2024 election: Will third-party candidates play a major role in November?

With many Americans unhappy with the prospect of a rematch between President Biden and former President Donald Trump, the prospect of a third-party candidate could end up being an attractive alternative for some voters — but whether or not that translates into a significant impact at the polls this November remains to be seen. Yahoo News Chief National correspondent Jon Ward explains the uphill battle third-party and independent candidates have in breaking through to the public.

Video Transcript

JON WARD: If there was ever an election that provided an opening for a third party candidate, an independent candidate, this is it. So many Americans don't want this match-up. They haven't wanted it for a long time.

There are groups out there that are working to facilitate a third party candidate or an independent candidate. No Labels is the biggest one among them. The problem remains that as much as a lot of Americans might want to vote for a third option, at the end of the day, they're going to be worried that by doing so, they're taking votes away from the lesser of two evils and helping the greater of two evils, in their eyes, the one that they don't want, to win. And so it goes back to why people have talked about ranked choice voting, where you could rank your choices and not feel like you're throwing away your vote. But right now, we don't have that system, and so that's a major challenge for any third party candidate.