Mr. Trump will tell you that fraud cost him the election. Those of us who have analyzed the facts and data almost inevitably come to other explanations: grumpy voters beset with COVID-19 and a crummy economy, high Democratic turnout stoked by Trump’s relentless trolling of the left, GOP voters who were put off by The Donald’s crassness, and a re-election campaign that failed to engage to enough suburbanites.

Jonathan Cervas of Carnegie Mellon University and Bernard Grofman of the University of California Irvine point to an additional factor for Trump’s loss: Jo Jorgensen’s third-party candidacy. I caught up with Prof. Cervas recently to ask him to explain.

Jo Jorgensen—few Americans know her name let alone that she ran for president. Who is she?

That’s right, most Americans do not know who she is. She is—in some ways, now—a footnote in American history. She received just shy of two million votes in an election where nearly 160 million were cast. The important point that Jorgensen’s candidacy makes is that many Americans feel uncomfortable voting for candidates of the two major political parties. This is especially true when those candidates have higher unfavorable ratings than favorability ratings.

Did she cost Trump the election in 2020?

I do not think it’s accurate to say that she cost Trump the election. In fact, it would be quite difficult to come to that conclusion. There are a lot of unknowns and “what-ifs” regarding third-party voters. There is no debate that those two million votes could have been decisive if distributed in the right states and the right quantities. And there is good reason to believe that many persons who cast a ballot for the Libertarian candidate might prefer a Republican president to a Democratic president. Empirically speaking, this tends to be the case. However, many people who voted for Jorgensen might have abstained if she was not on the ballot. But, had an alternative voting rule—such as ranked-choice voting—been used, it is a possibility that Trump would have received enough of the Libertarian vote to top Biden in several pivotal states. But any analysis like this is ceteris paribus, and we truly cannot know the counterfactual outcome were there different rules or different candidates on the ballot.

Your analysis also suggests that—in 2020—Trump’s vote count was hurt more than Hillary Clinton’s by the Jill Stein and Gary Johnson candidacies.

Yes, with the caveats mentioned above. Although Biden won the popular vote in 2020 by a far larger number of votes than Clinton in 2016, the 2020 election was closer in terms of votes needed to change the outcome. Trump infamously called Georgia Sec. of State Brad Raffensperger, “I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have because we won the state.” Jorgensen received over 62,000 votes in Georgia! A similar scenario played out in Arizona, where Trump lost the state by 10,457 votes, but Jorgensen won over 51,000 votes. Wisconsin’s margin of victory for Biden was less than the Jorgensen vote, too. And if those three states flip to Trump, both he and Biden would have received 269 electors, and a contingent election would have been held in the House of Representatives. In 2016, not only did Trump win the most electors but—if third-party candidates had not been on the ballot—Trump likely would have been the beneficiary and perhaps increased his Electoral College win while reducing his popular vote margin loss.

You might have titled the article, “Jo Jorgensen spoiled Trump’s re-election.” Instead, you titled it, “Why Donald Trump Should Be a Fervent Advocate of Using Ranked-Choice Voting in 2024.” Why?

It seems increasingly likely that the 2024 election could be affected by a significant independent vote. Trump has announced a third campaign for president. He will likely have challengers in the Republican primary. If he fails to emerge as the party’s candidate, some have speculated that he would mount an independent challenge. It is also possible he wins the nomination, but another Republican candidate runs a third-party campaign against him. If that were the case, he likely would be dividing votes between himself and that candidate. That would leave the Democratic candidate with an opportunity to win a plurality in many places where those electors would otherwise be out of reach. If a ranked-choice voting rule were used, it seems unlikely that those voting for Trump would prefer the Democratic candidate over the Republican candidate, just as it seems unlikely that the Republican voters would prefer a Democrat to Trump. In this hypothetical, Republicans and Trump particularly should be fervent advocates for using ranked-choice voting.

Kosar: Thank you, Professor Cervas.

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