Australia In Australia, the
1918 Swan by-election saw the conservative vote split between the
Country Party and
Nationalist Party, which allowed the
Australian Labor Party to win the seat. That led the Nationalist government to implement preferential voting in federal elections to allow Country and Nationalist voters to transfer preferences to the other party and to avoid vote splitting. Today, the
Liberal Party and National Party rarely run candidates in the same seats, which are known as three-cornered contests. When three-cornered contests do occur the Labor Party would usually direct preferences to the Liberals ahead of the Nationals as they considered the Liberal Party to be less conservative than the Nationals. The
1996 Southern Highlands state by-election in New South Wales is an example of this when the Nationals candidate
Katrina Hodgkinson won the primary vote but was defeated after preferences to Liberal candidate
Peta Seaton when Seaton received Labor Party preferences.
Bolivia Movimiento al Socialismo (MAS) criticised the registration of
Pachakuti Indigenous Movement (MIP) claiming that it was done to split the Indigenist vote in the
2002 general election. The two parties discussed an electoral alliance before both parties were allowed to run. MAS lost by less than 2% to the traditional
Revolutionary Nationalist Movement (MNR) while MIP unexpectedly won more than 6%. Combined the two parties had 27.03% compared to the 22.46% of MNR.
Bulgaria In
2001, the former tsar of Bulgaria
Simeon II founded the
NDSV. The NDSV won exactly 50% of the seats (120 out of 240 seats) thus barely missing an outright majority. Similarly named parties "Simeon II" Coalition, "National Union for Tsar Simeon II", "National Union Tsar Kiro" Coalition and "National Movement for New Era" (NDNE) got 3.44%, 1.70%, 0.60% and 0.05% respectively. In Bulgaria, the so-called "blue parties" or "urban right" which include
SDS,
DSB,
Yes, Bulgaria!,
DBG,
ENP, Coalition For you Bulgaria and Blue Unity frequently get just above or below the
electoral threshold depending on formation of
electoral alliances: In the
EP election 2007, DSB (4.74%) and SDS (4.35%) were campaigning separately and both fell below the natural electoral of around 5 percent. In
2009 Bulgarian parliamentary election, DSB and SDS ran together as
Blue Coalition gaining 6.76 percent. In
2013 Bulgarian parliamentary election, campaigning separately DGB received 3.25 percent, DSB 2.93 percent, SDS 1.37 percent and ENP 0.17 percent, thus all of them failed to cross the threshold this even led to a tie between the former opposition and the parties right of the centre. In the
EP election 2014, SDS, DSB and DBG ran as
Reformist Bloc gaining 6.45 percent and crossing the electoral threshold, while Blue Unity campaigned separately and did not cross the electoral threshold. In
2017 Bulgarian parliamentary election, SDS and DBG ran as Reformist Bloc gaining 3.14 percent, "Yes, Bulgaria!" received 2.96 percent, DSB 2.54 percent, thus all of them failed to cross the electoral threshold. In the
EP election 2019, "Yes, Bulgaria!" and DBG ran together as
Democratic Bulgaria and crossed the electoral threshold with 6.15 percent. In
November 2021, electoral alliance Democratic Bulgaria crossed electoral threshold with 6.37 percent.
Canada When the cities of
Fort William and
Port Arthur merged and (in 1969) voted on a name for the new town, the vote was split between the popular choices of "Lakehead" and "The Lakehead", allowing the third option to win, creating the town of
Thunder Bay,
Ontario. From 1993 to 2004, the conservative vote in
Canada was split between the
Progressive Conservatives and the
Reform (later the
Alliance) Party. That allowed the
Liberal Party to win almost all seats in
Ontario and to win three successive majority governments. The
2015 provincial election in
Alberta saw the left-wing
New Democratic Party win 62% of the seats with 40.6% of the province's popular vote after a division within the right-wing
Progressive Conservative Party, which left it with only 27.8% of the vote, and its breakaway movement, the
Wildrose Party, with 24.2% of the vote. In 2008, the last election in which the Progressive Conservative Party had been unified, it won 52.72% of the popular vote. The Progressive Conservatives had won every provincial election since the 1971 election, making them the longest-serving provincial government in Canadian history—being in office for 44 years. This was only the fourth change of government in Alberta since Alberta became a province in 1905, and one of the worst defeats a provincial government has suffered in Canada. It also marked the first time in almost 80 years that a left-of-centre political party had formed government in Alberta since the defeat of the United Farmers of Alberta in 1935 and the Depression-era radical monetary reform policies of William Aberhart's Social Credit government. During the
2021 Canadian federal election, it is speculated that the
People's Party of Canada might have coast the CPC up to 24 seats. In Canada, vote splits between the two major left-of-centre parties (
Liberals and
NDP) assisted the
Conservative Party in winning the
2006,
2008, and
2011 federal elections, despite most of the popular vote going to left-wing parties in each race. During the
2022 Ontario General Election,
Progressive Conservative Doug Ford won a second term as Premier of the
Province of Ontario. The Progressive Conservatives won several ridings due to vote splitting.
