So I'm just going to point out that there's never been a true third party win in a presidential election. It's a myth.
Back in the 1859-60, where the famous myth forms, there were two parties. The Democrats and the Whigs were twists of the original two parties that formed from the Jeffersonian democratic thinkers and the Hamilton republic thinkers. There's always been just two main parties.
These two parties right before the Civil War were both of divided minds. The Southern and Northern Democrats who were divided only on the issue of slavery. All races were still inferior to white. The Whigs had a bigger problem because of the time, they were the "intellectuals". So they were all opposed to slavery, but they had differing views on what the end of slavery meant. Full equality? Give them passage to the Caribbean or Africa? Or some brand of Jim Crow? The first two grouped together whether they agreed on full equality or not. The third group, incensed by the idea Natives, Africans, etc. could be equal, ran their own candidate, as did the Southern Democrats. So you had 4 candidates from the 2 major parties. The main body of the two parties ran a Dem who wanted to keep slavery legal but "free new births" or some other hocus pocus, basically find a nice way to end slavery. The third group of the Whigs (the smallest but most vocal ironically) ran a guy who was basically the same. The Republicans (the Whigs who wanted an immediate end to slavery and the majority of the Whig party at the time) ran Abraham Lincoln.
We know that Lincoln won. What we rarely know is he represented the majority of Whigs. It was not a third party coup d'etat. It was the majority of a party taking their party back from a minority who kowtowed to the money and power base.
There's no third party winning historically. A myth to try to transform the Republicans of the late 1800s into a wrongly elected end to slavery. In a strange twist, the Republicans used a repackaging of the third party myth to make themselves the "Grand Ole Party", aka. GOP. The myth it could happen again when it's really never actually happened before? Some feel good nonsense for the disgruntled to think they can find a way to fix what they view as wrong.
However, right now as our laws stand it's actually an impossibility. The two major parties "own" the Presidential debate as they always have. The last 3rd party candidate to be allowed in the debate was Ross Perot, only because of a massive donation he made. Next, even if the 3rd party candidate can get on the stage, he/she would need to be on all 50 states ballots. Since Perot, only Gary Johnson in 2016 was able to pull this off. And finally, the Electoral College. So many want to talk about how it should be abolished. It can't be. The whole reason it exists is so lesser populated states have a fair effect on the outcome of the Presidential election. (Believe it or not, it works exactly as the Founding Fathers' planned.)
We know only 2 out of 3 are fair right now for a 3rd party candidate. Lawsuits to force the debates to allow the 3rd party candidates still haven't managed to get all the way to the Supreme Court. This won't change until it gets that far, if it does then. Even if it gets the SCOTUS okay (it should, not the point), the CPD will still be able to place limits like having to be on all 50 ballots. But the big hurdle is the Electoral College. All but two states, Nebraska and Maine, give 100% of the electoral votes to the majority vote. In Nebraska and Maine, a candidate gets what percentage of the state they take. In Nebraska (5 electorates), if a candidate gets 20%, they get one of the 5. This would actually open up the ability for 3rd parties to overcome the electoral hurdle. It would also mean where votes are close, people in certain states wouldn't be disenfranchised that their vote doesn't "count" because they are "red" in a "blue" state or vice versa. However, you can see where neither party can be very invested in making this happen. Red or blue is pretty much in their favor, so why would they encourage a change that means both might lose?
While I'm all for both being changed and those 3 things that keep us couped up with only 2 "real" choices, I have had plenty of conversations with Libertarians that have no idea what the hell they are talking about. They talk about the government being limited, but ramble on about walls and protecting ourselves from some real and mostly imaginary threats. Or likewise, others (same party) who ramble on about no infringements at all. Mostly they don't want to pay any taxes. (So unrealisitic that's all it will get.) They can't even organize around the definition of what is or isn't "big" government. So it's not going to appeal to anyone until the majority in their party are on the same page. But does it really matter? Maybe, maybe not. If we ever break the winner take all for the electoral college votes for each state, then we all might feel better about being 49% of the population in our state, regardless of what the 51% are. Until we address that, a third party is nothing but a joke. A group or several that can't agree on what they want to believe in, let alone pitch it, with no hope of ever winning an actual election.
