No, Atlas, a Republican running third party won't send the election to the house

[Broken System]

Certain people are discussing how a third party candidate can throw the election to the house if they only run in one state. The primary example used is Kasich in Ohio. Ohio is already a swing state as it is. Kasich is not even popular among all Ohioans, plus, he would have to get virtually all of the support from the other Republican candidate to prevent it from being a simple vote split. You can't convince that many people to vote for a third party candidate who isn't even running in every state, even if it's their home state.

The GOP has a hard time reaching half of the vote as it is. It's not like any Democrats will vote for a third party Republican anyway. The only possible way for the vote to get sent to the house is if a Democrat like Webb or Bloomberg runs for president. They would not only pick up Republicans dissatisfied with their own nominee, but they would also have the potential to pick up Democrats who hate Clinton's guts. That's the kind of third party candidate that can win some states.

Here's a scenario. Trump vs Clinton 2016 election. Members of both parties are increasingly tired of both candidates. Bloomberg enters as a third-party candidate. At first, people dismiss him as irrelevant like all other third party candidates. But as every new poll comes out, he gathers more and more support. People who originally were afraid that a Bloomberg vote would be throwing out their vote start to bangwagon their support behind him. Feel free to post maps of such an election below.

[RI]

Yes, it could, but only if they picked off an otherwise Dem state, only ran in otherwise solid Dem states, and the election were very close to begin with.

[Mr. Reactionary]

I don't see a 3rd party run from either Trump or an Establishment Republican putting any States in play so as to deny Hillary a majority of the electoral college. In fact, a 3-way race probably makes it more likely that Hillary wins a larger electoral college majority, since its winner take all and she'd only need <40% to win. Bill Clinton won Montana and Georgia in 1992 for example, because of the split of the right vote. Congress only decides of no candidate gets a majority of the electoral college.

[Broken System]

Yes, it could, but only if they picked off an otherwise Dem state, only ran in otherwise solid Dem states, and the election were very close to begin with.

I just can't see that happening. If a Republican runs third party nationally, then the Democrats will win all of the swing states, lean GOP states, and tilt GOP states. For a third party GOP candidate to win a Democratic state, they will not only have to gain all of the GOP support from the nominee, but they will also have to get many votes from Democrat voters. Even if it did work, that one state they are popular in still wouldn't make up for all of the other states lost due to the vote split.

Now let's talk about the one state theory. A candidate only running in one state would make their support even lower. People don't want to vote for a candidate that can't even get enough electoral votes to win the election. The only possible way for this to work is for the candidate to explicitly announce "I am running third party so that I can prevent both candidates from reaching 270 electoral votes, so vote for me so they can't win this state." That won't go well. People nominate candidates for each party because they like them and would vote for them in the general election. Although you may personally hate both nominees, more people being extra angry doesn't take away the fact that both main party nominees have a substantial amount of support.

[Dwarven Dragon]

Yes, it could, but only if they picked off an otherwise Dem state, only ran in otherwise solid Dem states, and the election were very close to begin with.

I just can't see that happening. If a Republican runs third party nationally, then the Democrats will win all of the swing states, lean GOP states, and tilt GOP states. For a third party GOP candidate to win a Democratic state, they will not only have to gain all of the GOP support from the nominee, but they will also have to get many votes from Democrat voters. Even if it did work, that one state they are popular in still wouldn't make up for all of the other states lost due to the vote split.

Now let's talk about the one state theory. A candidate only running in one state would make their support even lower. People don't want to vote for a candidate that can't even get enough electoral votes to win the election. The only possible way for this to work is for the candidate to explicitly announce "I am running third party so that I can prevent both candidates from reaching 270 electoral votes, so vote for me so they can't win this state." That won't go well. People nominate candidates for each party because they like them and would vote for them in the general election. Although you may personally hate both nominees, more people being extra angry doesn't take away the fact that both main party nominees have a substantial amount of support.

It's worth noting that George Wallace basically ran on sending the election to the house. Yeah, he was on the ballot nationwide, but he never expected to win the election outright. And he got 13% with that.

What you need though, is something driving third party support - either a part of the rank and file of one or both parties and their leaners needs to have serious misgivings about their nominees that don't easily go away, likely resulting from a hotly contested broker convention (this is the scenario being used in my 2016 timeline), or there needs to be some sort of issue that a significant sector of the population is deeply angry at both parties with (this is what happened in 1968, the issue being segregation.).

[SteveRogers]

Yes, it could, but only if they picked off an otherwise Dem state, only ran in otherwise solid Dem states, and the election were very close to begin with.

I just can't see that happening. If a Republican runs third party nationally, then the Democrats will win all of the swing states, lean GOP states, and tilt GOP states. For a third party GOP candidate to win a Democratic state, they will not only have to gain all of the GOP support from the nominee, but they will also have to get many votes from Democrat voters. Even if it did work, that one state they are popular in still wouldn't make up for all of the other states lost due to the vote split.

Now let's talk about the one state theory. A candidate only running in one state would make their support even lower. People don't want to vote for a candidate that can't even get enough electoral votes to win the election. The only possible way for this to work is for the candidate to explicitly announce "I am running third party so that I can prevent both candidates from reaching 270 electoral votes, so vote for me so they can't win this state." That won't go well. People nominate candidates for each party because they like them and would vote for them in the general election. Although you may personally hate both nominees, more people being extra angry doesn't take away the fact that both main party nominees have a substantial amount of support.

It's worth noting that George Wallace basically ran on sending the election to the house. Yeah, he was on the ballot nationwide, but he never expected to win the election outright. And he got 13% with that.

What you need though, is something driving third party support - either a part of the rank and file of one or both parties and their leaners needs to have serious misgivings about their nominees that don't easily go away, likely resulting from a hotly contested broker convention (this is the scenario being used in my 2016 timeline), or there needs to be some sort of issue that a significant sector of the population is deeply angry at both parties with (this is what happened in 1968, the issue being segregation.).

If you want to mount a strong regional campaign like Wallace did in 1968, you need a major issue that both major parties have left ideological space open on AND you need that issue to be something that is of paramount concern to a specific region of the country. So no, I don't think running on a moderate conservative platform in just Ohio produces the desired result.

If the Republican establishment were really, really determined to mount a third-party campaign explicitly for the purpose of throwing the election to the House via shenanigans, they might be better off thinking more along the lines of 1836 . . .