this post was submitted on 10 Oct 2024

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204

So you don’t like Trump or Harris – here’s why it’s still best to vote for one of them (theconversation.com)

submitted 3 weeks ago by [email protected] to c/politics

269 comments fedilink hide all child comments

It has been said a gazillion times over the last few months, but is it getting through to those who need to hear it?

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[–] [email protected] 122 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (4 children)

And remember: a "protest" third party vote is a vote for Trump.

If neither Harris nor Trump gets 270 electoral votes....

[If] No one gets to 270 and the House of Representatives, voting on behalf of the 50 states, is entrusted to pick the next president. What could possibly go wrong with that constitutionally mandated solution?

-- What if no candidate wins 270 electoral votes?

Edit: I feel like this fact is often overlooked.

[–] [email protected] 74 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

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.

[–] themeatbridge 42 points 3 weeks ago (54 children)

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.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

That's because Harris is Satan and Trump is my Daaaaddy

[–] Archer 8 points 3 weeks ago

I’m really encouraged by the fact that universalmonk and return2ozma’s posts get heavily downvoted when they push this slop in Lemmy

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[–] jhymesba 14 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)

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. ;)

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[–] [email protected] 14 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

At least it’s the newly elected House that starts its session in January, right?

anakin.jpg

[–] FlowVoid 15 points 3 weeks ago

Yes, but unfortunately they vote by state not individually

[–] Semi_Hemi_Demigod 12 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

This government really is held together with hopes and dreams, isn’t it?

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[–] blanketswithsmallpox 9 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (4 children)

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.

[–] jhymesba 15 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

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.

[–] jordanlund 12 points 3 weeks ago

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

[–] meco03211 7 points 3 weeks ago

They could tie at 269.

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[–] [email protected] 65 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (4 children)

Whew the tankies and astroturfers are out in force in these comments. I think we got the gamut going here:

"I don't vote for genocide"
"A vote for 3rd party isn't a vote for Trump"
"If we don't vote 3rd party nothing will change"
"Jill Stein isn't a Russian asset"
"Who cares if Trump wins; they're both bad / nothing worse will happen l both sides"
"I literally don't understand how Trump can win if I vote 3rd party because I don't understand the difference between voting for and against a candidate"
"Liberals / Democrats / Harris voters are the real fascists"

Solid work astroturfers! Glad to see you're still trotting out these arguments despite plenty of Lemmy users discrediting each and every one. Really shows grit and dedication.

Also, calling it now that at least one of them replies with something about how they're true / haven't been discredited.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

I wouldn't be surprised if they're actually Trump supporters, just trying to get the swing voters to be all pessimistic and get them not to vote or vote 3rd party.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

Trump supporters aren't smart enough to understand how the Fediverse works.

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[–] Voyajer 11 points 3 weeks ago

It makes it easy to tag them for future reference or block them at least.

[–] aesthelete 9 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (2 children)

“Who cares if Trump wins; they’re both bad / nothing worse will happen l both sides”

Trump's RIGHT NOW basically talking about forming up goon squads and kicking out immigrants on the basis of some law passed in the 1700s and people are still pretending like this dude isn't basically a Hitler.

“I don’t vote for genocide”

Yeah....about that....a vote that helps Trump is one that not only exacerbates the ongoing genocide in the middle east, but starts up a new one right here. He's talking seriously about military tribunal and gas chamber type shit in "Operation Aurora".

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[–] [email protected] 61 points 3 weeks ago

... And the one that's best to vote for is Harris.

[–] jaggedrobotpubes 36 points 3 weeks ago

Third parties are crucial and we can't vote for them (intelligently) until we change away from first past the post:

Https://youtu.be/s7tWHJfhiyo

[–] jordanlund 32 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (43 children)

"Instead, protest voting is in fact likely to harm the democratic process, potentially leading to the election of the candidate the majority of voters overall, and protest voters specifically, most dislike."

^ THIS!

In a Presidential election, whoever gets the most votes wins.

If "Not Trump" is split between 5 candidates, and Trump gets the most votes, he wins.

Here's a scenario:

Trump - 40%
Harris - 35%
Kennedy - 15%
Oliver - 5%
Stein - 3%
West - 2%

Trump wins. Even though 60% of the voting public don't want him. The "Not Trump" vote failed to coalesce under one candidate enough to block him from winning.

[–] jhymesba 16 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

This is what I keep saying. It's like my scenario with the Class President. A Nerd and a Jock are running. 51 kids are nerds and don't want the Jock. 49 kids are jocks and don't want the Nerd. Pretty clear that the Nerd wins, because more people don't want the Jock than the Nerd, right? Wrong. If the Jock can peel just THREE votes off from the nerd coalition, the Jocks win it and D&D night is cancelled.

