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So you don’t like Trump or Harris – here’s why it’s still best to vote for one of them
(theconversation.com)
this post was submitted on 10 Oct 2024
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politics
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And remember: a "protest" third party vote is a vote for Trump.
If neither Harris nor Trump gets 270 electoral votes....
-- What if no candidate wins 270 electoral votes?
Edit: I feel like this fact is often overlooked.
A protest vote to a third party is actually a protest vote to whoever you prefer less. You're essentially just removing yourself as a voter and making it more likely the person you like less is elected... we often say "third party is a vote for Trump" since most of lemmy is sane - but for a staunch conservative a vote for a third party is a vote for Harris.
I'd encourage everyone to vote regardless of your leaning - having low voter turnout allows more shitty shenanigans.
Yep, we also say that because there are a lot of astroturf accounts pushing Stein and De La Cruz on Lemmy that are hyper-critical of Harris but suspiciously never want to talk about what a shitbag Trump is.
That's because Harris is Satan and Trump is my Daaaaddy
\s
I’m really encouraged by the fact that universalmonk and return2ozma’s posts get heavily downvoted when they push this slop in Lemmy
Yeah, also, Conservatives are more 'fall in line' voters, so there's less vote splitting on the Right than on the Left. Libertarians do appeal to the people opposed to both eyes in the boardroom and eyes in the bedroom on both the Left and the Right, but for the most part, the GQP follows the 'Vote for the Conservative in the Primary and the Republican in the General' more than we follow its inverse (replace Conservative with Liberal and Republican with Democrat). And for Republicans afraid of a Trump presidency, come join us and vote for Harris. Then maybe go work on de-Trumping your party after they lose with you helping us. ;)
At least it’s the newly elected House that starts its session in January, right?
anakin.jpg
Yes, but unfortunately they vote by state not individually
This government really is held together with hopes and dreams, isn’t it?
It always was. Sometimes that's stronger than other times.
Wait... you can actually have someone NOT get 270 votes?
Oh... duh... 3rd parties taking some. You think it'd just be whoever has the most electoral college votes then... Alas, needlessly complicating things.
Yeah. It has been that way since the founding of the country. The winner not only must have the most votes, they must get half of the available EVs, rounding up. This was learned early on in the history of the US, when four Democratic-Republicans ran for President, and nobody got the required number of votes. This happened in 1824, barely half a century after the US was founded. It resulted in Andrew Jackson (Trump's role model, BTW), getting 99 EVs, John Q. Adams winning 84 EVs, William H. Crawford (who had a stroke) winning 41 EVs, and Henry Clay winning 37 EVs. Per the 12th Amendment of the US constitution, nobody had a straight majority here, so the top three vote getters (disqualifying Henry Clay) advanced to the House of Representatives. Clay's supporters in Congress threw their weight behind John Q. Adams, giving him a straight majority over the top candidate, Andrew Jackson, and Adams gave Clay a spot in his cabinet. Capping this shitstorm off was Andrew "Sore Loser" Jackson throwing a fit, calling it a 'corrupt bargain', in a very Trumpian temper tantrum.
IMO, what happened in 1828 (and again in 1837 with the VP) is an important history lesson for voters thinking of voting Third Party. Unless you can somehow convince 50% + 1 people to pick your Third Party candidate in 270 EV worth of states, your best bet is to get that candidate to run for a local election and become a vocal proponent for fixing the US electoral system. Because you'd hate to have 269 EV go for Harris, 81 go to a mix of Left-Wing Third Party candidates, and 188 go to Trump, then have the election thrown to the House, where the Trumpian states give Trump the win despite the Left-wing candidates winning in a landslide were those EVs have gone to a single person. And even that's an unrealistic scenario. Only two people who have not had an R or D behind their name have gotten EVs in my lifetime, and both of them were from faithless electors, NOT from winning an EV. You're not going to win the Presidency with 1% of the vote. But you WILL throw your state over to the bad guy if your 1% share makes the difference between Harris winning and Trump winning.
There are a lot of reasons why you shoulnd't vote for third party for US Presidential Elections. The EC is just one of them.
Doesn't have to be a 3rd party. With the way proportional voting works in NE and ME, it is possible, however unlikely, that there will be a 269-269 tie vote.
https://youtu.be/YnNSnJbjdws#t=52s
They could tie at 269.