novel The Last Election. Named by President Obama as a Presidential Ambassador of Global Entrepreneurship, Yang is the cofounder of the Forward Party, a new independent political movement dedicated to restoring the promise of American democracy. He was also the founder of Humanity Forward and Venture for America, and currently serves as the founder and CEO of Noble Mobile, a new wireless carrier designed to save Americans money and get us to look up more. He lives with his family in New York.

STEPHEN MARCHE is a novelist and essayist. He is the author of half a dozen books, including The Next Civil War, The Unmade Bed: The Messy Truth about Men and Women in the Twenty-First Century, and The Hunger of the Wolf. He has written opinion pieces and essays for the New Yorker, the New York Times, the Atlantic, Esquire, and many others. The Last Election is his most recent work.