Joe Manchin has a lot to learn about third party presidential bids

On spoilers.

(Joe Manchin)

West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin went out NBC’s “Meet the Press Daily” on Wednesday to make two points.

1. He is “absolutely” looking at running for president in 2024

2. He will not be a spoiler in that race

Here’s exactly what Manchin said on the spoiler front: “I’ve never been a spoiler in my life of anything, and I would never be a spoiler now.”

Uh….

There’s a few ways of reading this.

The most optimistic view for Democrats is that while Manchin is going to take a look at running for president as some sort of independent candidate (likely on the “No Labels” ticket), he won’t actually do it if he determines that he can’t win — and that he will only be a spoiler.

To that end, this quote from Manchin on Wednesday is encouraging: “I'm totally, absolutely scared to death that Donald Trump would become president again. I think we will lose democracy as we know it.”

So, maybe?

The alternate — and less, well, good — outcome for Democrats is that Manchin convinces himself that there is a path to victory for a sensible centrist. That the country badly wants (and needs) that third option and, if given it, would respond in kind.

To THAT end, this quote from Manchin on Wednesday is encouraging: “I'm going to do everything in my power to make sure, to mobilize that moderate, sensible, commonsense middle.”

What reality does Manchin believe?

Hard to say. Although, from what I know of politicians, they tend to be, um, pretty self confident. As in, they believe that they can make history. That they can bend the electorate to their will rather than the other way around.

I think that is especially true for Manchin who, by dint of his avowed moderation and the narrow Senate majorities of recent years, has been in a position of massive power to determine legislative outcomes in Congress.

“As the critical swing vote in a 50-50 Senate, Joe Manchin has emerged as the most powerful man in Washington,” Politico wrote in 2021. That kind of stuff can go to a guy’s head.

What the past few years have done then is convince Manchin that he is uniquely positioned — in the country — to do things that no other politician can. That he is, at least potentially, a great man of history.

That should worry you if you are a Democrat. Because no matter what Manchin might think — or what “No Labels” polling might say — history suggests that spoiler is the role he would play if he ran.

To state the obvious: No third party candidate has ever been elected president.

The two best showings in the modern era are John Anderson in 1980 and Ross Perot in 1992.

Here’s a look at how they did:

1980 presidential election

Ronald Reagan 43,904,153 (50.7%)

Jimmy Carter 35,483,883 (41.0%)

John Anderson 5,720,060 (6.6%)

1992 presidential election

Bill Clinton 44,909,326 (43.0%)

George H.W. Bush 39,103,882 (37.4%)

Ross Perot 19,741,657 (18.9%)

In neither case, as you likely noticed, did Perot or Anderson come close to winning. While Perot took almost one in every five votes, he still received less than half of the vote that Bill Clinton took in victory.

In more recent elections, third party candidates haven’t come close to replicating even those performances.

Gary Johnson got 3% of the national vote as the Libertarian nominee in 2016. Jill Stein, the Green party nominee, took 1%.

Now, you might be tempted to conclude from that history that even if Manchin DID run that it wouldn’t matter all that much. After all, to be a spoiler, you have to be relevant. And the recent history of third party presidential bids suggests a decided lack of relevance.

Which is true! If the election between the two major party candidates is not particularly close.

But, there is EVERY indication that this 2024 race — likely between Joe Biden and Donald Trump — IS going to be quite close. (At the moment, Trump has a 1 point lead over Biden in the Real Clear Politics polling average.)

And in close election, every little percentage point counts. (I give you Ralph Nader’s 2.7% of the national popular vote in the 2000 presidential election.)

There’s also this, which is unique to the 2024 race: I think Trump has a hard ceiling not just nationally but in a number of swing states. And, in most cases, that ceiling is below 50% of the vote.

The Cook Political Report’s Amy Walter makes that point well here — writing off the New York Times/Siena College polls that showed Trump leading Biden:

Given that reality, the lower Trump’s win number is in any state, the better for him. And what is the best way for that win number to dip? For there to be a third party candidate in the race — siphoning off a point or three in swing states and nationally.

So. Joe Manchin seems to a) want to run for president and b) not be a spoiler in that race.

I don’t see how both of those things are possible.