Independent Democrat

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Independent Democrat is a term occasionally adopted by members of Congress in the United States to refer to their party affiliation.

The first Independent Democrat in the United States House of Representatives was Zadok Casey in the mid-1800s. Casey was a Jacksonian Democrat before becoming an Independent.^{[citation needed]}

Strom Thurmond was elected to the Senate in 1954 and served as an Independent Democrat for the 84th Congress until his resignation on April 4, 1956.^{[citation needed]} In November of that year he was elected as a Democrat to fill the vacancy created by his resignation^[1]. Thurmond later became a member of the Republican Party in 1964.^{[citation needed]}

Harry F. Byrd, Jr., a senator from Virginia, left the Democratic Party in 1970. He continued to caucus with the Democrats and referred to himself as an Independent Democrat.^{[citation needed]}

U.S. Senator Joseph Lieberman served as a Democrat but was defeated for the Democratic nomination in the 2006 Connecticut primary by the businessman Ned Lamont by a 52%-48% margin. Lieberman decided to run as an independent in the general election and won under the self-created Connecticut for Lieberman Party, defeating Lamont – the official Democratic candidate – and the Republican candidate with 50 percent of the vote. Lieberman decided to caucus with the Democrats in the 110th United States Congress, referring to himself as "an Independent Democrat, capital I, capital D," in an interview with Tim Russert on NBC's Meet the Press a week following the midterm elections, thus assuring Senate Democrats that they would hold the 51-49 majority they won in that year's elections. He is officially listed as an "Independent Democrat" in U.S. Senate records for the 110th Congress. [1]