ONDP and
Liberal Party voters combined for 47.8% of votes, whereas Ford emerged victorious with only 40.82% of total votes.
Chile In the
2025 Chilean general election, multiple left-wing parties did not join the
Unidad por Chile but competed with their own lists, namely the
Greens, Regionalists and Humanists, the
Popular Ecologist, Animalist, and Humanist Left, the
Popular Green Alliance Party,
People's Party and
Green Ecologist Party. Combined these lists would have won 10% of the vote but only the first list managed to win 3 seats. Similarly, both
Amplitude and
Amarillos por Chile endorsed the candidate of
Chile Vamos but did not join the coalition and ended up without seats.
Czech Republic After
Independents disintegrated, their MEPs
Vladimír Železný and
Jana Bobošíková ran for
Libertas and
Sovereignty - Jana Bobošíková Bloc, alongside
Party of Free Citizens three eurosceptic and
Klausist lists ran in the election splitting the vote. In
2021,
Přísaha (4.68%),
ČSSD (4.65%) and
KSČM (3.60%) all failed to cross the 5 percent threshold, thus allowing a coalition of
Spolu and
PaS. This was also the first time that neither ČSSD nor KSČM had representation in parliament since
1992.
Egypt In the
2012 Egyptian presidential election, held using the
two-round system, vote-splitting among three leading moderate, non-Islamist candidates caused them all to be eliminated in the first round. This allowed the two more polarizing candidates,
Mohamed Morsi and
Ahmed Shafik, to advance to the runoff, despite
pre-election polls suggesting the eliminated moderates would have defeated either finalist in a head-to-head contest. This led to the
June 2013 Egyptian protests and
2013 Egyptian coup d'état.
France In France, the
2002 presidential elections have been cited as a case of the spoiler effect: the numerous left-wing candidates, such as
Christiane Taubira and
Jean-Pierre Chevènement, both from political parties allied to the
French Socialist Party, or the three candidates from
Trotskyist parties, which altogether totalled around 20%, have been charged with making
Lionel Jospin, the Socialist Party candidate, lose the two-round election in the first round to the benefit of
Jean-Marie Le Pen, who was separated from Jospin by only 0.68%. Some also cite the case of some districts in which the moderate right and the far right had more than half of the votes together, but the left still won the election; they accuse the left of profiting from the split. Also in the presidential elections
1969 (with five left-wing candidates which combined had 32%), in
2017 (split between four candidates which had 27% combined) and in
2022 (six left-wing candidates with 32% combined), the left failed to reach the run-off which may be traced back to the number of left-of-centre candidates. Similarly in the
1993 parliamentary election, where the green parties ran against the parties of the presidential majority. This led to many right-wing run-offs and the most right-wing dominated parliament since
1968. In the
2023 French Polynesian legislative election, the anti-separatist
A here ia Porinetia did not form an alliance with the
Tāpura Huiraʻatira allowing the separatist
Tāvini Huiraʻatira to win the run-off with just 44%. In the
2009 European Parliament election, two
right-wing sovereignist lists
Libertas France and
Debout la République (DLR) competed against each other. Libertas and DLR failed to cross 5% threshold in all but one constituency. Similar vote splitting happened between the two (post-)Trotskyist parties
New Anticapitalist Party and
Lutte Ouvrière.
Debout la France–
CNIP (the former previously known as DLR),
Popular Republican Union (UPR) and
The Patriots ran independently and gained 3.5%, 1.2% and 0.6% respectively thus falling below the newly introduced national threshold of 5%.
