Robert F. Kennedy Jr. may have dropped out of the presidential race, but that by no means should lead to the conclusion third party candidates won't impact the outcome in November.

While it was unclear whether Kennedy would have pulled more votes from former President Donald Trump or Vice President Kamala Harris, what is clear is that the remaining third-party candidates with ballot access in the swing states, present far more electoral jeopardy to Harris than to the former president. Now, with a presidential race that in all likelihood will come down to one or two percentage points in four or five swing states, third-party candidates that siphon one or two points from a candidate could be absolutely decisive. Most political polling puts the ceiling of Trump's support at 47 percent to 48 percent of the vote. For Trump to win, he must secure a plurality of the votes by virtue of votes for a third-party candidate or candidates denying his opponent a majority.

Little focus has been put on certain third-party candidates, specifically Jill Stein, whose Green Party effort in 2016 is largely viewed as having been responsible for Hillary Clinton's loss of the presidency. Given the fact that Stein's share of voters in 2016 exceeded Trump's margin of victory over Hillary Clinton, Clinton would have won Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin and thus the presidency, if Stein had not been in the race.

In 2016, Trump's margin of victory in Pennsylvania was 44,292 voters. Stein's vote was 49,941. In Michigan, Trump's margin was 10,704 and Stein's vote was 51,463. In Wisconsin, Trump's margin was 22,748 and Stein's vote was 31,072.

Unfortunately for Kamala Harris, Jill Stein is back in the 2024 election, having not run in 2020. Why she is back is a good question. She has absolutely no chance of even getting a single electoral vote. However, she has some chance of playing spoiler in a way that would do what she did in 2016 and directly cause Trump to........

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