No EV winner, could Johnson win in the House?

[Simfan34]

Suppose Gary Johnson begins climbing in the polls over the next few months. He receives several high-profile endorsements-- inter alia, Mitt Romney, Rand and Ron Paul, Brian Sandoval, Susana Martinez, Justin Amash, Angus King-- while carefully toeing the line of stressing his differences with the Republican establishment. He is backed by the Club for Growth and other pro-business groups. He notably distinguishes himself by calling for marijuana legalization, whereas Trump nor Clinton despite an emerging bipartisan majority remain opposed*.

By September Johnson is averaging 16-18% in the polls and qualifies for the debates, where he does well**, frequently teaming up with Hillary against Trump; his weakest performance is in the foreign policy debate (but decisively outperforms Trump in all three). Weld, meanwhile, is narrowly declared the winner of the VP debate, although many say it's a draw. Hillary remains stuck in the polls while reality appears to set in for Trump, who drops.

The election day result is this, and the GOP retains a reduced majority in the House:

Hillary Clinton (D-NY) / Tim Kaine (D-VA) - 39.2% (263)
Donald Trump (R-NY) / Mike Pence (R-IN) - 34.4% (234)
Gary Johnson (L-NM) / Bill Weld (L-MA) - 25.9% (41)
Others - 0.5%

Given this scenario, could Johnson win the resultant election in the House of Representatives? Could he win in a scenario where he received approximately ~15% of votes and won one or two states?

*Disclosure: This isn't some personal fantasy; I too remain opposed.
**Note: To be honest, I've seen little evidence to suggest Johnson is actually good in debates.

[Vosem]

I don't think Johnson could win in such a scenario. If the Senate remains Republican, however, it's not difficult to envision a scenario where anti-Trump Representatives abstain in a sufficient number of states to keep the Presidency vacant and install Mike Pence as an effectively permanent Acting President. Such a map could come about even if Johnson is only at ~15% nationwide:

This is 266-266-6. Republicans have 33 congressional delegation majorities now; CO, IA, and NV are probably lost in the House election, which brings Trump down to 30; absentions or Johnson support among anti-Trump Congressmen could then cost him enough states, mostly in the west and northern Great Lakes (Don Young, Mike Simpson, at least one Wisconsinite, the Michigan Trio of Amash, Huizenga, and Upton, and the Utahns abstain or vote Johnson -- which could be aided by strong Johnson performances in AK and ID) to cost him the election in the House, making Pence President.

But I don't think Johnson has any path to actually win through the House.

[Higgs]

Hell no.

[ElectionsGuy]

No, Johnson would need to win 270, wouldn't even matter if he won the popular vote and got a plurality of electoral votes (as much of a fantasy that is) the house and senate would just select the Republican option.

[Vosem]

No, Johnson would need to win 270, wouldn't even matter if he won the popular vote and got a plurality of electoral votes (as much of a fantasy that is) the house and senate would just select the Republican option.

I honestly don't think a Republican-controlled House would elect Trump if abstaining resulted in Pence becoming President, even if it was against Pence's own wishes. If the Democrats manage to take the Senate, Trump probably gets elected to block a Kaine Presidency.

Johnson and Hillary would have no chance, though as I pointed out in my earlier post, Johnson could conceivably throw the election to the House even if he only carries a single state, which he could well do with ~15% of the national vote.

[Maxwell]

Guaranteed, Johnson's numbers dip badly if he ever gets a debate stage

[Californiadreaming]

In short: No.

[Californiadreaming]

Guaranteed, Johnson's numbers dip badly if he ever gets a debate stage

Did you previously listen to Gary Johnson speak, or what?

[Seriously?]

Hell no.

Agreed. Why would any state delegation that is part of the two-party cartel give their vote to a third-party? Ever?

[Bakersfield Uber Alles]

Johnson supporter here. Uhhh... Yeah... No.

It's a silly pipe-dream meant to fire up voters. At this point, Johnson really only has a shot in Utah, I would say. In the event that no one gets a majority, I could see either Turnip winning the House or a deadlock with the VP being decided by the incoming Senate (TBD who wins, but Dems could have a shot).

