With all this talk of the GOP establishment potentially stealing the nomination from Trump at the convention, I decided to look up the ballot access laws for third party candidates. I compiled the information I
found into the below map.
Texas and
South Dakota have "sore loser" laws which prohibit a candidate who has lost a major party's nomination for the presidency to run for president as an independent. Of 45 states with similar books on the laws, these are the only two states which appear to apply to presidential candidates. This takes
41 electoral votes out of play for Trump.
Nevada,
Oklahoma, and
South Carolina do not count write-in votes. The deadline to file as an independent in these states is before the Republican National Convention ends July 21 so presumably Trump will not have announced his independent campaign in time to qualify. This takes another
22 electoral votes out of play for Trump.
Georgia, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, New Mexico, and
North Carolina all have filing deadlines for independent candidates which close before the Republican National Convention is scheduled to end on July 21. Therefore, Trump will have to run a write-in campaign in these seven states. This puts
112 electoral votes effectively out of Trump's reach, though it is plausible that a "write-in Trump" movement could swing traditional "red states" to the Democratic candidate.
Trump can technically appear on the ballot in all of the blue states. However, each state has a different filing deadline and signature requirement, some of which would pose significant challenges to Trump's third party bid. I've divided this group into three sub-categories based on the timing of their filing deadlines.
Missouri and
Washington have filing deadlines immediately after the convention is scheduled to conclude, 7/25 and 7/23 respectively. It is plausible to imagine a scenario where the convention runs two or even four days over schedule, in which case both of those states would be relegated to "write-in Trump" states. That's another
22 electoral votes that Trump's ability to contest is questionable.
The next shade of blue states (
Arkansas, Kansas, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Vermont, West Virginia, Wisconsin) all have filing deadlines on either the 1st or 2nd of August. That's a week and a half after the convention ends. It's quite easy to imagine the Trump campaign falling short of the signature requirements in a number of these states; Maryland is the most difficult with 38,000 signatures required (0.64% of the state's population), followed by West Virginia (6,705 - 0.36%), Maine (4,000 - 0.30%), South Dakota (2,775 - 0.30%), and Pennsylvania (25,000 - 0.2%). Therefore,
85 electoral votes may or may not be seriously contested by Trump, depending on the strength of his signature gathering organization. Note that if he misses the mark in Arkansas write-in votes for Trump would not be counted.
The remainder of states have filing deadlines sufficiently late that Trump should be able to get on the ballot in all of these so long as he is running a serious campaign. A number of states have ballot access deadlines within three weeks of the convention's scheduled end (8/10 for
Alaska, Colorado, Connecticut, D.C., Hawaii, New Hampshire, Ohio and 8/12 for
California). A number of these states have particularly strenuous signature requirements; California is particularly noteworthy for requiring 178,039 signatures. These states represent a combined total of
103 electoral votes, most of which should be seriously contested by Trump but there is still a serious chance of organizational failure. Note that if he misses the mark in Hawaii write-in votes for Trump would not be counted.
Remaining are 17 states with
153 electoral votes between them which Trump should certainly contest if he is running a serious campaign. Therefore, there are
256 electoral votes which Trump can be reasonably sure of seriously contesting (with his name on the ballot). This is less than the 270 EVs required to be elected President. Adding the lighter blue states brings his total seriously contestable states to 370 EVs. Of course, many of these states are solid Democratic states which Trump shouldn't be competitive in. Therefore, based solely on ballot access realities, it appears highly unlikely for Trump to be able to win a general election.
Summary370 Trump may theoretically have his name on the ballot
112 Trump must run as a write-in candidate
63 Trump can not appear on the ballot and write-in votes will not be counted
