"Cant-idates"
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The "what we do" page for the CANTWINVICTORYFUND starts by explaining that they "Run Cant-idates to lose spectacularly in gerrymandered districts".
For most U.S. speakers, the linguistic phenomena of flapping and voicing means that "cant-idates" and "candidates" are pronounced pretty much the same way, unless the speaker is trying to make the distinction clear by glottalizing the word-final /t/, or maybe aspirating it.
Some relevant earlier posts:
"Raising and lowering those tighty whities", 3/20/2005
"Metal v. medal", 11/27/2013
"Phonology in the comics", 5/6/2016
"Geddadavit?", 12/24/2016
"Weak t", 4/6/2017
"Consonant lenition + r-less perception = FUN", 8/16/2020
"Political flapping and voicing of coronal stops", 5/29/2022
"Ron's Princibles", 8/22/2023
kmh said,
November 12, 2025 @ 8:24 am
In the Lonely Island movie Pop Star: Never Stop Never Stopping, Tim Meadows' character tells Andy Samberg's character that he has an idea, but "You are going to like it," with his intonation and articulation leading to confusion: https://youtu.be/51c9_gcqm7g?t=50
Daniel Barkalow said,
November 12, 2025 @ 11:21 am
I feel like I could convey the difference in syllable break using timing, and signal that it's contrastive using pitch, provided the word is stressed. On the other hand, I think "cant-didates" would be more distinctive, although still identical when not stressed.