As the presidential election comes down to the wire, a new app has launched letting third-parties in swing states swap candidates with Clinton supporters in safe states, in a bid to shore up Clinton’s path to the White House. The #NeverTrump app, created by developer Amit Kumar, matches Democratic voters in states like California with […]
As the presidential election comes down to the wire, a new app has launched letting third-parties in swing states swap candidates with Clinton supporters in safe states, in a bid to shore up Clinton’s path to the White House.
The #NeverTrump app, created by developer Amit Kumar, matches Democratic voters in states like California with supporters of Jill Stein or Gary Johnson in swing states, giving each voter a chance to cast a ballot in a state that could have a greater impact.
As a Clinton supporter in deeply blue state, Silicon Valley-based entrepreneur Kumar knew his vote wouldn’t do much to affect the outcome.
He also knew that elsewhere in the country (particularly in the crucially important swing states) large numbers of third-party votes were tightening the race.
Kumar realized that the best way he could help was by getting these third-party swing state residents to vote for Clinton, while still being able to show support for their original candidates.
The app, which works on the honor system, and allows voters to chat with their potential partners to see whether they agree on trading their votes. Voters can even use a map to choose a match in a specific swing state.
When you initiate the app, a bot asks you a series of questions to determine your location and political preferences.
Once completed, it grants you access to a chatroom where hundreds of Clinton voters in “safe” states propose trades with Jill Stein, Gary Johnson, and Evan McMullin voters in swing states:
“The reason for the difference is not that people are less interested. It’s that they feel their votes don’t matter as much,” Kumar said, arguing that giving voters a chance to swap votes eliminates the excuse not to vote.
Despite being controversial, vote swapping has been used in US plitics for years. The fever pitch around trading votes reached a peak in 2000, when websites encouraging the practice became popular, largely because of support for third-party candidate Ralph Nadar.
In response, several Republican states sued the sites, claiming swapping votes is illegal.