Germany In the
German presidential election of 1925,
Communist Ernst Thälmann refused to withdraw his candidacy although it was extremely unlikely that he would have won, and the leadership of the
Communist International urged him not to run. In the second (and final) round of balloting, Thälmann shared 1,931,151 votes (6.4%).
Centre Party candidate
Wilhelm Marx, backed by pro-republican parties, won 13,751,605 (45.3%). The right-wing candidate
Paul von Hindenburg won 14,655,641 votes (48.3%). If most of Thälmann's supporters had voted for Marx, he likely would have won the election. That election had great significance because after 1930, Hindenburg increasingly favoured authoritarian means of government, and in 1933, he was persuaded by
Franz von Papen to appoint
Adolf Hitler to the chancellorship. Hindenburg's death the following year gave Hitler unchecked control of the German government. In the
1990 German federal election, the Western Greens did not meet the threshold, which was applied separately for former East and West Germany. The Greens could not take advantage of this, because the "
Alliance 90" (which had absorbed the East German Greens) ran separately from "The Greens" in the West. Together, they would have narrowly passed the 5.0 percent threshold (West: 4.8%, East: 6.2%). The Western Greens returned to the Bundestag in 1994. In the
2013 German federal election, the
FDP, in Parliament since 1949, received only 4.8 percent of the list vote, and won no single district, excluding the party altogether. This, along with the failure of the right-wing eurosceptic party
AfD (4.7%), gave a left-wing majority in Parliament despite a center-right majority of votes (
CDU/CSU itself fell short of an absolute majority by just 5 seats). As a result, Merkel's CDU/CSU formed a
grand coalition with the
SPD.
Klimaliste has been accused of splitting the vote which would have gone to
Alliance 90/The Greens. For example, in the
2021 Baden-Württemberg state election a
Red-Green coalition was just a single seat short of a majority while Klimaliste missed the threshold with receiving 0.9% of the vote.
Greece In
Greece,
Antonis Samaras was the
Minister for Foreign Affairs for the
liberal conservative government of
New Democracy under
Prime Minister Konstantinos Mitsotakis but ended up leaving and founding the
national conservative Political Spring in response to the
Macedonia naming dispute, resulting in the
1993 Greek legislative election where
PASOK won with its leader
Andreas Papandreou making a successful political comeback, which was considered to be responsible for the
Greek government debt crisis.
Guatemala In
2019 the different parties to the left of
National Unity of Hope (
Semilla,
Winaq,
MLP,
URNG,
EG,
CPO-CRD and
Libre) ran with their own lists and presidential candidates. Their highest candidates
Thelma Cabrera and
Manuel Villacorta archived 10.3% and 5.2% respectively, combined stronger than the main conservative candidate
Alejandro Giammattei 13.9% (who was elected in the run-off). If they ran together there wont have been any conservative candidate in the run-off. A similar scenario happened in the
2023 election, in which four right-of-centre candidates (
Manuel Conde,
Armando Castillo,
Edmond Mulet and
Zury Ríos) gained just below 11% each, all behind Semilla's candidate
Bernardo Arévalo with around 16%.
Hungary In the
2014 parliamentary election small
Social Democratic Hungarian Civic Party won 278 votes in Budapest 12 and 128 votes in Budapest 15. If they voted
Left Unity in one of these constituencies instead,
Fidesz–KDNP would have lost their super-majority. Before the
2018 parliamentary election, there were calls for a united opposition alliance including of
LMP and far-right
Jobbik which were not part of the Left Unity. Only in some constituencies, there were joint candidates.
Israel In
1981, three
Arab lists competed: the Muslim-Druze-led
United Arab List, Christian-led Arab Citizens' List and the Bedouin-led Arab Citizens' List, all of them falling below the 1% threshold. In
April 2019, among the 3 lists representing right-wing to far-right Zionism and supportive of Netanyahu, only one crossed the threshold the right-wing government had increased to 3.25 percent: the
Union of the Right-Wing Parties with 3.70 percent, while future Prime Minister Bennett's
New Right narrowly failed at 3.22 percent, and
Zehut only 2.74 percent, destroying Netanyahu's chances of another majority, and leading to snap elections in
September and a political
gridlock lasting three years. The former two would unite as
Yamina while Zehut withdrew after a deal with Netanyahu. Nevertheless, the
National camp failed to win a majority.
