Are Third Party Votes “Voting Against The System?”

Well… No. Absolutely not. I’ll keep this short so read the whole damn thing, alright?

Third party votes are not votes against the system, they are votes the system is designed to devalue. To get the presidency, a candidate has to get 270 votes in the Electoral College. In a 2-way split, that’s essentially a majority. In a 3-way split, no one gets 270. Unless the third party gets more votes than the other two combined (they won’t — there are way too many registered GOP and DNC), no one gets to 270.

Since no one gets to 270, the House of Representatives votes on who becomes President — do you think the Republican-controlled House is going to vote for Jill Stein or Gary Johnson? Do you think they’re going to shake up the political binary they benefit from? Do you think they are going to elect someone who they have been given the rights not to elect by our founding fathers? Hint: no.

If you want a 3rd party vote not to be a waste, then we need a new third party whose top order of business is abolishing the Electoral College and implementing a new voting system (like Instant Runoff Voting, which has been proven to create more democratic results). They need to be elected to congressional seats in large numbers — large enough to start pushing EC abolition bills — and the people need to rally behind them and create a mandate.

I can see no other non-violent path to breaking the political binary.