What to do when you don’t know who to vote for . . .

This election season has so many people scratching their heads! It’s a presidential election that appears to be like no other– huge issues on the table in a race between two men who are two of the oldest presidential candidates this country has ever seen. It has been heated, and even ugly at times, and with less than a month away from the election, polls show there are still a lot of undecided voters. Are you one of them?

What do you do when you don’t know who to vote for has been our #1 MOST asked question over the last several weeks. We’ve received so many pleas in our inbox asking for some guidance. “Help! I don’t want to vote for either candidate! What do I do?” and “I want to make good decisions on my ballot, but I don’t know where to start!” It’s never too late to become a smart voter.

TIPS TO HELP YOU MAKE A DECISION ON THE BALLOT

1. First and foremost, DO YOUR OWN RESEARCH . Don’t rely on hearsay from family and friends or social media. Opinions are NOT research. Most social media influencers are NOT experts. So much of what is posted on social media is either taken out of context or completely inaccurate. Dig in to what each candidate REALLY stands for? What policies have they been implementing? What laws have they stood by in the past? What’s their voting history? Every state also offers some form of a voter’s guide. It often comes to your mailbox a few weeks prior to receiving your ballot (if you’re a mail-in state) or you can visit your state’s election website to find or request one. They offer information on every candidate and issue that will appear on your ballot. In the meantime, here’s a few links that will help get you started on researching our presidential candidates…
   • Joe Biden: His campaign website is a good place to start to understand his vision for our country. If you want to donate or volunteer on his campaign, you’ll find that info there too. You can also read the Democratic Party’s platform. It will likely contain the most important issues the party will want him to focus on if he’s elected. If you want to know how he voted as a senator and which bills he sponsored, you can go to Congress’s GovTrack site. There are also websites that break the issues down even further into speeches he’s given on specific issues or who he has received donations from. You can visit Vote Smart for that info.
   • Donald Trump: His campaign website shares his vision and priorities as well as ways to get involved and donate. Again, the Republican Party’s platform is a good place to start if you want to read up on what issues are most important to the party as a whole. The “Political Galaxy” section of the Vote Smart site will show you who has donated to his campaign, as well as what bills he has signed and speeches he has given on key issues.
   • Comparing candidates side by side on key issues: we like websites like ProCon for breaking down major issues in an easy to read side by side comparison chart. By the way, that chart also includes third party candidates. Vote Smart also has a similar section for presidential as well as congressional candidates.
2. After all that research, if you still don’t like either candidate, you might be tempted to throw in the towel and sit this election out. Don’t! It might seem difficult to separate the two, but consider voting for POLICIES OVER PERSONALITIES. What does that mean exactly? Focus on the issues at stake instead. Which candidate aligns best with the issues that matter most to you? Make a side by side comparison if that helps. Additionally, if you can’t stomach their personalities, which one has the voting record you can stomach the most? Remember, it’s not possible to agree with candidates on every single issue. But who do you agree with the most? You can check out the quiz below to help narrow it down. After all, policies and laws live on long after the “personalities” leave office.
   • Take THIS QUIZ to find out which candidate you align with best. It does a fantastic job at recognizing that not every issue is black and white–there are a lot of in between areas where most Americans fall and it gives you all those “middle ground” options.
3. If you just cannot support either a Democrat or Republican candidate, then VOTE FOR A THIRD PARTY*. Yes, the two-party system dominates American politics. But more and more people are voting every year for Independent or third party candidates. This year there is a third party candidate on the ballot in all 50 states. So if you’re so disgusted by the main party candidates that you refuse to vote for them, there’s good news: there are other options! The reason you don’t hear a lot about third-party candidates in the news is because they don’t have a fraction of the funding behind them as the main party candidates. If they don’t have the funding, their polling is generally low. If their polling is low, they don’t qualify for the national debates. As we saw last week, perhaps our presidential debates would benefit from a third-party candidate joining them. While there are several third party candidates running for president, only two have qualified to appear on enough state ballots to win a majority– Libertarian candidate Jo Jorgensen and Green Party candidate Howie Hawkins. However, the only third party candidate on the ballot in all 50 states is Libertarian candidate Jo Jorgensen. Here are a few links to help get you started researching them…
   • Libertarian Party: Dr. Jo Jorgensen
   • Green Party: Howie Hawkins
   • Other Third-Party Candidates

*A note on third-party candidates: you may have heard the argument that a vote for a third-party is simply throwing your vote away. Though some people may buy into that argument, we don’t. Your vote is never a waste. Voting is one of the loudest ways to make your voice heard (win or lose). By voting third party, you’re making the statement that you don’t support the other two candidates. If it’s voting your conscience, and giving you something you can live with for the next four years, how is that a waste?

Additionally, in the last presidential election, third party candidates received nearly 8 million votes . . . not enough to make a real dent in the third-party movement. However, over 100 million registered voters didn’t vote at all. Many because they were disgusted with the two main party choices. Can you imagine what could have happened had they looked into another candidate instead? Not voting is a vote . . . not the kind that our country needs.

Finally, every four years Americans get riled up about the presidential election. This year, they’re more riled up than ever before. But guess what? Elections take place in our country more than just every four years. There are mid-term elections AND local elections. If we all spent this much energy and enthusiasm on our local elections, think of how we could transform our communities! Please do your research and choose to make your voice heard in those elections as well!