Italy Sicily is traditionally dominated by the
centre-right but in the
2012 Sicilian regional election the centre-right was split between
Nello Musumeci,
Gianfranco Micciché, Mariano Ferro and
Cateno De Luca allowing the
centre-left Rosario Crocetta to win the election with just 30.5%. The Italian Left often struggled to meet thresholds after the formation of the
Democratic Party, in
2008 most left-wing parties ran on the
Rainbow Left list which got 3.08% but other left-wing parties, the
Workers' Communist Party (PCL) with 0.57%, the
Critical Left with 0.46% and the
Communist Alternative Party (PdAC) with 0.01%, still split enough votes from them to fall below the 4% threshold. In
2009 three different left-wing lists competed against each other. The
Federation of the Left got 3.39%,
Left and Freedom got 3.13% and the PCL got 0.54%, thus all fell short of the 4% threshold. Similarly in
2019,
Green Europe got 2.32% and
The Left got 1.75%.
Latvia Since the decline
Social Democratic Party "Harmony", the Russian vote is split among different parties. In the
2022 election, only
For Stability! passed the threshold with 6.80%; while Harmony (4.81%),
Latvian Russian Union (3.63%) and
Sovereign Power (3.24%) all failed to do so. A similar scenario happened in the
2024 European Parliament election, when only Harmony won a MEP with 7.13% and the other Russian-dominated parties Sovereign Power with 2.62%,
Alliance of Young Latvians with 2.13%, For Stability! with 1.98% and
Centre Party with 1.72% did not cross the 5% threshold.
Moldova Observers meant that the creation of the
Communist Reformers Party of Moldova had the
only purpose to weaken the
Party of Communists of the Republic of Moldova (PCRM) in the
parliamentary elections of 30 November 2014. The party mimicked the logo of PCRM and another list called "Moldova's Choice – Customs Union" (AM–UV) was placed right next to the other main pro-Russian party
Party of Socialists of the Republic of Moldova (PSRM). In 2016, a member of the Moldova's Choice – Customs Union bloc adopted the name "Partidul Ruso-Slavon al Moldovei" (, PRSM) and unlike other pro-Russian parties it endorsed direct presidential elections and another member, the
Social Democratic Party endorsed pro-Western
Maia Sandu in the
2016 presidential election. The PCR received 4.92% and AM–UV 3.45% of the votes, but no seats. The four pro-Russian parties 46.36% combined, while the
Alliance for European Integration won 45.63% (but 47.19% including the
PLR). In April 2015 the PCR was deregistered.
New Zealand In the
1984 New Zealand general election, the newly founded
New Zealand Party won 12% of the popular vote but failed to win a seat. The vote splitting was a reason why the
New Zealand National Party lost the election.
Nicaragua Before the
2006 Nicaraguan presidential election, the
Nicaraguan Liberal Alliance broke away from the
Constitutionalist Liberal Party. This allowed
Daniel Ortega to win the election with less than 40%.
Norway In
2009, the
Liberal Party received 3.9 percent of the votes, below the 4 percent threshold for
leveling seats, although still winning two seats. Hence, while right-wing opposition parties won more votes between them than the parties in the governing coalition, the narrow failure of the Liberal Party to cross the threshold kept the governing coalition in power. It crossed the threshold again at the
following election with 5.2 percent.
Peru In
2016, the leftist vote was spit allowing the right-leaning candidate
Pedro Pablo Kuczynski to face far-right candidate
Keiko Fujimori in the run-off. Gregorio Santos won more votes than Kuczynski was ahead of
Verónika Mendoza.
Poland In
2015, the
United Left achieved 7.55 percent, which is below the 8 percent threshold for multi-party coalitions. Furthermore,
KORWiN only reached 4.76 percent, narrowly missing the 5 percent threshold for individual parties. This allowed the victorious
PiS to obtain a majority of seats with 37 percent of the vote. This was the first parliament without left-wing parties represented.
Philippines In the
2004 Philippine presidential election, those who were opposed to
Gloria Macapagal Arroyo's presidency had their vote split into the four candidates, thereby allowing Arroyo to win. The opposition had film actor
Fernando Poe, Jr. as its candidate, but
Panfilo Lacson refused to give way and ran as a candidate of a breakaway faction of the
Laban ng Demokratikong Pilipino. Arroyo was later accused of
vote-rigging.
