In most states, primaries are how a party picks its own nominee. Voting in the Democratic or Republican primary chooses which Democrat or Republican is on the November ballot. It doesn’t help a third party at all. Many third parties don’t use state-run primaries; they nominate at conventions. And in closed-primary states, like Maryland, you can only vote in the primary of the party you’re registered with.

The bigger hurdles come before and after the primary. First, a third party has to get on the ballot. That usually means collecting petition signatures or meeting a vote or registration threshold, and the rules differ by state. Then the candidate has to win a plurality in the general election, where the spoiler dynamic pushes voters back toward the two major parties. Primaries don’t change either of those.

Some primary systems make it worse. California and Washington use “top-two” primaries, where only the two highest finishers advance regardless of party. Third-party candidates almost never place top two, so they’re usually absent from the November ballot entirely.

The system is wired against third parties. They have to work significantly harder just to be eligible to be voted for.

That's why you can't "Just vote in the primaries"

Sure, that's obvious to you and me, as seasoned internet users. But we can't expect lawyers and career politicians to understand such things. They must be ignoring it by accident.

Voting blue donkey slows the slide, it doesn't stop it. Remember they are the pall in the system

Okay let's see. We have a large part of the population who just won't vote. Voter apathy is real.

Of the Democrats and Republicans, you have about 2/3 of each party that are voting like it's a sports team. They'll never change and they'll never think.

The thinking people who vote for each party understand that the third party has no chance and they're trying to sway things generally in their direction.

So the third party victory plan, if I have it correct, is to overcome voter apathy, and also to sway some people who are voting like a sports team from both parties.

If that's your plan for victory, then you don't have a plan for victory. And you're just wasting your vote.

Call me cynical, but I think third parties are funded by people outside the country to sway the election. Just like they only thaw out Jill Stein every 4 years to steal votes from the Democrats, and then they park her in a Russian freezer somewhere for the rest of the time.

Yet Jill Stein vanishes for four years between Presidential elections and does absolutely nothing to support a third party coalition at the state and local level.

And she somehow deserves your vote for simply not being a D or R? Yeah nah.