Now re-read that and replace nerds with Liberals, jocks with Conservatives, and 'D&D night is cancelled' with 'Project 2025 is shoved down our throats.' Then...vote with your fucking head and not your fucking heart!

[–] [email protected] 13 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

It's like this, but Jocks' votes are worth more than Nerds'.

[–] jhymesba 8 points 3 weeks ago

Definitely. I tried to keep the scenario simple to make it easy to understand, but there is truth in the statement that the jocks have some fingers on the scale of Democracy. I suspect there's more nerds than jocks. We just have to make sure they all turn out to vote because the cheerleader that is the jock's politician is pulling out ALL the dirty tricks.

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 3 weeks ago (3 children)

No you don’t. You just really ought to vote.

I hope you vote for Harris because Fuck Trump and I think she’ll be a good president, but you don’t HAVE TO vote for one of them. But really, please vote.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 3 weeks ago

It didn't say "have to" as in you are legally obligated to. It says why "it's best to" and explains why 3rd parties act as spoilers in the first past the post system and how voting for a 3rd party can lead to the exact opposite person winning than who you want

[–] [email protected] 18 points 3 weeks ago

Isn't that precisely what the article said?

[–] jhymesba 15 points 3 weeks ago

I get where you're coming from here, but ... let's be clear.

Come January, one of two people will be taking the Oath of Office.

Kamala Harris.
Donald Trump.

The article explains why it's best for you to vote for the person you dislike the least (if you can't say 'like the most') out of those two.

None of the other candidates for President have any realistic shot at POTUS.

In fact, many of them are mathematically eliminated from a shot at POTUS by virtue of them not being able to secure 270 EVs because they are not on the ballot in enough states. Most of them can't even get 100EV, let alone 270.

Apart from RFK Jr, Chase Oliver, and Jill Stein, none of them appear as a pickable option in enough states to have a shot at winning 270 EVs and will require Write-In Campaigns.

RFK Jr., Chase Oliver, and Jill Stein COMBINED represent less than 10% (largest vote share I have seen in the past month is Outward Intelligence, which had Kennedy at 3%, West at 1%, Oliver at 1%, and Stein at 1%, taken between 22 and 26 Sept of 1735 Likely Voters, while most other polls show Third Parties between 2% and 5%). Harris is between 45% and 50% in many of these polls, which means...well, Harris has MUCH more of a shot of winning than any of the Third Party candidates, let alone any one of them.

The fix for this is to get your Greens and Socialists and Liberals and Progressives running for local offices, and pushing and pushing hard for RCV. I can't vote for your favourite candidate now because I don't want Republicans in office, but if RCV passes this November, I'll be far more open to it. In fact, I'll take a risk on a Green or Progressive or Libertarian alternative to my Senator or Representative because I can vote that person 1, and make sure the Dem is ranked over the GQPer, so my vote becomes a Dem long before a Republican can win. Then work on getting the EC torn down. And I think you should to. I won't tell you you MUST. But I won't shy away from saying that if you want a progressive future, letting Harris lose now is a stupid way to try (and fail) to achieve that.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 3 weeks ago

If anyone actually wants the option to vote for 3rd parties, then a landslide victory for Harris is the best option in this election.

The Republicans are already torn. They stand together with the MAGA insanity hoping to get enough votes by including the crazyness. If the election clearly shows that it's a losing strategy, they will have to regroup and the GOP will be split. Then when Democrats are clearly outnumbering the opposition, it will also be more tempting for radical left wing to branch out without risking the opposition winning.

When "both sides" are then fractioned into smaller groups, it will finally be possible to get a majority to vote for getting rid of the 1st past the post problem, and make it possible for 3rd parties to get any influence.

But the first step is to make sure the Republicans lose really hard. Voting 3rd party won't do it in this election.

[–] meco03211 13 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

There's a third scenario where a protest vote makes sense. In solid states, a vote for a third party could push that party to meet the threshold for getting over $100 million in federal funds for the next campaign. They just need to get 5% of the popular vote to be eligible. Now I'm not saying that this would necessarily lead to some utopia of qualified candidates, but it would help disrupt the higher echelons of politics from both sides that keep the system in place. And before some dumbass comes in and accuses me of "both sides-ing" this, when was the last time congressional term limits was seriously considered for legislation despite having broad support from both sides of the electorate? The top rungs of congress that have been in office since before most of us were born won't allow it.

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