For a 3rd party candidate to qualify to be at the debate, he/she needs to get to at least 15% on average in the major national polls that are taken just prior to Labor Day.  How are they doing? Let’s look at the last 50 polls taken between June and August to see if there’s any trends.

Green Party candidate Jill Stein appears to be losing momentum.  She was polling at 4.3 in June, decreased to 3.6 in July, and down again to 3.4 in August.  Short of a miracle, there does not appear to be a way for her to qualify for the debates.

Gary Johnson, on the other hand, seems to be gaining momentum.  He polled  at 7.3 in June, improved to 7.6 in July, and 8.6 in August.  Although the momentum seems to be on his side, he is unlikely to qualify for the debates:

• He only has a a few weeks to qualify
• the highest he has been able to achieve in any single poll  is a 12
• As this article points out, the commission’s decision to include Stein in the polls takes away from anti-establishment votes he would have received. Even if Stein was not in the poll, and one assumes all of her votes go to Johnson, Johnson would only be at 12 in August.

Here is a trend of the polling:

Click here for a state by state forecast of the elections

Click here for running list of forecast changes

Click here for results from last 5 elections

Follow me @2016ElectOdds for updates

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