While his hopes of becoming president are marginal at best, there is still a strong possibility that progressive activist Cornel West could have a major impact on the 2024 election.
West, 70, announced that he will be running for president next year as the Green Party's candidate having previously declared his candidacy for the People's Party nomination.
Any third party candidate is always going to struggle in a presidential election. However, having decided not to openly challenge Biden in a Democratic primary, West could still impact Biden's reelection chances by pulling votes away from the president in key swing states.
Numerous polls have stated that voters do not want Biden to run for president again, citing concerns about his age and at times poor approval ratings. With the ballot now set to feature West—who previously endorsed Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders in both his 2016 and 2020 presidential campaigns—there is a chance that progressive voters now see the activist as a more suitable candidate.

"There is always a danger a third-party candidate can impact the electoral college results, particularly if they receive enough votes in a battleground state or states to change the outcome. In a close election, Cornel West could well be a spoiler," David B. Cohen, professor of political science at the University of Akron in Ohio, told Newsweek.
"There is no evidence to suggest that the 2024 election will be anything but a very close election decided by razor-thin margins which means that a third-party candidate could have an outsized influence in the result."
There is precedent in Green Party candidates having a major influence on the overall outcomes of presidential directions despite receiving extremely low support in the ballots.
In 2016, Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton lost three key states to Donald Trump by less than one percentage point—Michigan (47 to 47.2), Pennsylvania (47.4 to 48.1) and Wisconsin (46.4 to 47.2)—helping pave the way for the Republican's victory.
In each case, Green Party candidate Jill Stein had received enough votes in the three states to have swung it for Clinton if her supporters backed the Democrat instead.
It may too be simple to suggest that all of Stein's voters would have automatically backed Clinton if there was no Green Party candidate on the ballot, as a significant percentage of Stein's supporters could have been Republicans not wanting to cast their ballot for Trump.
However, in the 2000 election, Green Party candidate Ralph Nader had a much clearer influence on the overall outcome due to the amount of support he received in Florida that year.
The election between George W. Bush and Al Gore was so close that it eventually was all dependent on a controversial recount in the Sunshine State which lasted weeks. Eventually, Bush was declared the winner in Florida by the Supreme Court with a margin of just over 500 votes.
In the same election in Florida, Nader received more than 97,000 votes (1.64 percent), meaning just a tiny fraction of his supporters needed to back Gore in order to swing the election in favor of the Democrat.
In 2008, Nader, who received more than 2.8 million votes overall in the 2000 election, rejected the idea that his candidacy cost Gore the presidency.
"If the premise is that we have an equal right to run for election, no one's a 'spoiler' unless we're all 'spoilers' of one another," Nader told the Wall Street Journal. "So when they say, 'You cost Gore the election,' I say, 'I thought Bush took more votes from Gore.'"
Bernard Tamas, an associate professor of political science at Valdosta State University in Georgia, agreed that a third party run by a "popular, progressive politician" could be "dangerous" for Biden in 2024.
But it remains to be seen if West will be able to pull enough votes away from the Democrats next year to make a difference like Stein did in 2016 and Nader "clearly did" in 2000.
"The critical difference between the 2024 election and the 2000 and 2016 election is the amount of negative partisan voting that we can expect to happen. Democrats are now more driven to vote against the Republican Party than voting for Democratic candidates, and vice versa," Tamas told Newsweek.
"So, while there were a significant number of progressive voters in 2000 or 2016 who were willing to risk a Republican victory with a Green Party vote, widespread fear that Trump or another Republican president might undermine American democracy will likely make it very difficult for West to convince a substantial number of progressive voters to abandon the Democratic Party."
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
About the writer
Ewan Palmer is a Newsweek News Reporter based in London, U.K. His focus is reporting on US politics, domestic policy ... Read more