Romania In 2000, the different candidates of the incumbent government got in the
Romanian presidential election 11.8% (
Stolojan), 9.5% (
Isărescu), 6.2% (
Frunda) and 3.0% (
Roman) respectively. Combined they had more than
Corneliu Vadim Tudor of the
Greater Romania Party, who got 28.3% in the first round. In
2024, the government ran three candidates who got 19.15% (
Marcel Ciolacu), 8.79% (
Nicolae Ciucă) and 4.50% (
Hunor Kelemen) excluding them from the run-off but in the re-run in
2025, they failed to reach it again despite uniting behind one candidate.
Serbia In Serbia, there are often quite a few
nationalist and right-wing parties, which compete independently. Since the rise of
Aleksandar Vučić's
Serbian Progressive Party, which broke away from the
Serbian Radical Party in 2008, vote splitting became common among them. The most extreme cases of vote splitting were in
2014, none of the nationalist lists (
DSS, SRS,
Dveri,
Third Serbia, "Patriotic Front" and the
Russian Party, a nominally Russian minority party) made it above 4.2% thus neither of them won seats despite having a total of 10.6%. and in
2020, the
POKS (2.7%),
DJB (2.3%), the DSS (2.2%) and the SRS (2.1%) alongside smaller parties all ended up below the 3% threshold, Only the
Serbian Patriotic Alliance gained 3.8% in their first and only election.
Singapore Since Singapore gained independence, many contests had straight fights against one opposition party and multi-cornered contests are less frequent in every election (except in
1968 and
2006), with talks from several opposition parties to avoid such fights in risk of
splitting their votes and ensuing
People's Action Party's (PAP) winning the constituency, and the risk of losing their
election deposit Below here are some notable scenarios where vote splits are seen among contests: •
1963 election: All but one of the 51 constituencies had multi-cornered fights, with most of them being the
Barisan Sosialis (BS) party and at least one other opposition party. The PAP however, won 37 seats while 92 candidates had their deposits forfeited. •
1972 election: All but eight of the 65 seats were contested, with 24 being three-way contests with either the BS or
Workers' Party (WP) or both, after both parties undergo party renewals. However, all of the contests were won by PAP and 22 candidates had lost their deposits. •
1992 and
2013 by-elections: Both by-elections saw a four-way contest between the incumbent PAP, one larger opposition party at the time, and two other smaller parties. In both cases, the two smaller parties garnered less than 2% of the votes and subsequently lost their deposits, and in the latter's case, the PAP did not win the by-election (this also occurred in
1981, which was also coincidentally a multi-cornered contest). •
2011 Presidential election: In another notable scenario of vote splitting, the final results were suggested to be heavily divided between the four presidential candidates, with possibility of vote splitting towards two of the PAP-affiliated candidates (
Tan Cheng Bock and
Tony Tan), an opposition-affiliated candidate (
Tan Jee Say) and a candidate making his political debut (
Tan Kin Lian). The results were reportedly close due to a
recount, but Tony Tan ultimately won the election at a narrow margin by
plurality (under
First-past-the-post voting), while Kin Lian had lost his election deposit. •
2015 election: Three Single Member Constituencies had three-cornered contests, with
MacPherson SMC being the most notable case as it the PAP incumbent is up against the WP and
National Solidarity Party (NSP); prior to nomination day, NSP pulled out their intention to contest MacPherson but later reversed their decision, citing that they have also contested MacPherson when the ward was part of
Marine Parade GRC in 2011, which NSP has also contested. The decision affected the party's reputation and in the election that ensued, NSP's candidate
Cheo Chai Chen, would ultimately lose his election deposit. The other two fights were
Bukit Batok and
Radin Mas SMCs, both of which saw an
independent candidate losing their deposits. •
2020 election:
Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC saw its first multi-cornered contest inside a
Group Representation Constituency (GRC) in 28 years since 1992, between the
Singapore Democratic Alliance who had worked in this constituency since
2006, and the new
Peoples Voice (PV). While both opposition parties garnered a respectable number of votes, PV however, fell short of retaining their deposit by just 0.32%. •
2025 election: Five constituencies saw multi-cornered contests (the most since 1991), four being three-cornered contests and
Tampines GRC being the only constituency with a four-cornered contest. A total of 27 candidates, including two parties of five members from both Tampines and
Ang Mo Kio GRC, had forfeited their election deposit, the most since post-independence.
