We are writing in response to a recent opinion piece entitled “Why I’m Voting Third Party.” Of course we broadly agree with the notion that Americans should not be limited to only two options for whom they choose as president. However, we strongly disagree with the author’s conclusion that the solution is to vote for a third party in the upcoming presidential election. While we do not believe it was done intentionally or with malice, this article does contain several logical fallacies which we feel it is important to highlight and refute.
First, the author claims that you should not vote for a Democrat because they are not any better than the Republicans. In order to back this claim up, they cite several examples of policy issues where the Democrats claim to be different but have essentially the same policy as Republicans. The author has cherry-picked issues in order to make their case. Of course, it’s possible to find issues (such as immigration) where the Democrats are arguably just as right-wing as the Republicans. But, there are also plenty of issues on which the Democrats are actually significantly better.
During the Biden administration, there have been many positive changes such as increasing healthcare access for transgender people, expanding overtime benefits, creating an Office of Gun Violence Prevention and appointing Lina Khan as FTC Chair where she has led a crackdown on monopolies and large corporations that harm consumers. This included capping the price of insulin at $35 a month. These are policies that Trump would never enact, ever. We agree that Democrats are very right-wing on many issues, but when you take a big picture look, there are so many vulnerable people who would be dramatically better off with a Democrat as president rather than Trump.
The author also responds to the often repeated argument that voting for a third party is wasting your vote. They claim that voting for a third party candidate is not actually wasting your vote because you’re sending a message to politicians that they need to listen to more radical ideas that don’t align with the mainstream of either party. However, this is an ineffective form of protest because you risk the people you’re trying to send a message to actually concluding that Harris was too progressive for independent voters. This will make them think that they need to run more moderate candidates next time, which is exactly the opposite of the outcome the protest was aimed at achieving.
Additionally, we want to strongly caution people against taking the author’s advice without considering a major caveat. If you vote in a state that is solidly blue and has absolutely no chance of being won by Donald Trump, then sure, indulge in this “protest” and vote for a third party. However, if you live in a swing state or red state, you absolutely SHOULD NOT VOTE FOR A THIRD PARTY! Here’s why: when the margins are thin, it is absolutely possible for a percentage of people to swing an election by voting for a third candidate who doesn’t end up winning. In a system where either Harris or Trump is going to win (that is just a fact), not voting for Harris, whether by abstaining or voting for a third party, is the same as voting for Trump. We’ve already established that voting third party isn’t even an effective form of protest, but even if you think it is, there is no amount of “sending a message” that’s worth electing Donald Trump over, because this country will not survive another Trump presidency. That’s what is at stake.
Lastly, the author of the article dismisses fears about Project 2025 on the grounds that Republicans have made big ambitious plans in the past. This is not a reason to take Project 2025 unseriously. Arguably those past Republican strategy plans are a big part of how we ended up with the situation we have now. The author cites Jimmy Carter’s implementation of neoliberal policies as evidence that the Democrats are aligned with the right on the issues discussed in Republican strategy plans. However, that was a very different time in American politics, and Harris has made it very clear that she is opposed to the dismantling of the administrative state and executive branch bureaucracy that Project 2025 advocates.
Unlike in the case of Jimmy Carter, there is no doubt that Harris would keep protections for Federal bureaucrats and agency experts, while Trump has made it abundantly clear he would wipe all of that away in favor of an executive branch that bends to his will alone. He wants to eliminate the Department of Education for crying out loud. When evaluating the Democrats, you have to count not only the actions they do take, but the value of them preserving our country against actions that the Republicans would take.
When the Republicans tell us they want to implement extreme anti-democratic changes, we should believe them. That’s why we are voting for Kamala Harris this November.