[Sir Mohamed]

No, they just can't elect the third man who has so far less votes. If it's 269-269, the Trumpster will be no. 45.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

If Johnson starts doing well, it's unlikely he'd draw support from both parties equally. If Johnson does well enuf to win the Southwestern States, the map is going to look like this:

Johnson will have a very limited appeal with African-Americans, tho he may do reasonably well with other minorities. A Johnson candidacy that does well is going to put a good chunk of the South in the Democratic column.

Even with fantasy election results, the only realistic scenario for Johnson to win the Presidency this election is he gets a faithless elector or two in a close race that puts the election into the House, and that the Senate goes Democratic so that a few House Republicans can deny Trump the election in the House and force their colleagues to accept Johnson.

[Badger]

Of course not. Don't be silly.

[i4indyguy]

He could not win on a first ballot vote, or if each Rep was sequestered and unable to speak to others, but he might have an outside chance if there were days of horse-trading that went on before. I could see establishment Republicans possibly defecting.    Unlikely though

[Beefalow and the Consumer]

The GOP House caucus doesn't have the political guts to oppose Trump.  They would be tearing the party apart, and would probably be signing the death warrants of half their membership, either through primaries or to Democrats.

Unless you're Ted Cruz, who is singularly adept at opposing his own party, there's no way you could get away with keeping the party nominee out of the White House.  Donald Trump is legitimate, and the GOP has come to accept that.

[King]

Fun fact: by law the House can only choose between the Top 3 candidates in electoral vote. Dems best strategy in a 269-269 tie would be to put up a third candidate and have some electors go faithless for them. Make the choice Trump, Clinton, or a Democrat even more despised.

[Torie]

Fun fact: by law the House can only choose between the Top 3 candidates in electoral vote. Dems best strategy in a 269-269 tie would be to put up a third candidate and have some electors go faithless for them. Make the choice Trump, Clinton, or a Democrat even more despised.

You saved me from making that post. However, two can play that game, and Trump electors could vote for some third person, to get that person in third ahead of the unnamed even more despised Democrat (Harry Reid?).

[Beefalow and the Consumer]

Fun fact: by law the House can only choose between the Top 3 candidates in electoral vote. Dems best strategy in a 269-269 tie would be to put up a third candidate and have some electors go faithless for them. Make the choice Trump, Clinton, or a Democrat even more despised.

You saved me from making that post. However, two can play that game, and Trump electors could vote for some third person, to get that person in third ahead of the unnamed even more despised Democrat (Harry Reid?).

This would require a lot of collusion between electors.  This isn't just either party making a public "suggestion" that electors "vote their conscience."  This is outright brokering of officials whom the public have entrusted to vote a certain way.  Which is a total betrayal of democracy.  I mean, the bar for "democratic behavior" has been lowered since 2000, and the public tolerance for this kind of thing has been high.  But I have to imagine this is a bridge too far, and the public backlash would be enormous.

[Torie]

Fun fact: by law the House can only choose between the Top 3 candidates in electoral vote. Dems best strategy in a 269-269 tie would be to put up a third candidate and have some electors go faithless for them. Make the choice Trump, Clinton, or a Democrat even more despised.

You saved me from making that post. However, two can play that game, and Trump electors could vote for some third person, to get that person in third ahead of the unnamed even more despised Democrat (Harry Reid?).

This would require a lot of collusion between electors.  This isn't just either party making a public "suggestion" that electors "vote their conscience."  This is outright brokering of officials whom the public have entrusted to vote a certain way.  Which is a total betrayal of democracy.  I mean, the bar for "democratic behavior" has been lowered since 2000, and the public tolerance for this kind of thing has been high.  But I have to imagine this is a bridge too far, and the public backlash would be enormous.

Heck, unless state law provided otherwise, I would be a faithless elector in a millisecond. If it's legal, it's legal. If the public doesn't like it, change the law. Suppose I was an elector for a candidate, say for Trump, and it was revealed that Trump was a Soviet agent, a Manchurian candidate as it were. And given Trump's comments, well, whatever. Anything is possible with Trump - anything.

[Enduro]

It will be a big gain for the Libertarian Party if we force it to the House, and it would put us in a position to do more damage in 2020. Unfortunately, the two parties are going to be more willing to elect Trump and Clinton than admit Libertarians exist.