Election: Third party vote makes sense in this state

Unfortunately, the three most viable choices for the 2016 Presidential election are Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump, and “I don’t like either.” To those in the “I don’t like either” camp, I would like to suggest the following:

It’s pretty much a given that Clinton is going to carry Washington State and its electoral votes. Therefore, whoever you individually select is not going to change the outcome, but you could possibly influence it by voting for a 3rd party or write-in candidate. It doesn’t really matter who they are, or how much you may like or dislike them--they’re not going to get elected anyway.

The purpose of voting 3rd party or a write-in is to reduce the overall popular vote that Clinton and Trump get, preferably keeping it well under 50% for each in order to remove any credible claim that the winner has an “election mandate” to work with.

And in the ideal world, a significantly “I don’t like either” vote might act as a wake-up call to both the Democrat and Republican parties to reform how they chose their presidential nominees for the 2020 election. So please, don’t squander your “I don’t like either” voice by not voting.

This story was originally published October 27, 2016 at 9:09 AM with the headline "Election: Third party vote makes sense in this state."