Slovakia 2002. The
True Slovak National Party (PSNS) split from
Slovak National Party (SNS), and
Movement for Democracy (HZD) split from the previously dominant
People's Party – Movement for a Democratic Slovakia. All of them failed to cross the 5 percent threshold with PSNS having 3.65 percent, SNS 3.33 percent and HZD 3.26 percent respectively, thus allowing a center-right coalition despite having less than 43 percent of the vote. In
2016, the
Christian Democratic Movement achieved 4.94 percent missing only 0.06 percent votes to reach the threshold after
#SIEŤ split from KDH which meant the first absence of the party since the
Velvet Revolution and the first democratic elections in
1990. In
2020,
Velvet Revolution in which no party of the Hungarian minority crossed the 5 percent threshold. The vote was split between
Hungarian Community Togetherness with 3.9% and
Most–Híd with 2.1%. Before the
2024,
Republic broke away from the
People's Party Our Slovakia (ĽSNS). Republic received 4.75% and the ĽSNS 0.84%.
Slovenia Before the
2022 Slovenian parliamentary election, there were attempts by
Let's Connect Slovenia to win
Our Country as a partner but they rejected the offers. In the end, both parties failed to cross the 4% threshold with 3.41% and 1.50% respectively.
South Korea In 1987,
Roh Tae-woo won the
South Korean presidential election with just under 36% of the popular vote because his two main liberal rivals split the vote. A similar scenario happened when in
1997 won by just
Kim Dae-jung 40.3% because his two main conservative rivals split the vote. A run-off might have changed the outcome of these two and potentially the
2017 election (which saw the liberal
Moon Jae-in win with 41%).
FairVote pointed out that during the
2022 South Korean presidential election, the progressive candidate
Sim Sang-jung result (2.37%) was more than three times the lead of conservative candidate
Yoon Suk Yeol (0.73%). In
2025, liberal
Lee Jae-myung got 49.42% ahead of conservative
Kim Moon-soo with 41.15% but the two conservative candidates combined had 49.49%.
Taiwan In the
2000 presidential election in Taiwan,
James Soong left
Kuomintang (KMT) party and ran as an independent against KMT's candidate
Lien Chan. This caused vote-splitting among KMT voters and resulted in victory for
Democratic Progressive Party's candidate,
Chen Shui-bian. It is the first time in Taiwan history that the KMT did not win a presidential election, and it became the
opposition party. A similar scenario happened in
2024, when after the opposition candidates
Hou Yu-ih (KMT) and
Ko Wen-je (
Taiwan People's Party) failed to reached an agreement,
Lai Ching-te (DPP) won with just 40% of the vote.
Turkey Regular military coups in the second half of the 20th century led to a situation, where two similar
centre-left kemalist parties, the
Republican People's Party (CHP) and the
Democratic Left Party (DSP), and centre-right kemalist parties, the
True Path Party (DYP) and
Motherland Party (ANAP), competed against another. In the
2002 general election, the centre-left (CHP, DSP,
NTP) got 21.76% and the centre-right (DYP, ANAP,
YP,
LDP) got 15.89% but because of the split only the CHP and the new
Justice and Development Party (AKP) made it above the 10% threshold with the AKP having 66% of the seats with just 34.28% of the vote. Attempts to merge ANAP and DYP before the
2007 election failed and the
Democrat Party (the successor of DYP) only won 5.4%.
United Kingdom In the
1994 European Elections,
Richard Huggett stood as a "Literal Democrat" candidate for the
Devon and East Plymouth seat, with the name playing on that of the much larger
Liberal Democrats. Huggett took over 10,000 votes, and the Liberal Democrats lost by 700 votes to the
Conservative Party. The
Registration of Political Parties Act 1998, brought in after the election, introduced a register of political parties and ended the practice of deliberately confusing party descriptions. In the run up to
2019 UK General Election, the
Brexit Party, led by former
UKIP leader
Nigel Farage, initially put up candidates in 600 seats after a strong showing for the newly formed party in the
2019 European Elections, but days later, he reversed his position after
Conservative British Prime Minister Boris Johnson stated that he would not consider an electoral pact with the Brexit Party. That was seen as benefiting the Conservative Party and disadvantaging the
Labour Party. Farage later encouraged voters not to vote for the Labour Party in areas that traditionally favoured it but voted to leave in the
2016 EU Membership Referendum but instead to
vote tactically. After the Conservatives' decisive victory, it was suggested by some media outlets and political analysts that Farage had acted as "kingmaker" and
stalking horse and effectively won the election for the Tories, as Farage's decision avoided splitting the vote.
