What year will a real third party candidate make a real impact?

[Suburbia]

2020 is looking to be a bitter binary choice "a vote for a third party is a vote for R or D" especially with the danger of President Donald Trump.

Anyone who votes third party, especially in the flawed Electoral College swing states could swing the election or siphon "spoiler" votes away.

When Trump is gone, whenever that is, will 2024, 2028, 2032 and beyond really be the year a real third party can make a real impact?

[Some of My Best Friends Are Gay]

Probably not for the foreseeable future.


It would take a scenario where you have two truly awful and extremely unpopular major party nominees (much moreso than Trump and Clinton), and a very, very popular third party candidate with near endless wealth.


Something like Richard Spencer vs. Linda Sarsour vs. a hypothetical billionaire war hero from "the heartland".

[SuperCow]

The only thing that would make a third party candidacy viable (other than a willingness to throw away a billion+ dollars), is a viral interest and acceptance in a significant number of states for ranked-choice voting systems like they have recently adopted in Maine.

[WithLeast]

Right now, I could only see a third party actually winning electoral votes in states like Nebraska or Maine if a candidate targets a specific district. I have a hard time imagining that a third party could have a real impact with the way the two major parties are polarized at the moment.

[GM Team Member and Senator WB]

not unless whoever becomes president in the future gets rid of the EC, which might actually happen quite soon.

[morgankingsley]

It's not that hard for a third party to win states. They just need to do a regional campaign in rural states

[Ilhan Apologist]

It's not that hard for a third party to win states. They just need to do a regional campaign in rural states

Given that rural voters have become increasingly loyal to the GOP, I can't see that happening any time soon.

[Cassandra]

Whenever the Democratic Party actually nominates a socialist, be it Bernie this year or someone else in the next cycle or two (AOC?), I expect some billionaire to run a third party campaign and pull enough capitalists and useful idiots in the suburbs to throw the election to the Republican.

[skbl17]

When the electoral system changes. The presidential election isn't one big election, but 56 (50 states + DC + ME1/2 + NE1/2/3) individual first past the post elections with different weights.

Short of that, you'd need a race where the candidates are extreme, highly offensive and stereotypical caricatures of a traditional Democrat and Republican versus some generic, stay-the-course moderate. It could be something like someone-far-left-of-Bernie Sanders vs. someone-right-of-Richard Spencer vs. someone like Charlie Baker/Larry Hogan/Phil Scott/John Bel Edwards.

[Former President tack50]

Probably some sort of more extreme 2016 election, with a far left unpopular Democrat, a far right unpopular Republican and a centre-right mormon Indy.

Maybe that way the indy could win Utah, but even that's a stretch.

[TML]

First-past-the-post must go in order for this to happen.

[TrumpBritt24]

If not Amash in 2020, I'm willing to say probably never.

The Green Party has, since Nader's effective exit, been a joke. And the LP's last great realistic down-to-earth candidate was Austin Petersen - who left the party.

[redeagleofficial]

Trump vs. Sanders vs. Schultz is plausible for 2020

[TML]

Trump vs. Sanders vs. Schultz is plausible for 2020

Ask John Anderson how he managed to keep Ronald Reagan from unseating Jimmy Carter in 1980.

[Sumner 1868]

Despite eighteen years of unwinnable Mideastern military interventions and the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, nothing remotely close to a third-party movement has emerged in this age. The last time a third-party was really important was Perot in 1992, and the last time a third-party was slightly important was Nader in 2000. If the sort of politics we've had in the first two decades of this century won't make the sheepish public consider the possibility, then nothing will.

[Blue3]

It’s becoming less likely as time goes on, not more. We would need a crisis on the scale of the Great Depression or War World 2 or the Civil War or a new Revolution or a new Constitution for it to happen.

[morgankingsley]

Despite joining the race in august, mcmullin still got half of trumps vote in 2016. If he joined in june or May, he may have won it. Perot almost won 1 electoral vote despite dropping out. Had he stayed, he could have won Maine, Montana and Nevada. Had gary Johnson made the debate, he probably would have gotten a faithless electoral vote from Montana and new Mexico. If you are a sectional candidate you probably could win one state with 2 or 3 percent of the overall vote, if you got all out there. If you pull a nationwide candidacy, you will probably get at least one or two states starting at 21 percent, so while the latter won't happen soon, the former maybe can