United States Since 1990, the Republican Party's presidential ticket, according to the research cited below, has benefited most from the spoiler effect of the
plurality voting system that chooses electors for the electoral college. The year 2000 was an especially clear case when Al Gore would likely have won without vote splitting by one or more of the third-party tickets on the ballot. Which party benefits from a third-party ticket depends on the election and the candidates.
President (since 1990) • The
2024 United States presidential election has seen an unusually large number of third-party candidates which could split votes and determine the winner.
Cornel West's campaign has been noted for the
support from Republicans and Trump allies to get on swing state ballots in the hopes of splitting votes away from Kamala Harris. • For the
2016 United States presidential election and
2020 United States presidential election, some analyses have found the impact of third-party candidates possibly only on the margin of victory. Some attribute Biden's election in 2020 to the lack of vote splitting, with studies of 2016 third-party voters showing them much more likely to vote for Biden in 2020. • In
2000,
Al Gore, the Democratic candidate, lost to
George W. Bush due to a difference of 537 votes in the state of
Florida.
Green Party candidate and progressive
Ralph Nader received 97,421 votes in Florida on a platform most similar to Gore's. Exit polling and surveys have estimated that around 47% of Nader supporters said they would have voted for Gore if Nader didn't run (21% Bush and 32% neither). Vote splitting has also been called the "Nader Effect" as a result. • Analysis of surveys and exit poll data from the
1992 presidential election predicts
Bill Clinton winning regardless of
Ross Perot's campaign though disagreements remain on which candidate lost more votes to Perot.
President (before 1970) • In
1968,
George Wallace ran for president as the
American Independent Party's nominee and was the most recent third-party candidate to win a state. • In
1912,
Progressive Party candidate
Theodore Roosevelt won almost 700,000 votes more than did the Republican incumbent,
William Howard Taft. After Democratic candidate
Woodrow Wilson won the election, many Republicans became concerned that Roosevelt might return to split the Republican Party vote again. • In the
1884 presidential election, the Prohibition Party's presidential nominee, former Republican Governor
John St. John, took 147,482 votes, with 25,006 votes coming from
New York, where Grover Cleveland defeated James G. Blaine by just 1,149 votes, allowing Cleveland to defeat Blaine in a very close contest (219–182 in the electoral college and a margin of 0.57% in the popular vote). Republicans were so angered by St. John's party switch, which caused their first presidential election defeat since 1856, that on November 27, 1884, an effigy of St. John was burned in Topeka, Kansas in front of a crowd of three thousand people. •
1844 presidential election was largely seen as being decided by vote splitting.
Other races • An analysis of 2006 to 2012 general election races in the U.S. found 1.5% were spoiled by third-party candidates, according to Philip Bump. • In
2008, Democrat
Al Franken was elected the junior senator from
Minnesota, defeating
Norm Coleman by only 0.1%. Independent candidate
Dean Barkley received over 15% of the vote, and a 2014 analysis by
Time found that without Barkley in the race, Franken would have lost the election to Coleman. • As a result of the
2011 Wisconsin protests and subsequent
recall elections, the
Wisconsin Republican Party has encouraged spoiler candidates to run in the recall elections on the Democrat ticket in order to force the Democrats into a
primary election. Republicans argued that this would even the playing field in the recalls, as incumbents facing recall did not have the time to campaign due to their work load in the
state senate. • In Maine's
2010 and
2014 gubernatorial elections,
Eliot Cutler ran as a left-wing independent. In the 2010 election
Paul LePage narrowly defeated him with 218,065 votes to 208,270 votes with the Democratic nominee
Libby Mitchell receiving 109,387 votes and possibly spoiling the election for Cutler. However, in 2014 Cutler performed worse and only received 51,518 votes, but it was still greater than the difference between LePage and
Mike Michaud causing a possible spoiler effect. These elections and LePage's unpopularity led to Maine adopting
ranked choice voting. • The Democratic primary for the
2026 New Jersey's 11th congressional district special election saw
AIPAC supporting
Tahesha Way over
Tom Malinowski after he put conditions on US aid to Israel. This allowed the progressive candidate
Analilia Mejia to win. ==See also==