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Kamala Harris and Donald Trump’s race for the White House has entered the final hours of campaigning, with most pollsters agreeing that the outcome remains far too close to predict.

Top election analyst Nate Silver has predicted that this year’s vote is a “toss-up” and could go either way, giving the Republican a 51.5 percent chance of winning, compared to Harris’ 48.1 percent.

Meanwhile, the last primaries New York TimesA Siena College poll shows the vice president narrowly leading in the key swing states of Nevada, North Carolina, Wisconsin and Georgia, while her rival leads in Arizona, while Pennsylvania and Michigan remain deadlocked.

With such narrow margins in play, the outcome will likely come down to a handful of undecided or persuadable voters in those seven swing states — meaning even small shifts in the voting intentions of individual blocs could take on enormous significance.

What impact can third-party candidates have on the outcome of the race?

Jill Stein of the Green Party, professor Cornel West and independent Trump ally Robert F Kennedy Jr. have no realistic chance of claiming the White House for themselves.

But their involvement in the elections could be crucial.

Both Stein and West could benefit from dissatisfaction among Democratic voters in Michigan, for example over growing anger over the Biden administration’s handling of recent events in the Middle East, especially the Israeli army’s actions in Gaza .

President Joe Biden was targeted by the “uncommitted” movement during the late February primaries, when more than 100,000 people in the state, which has a significant Arab-American population, used their ballots to express their dissatisfaction with the president and warn him. not to take their support for granted.

Since she succeeded Biden, Harris has increasingly been called on to address the conflict in Gaza at her rallies. She has tried to draw a distinction between herself and the president, but if voters are not convinced, Stein and West (and perhaps even Trump) stand to gain.

Stein in particular has been openly critical of Israel’s behavior, receiving a warm welcome when she attended the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee’s annual convention earlier this year and receiving support from the American Arab and Islamist PAC and the Abandon Harris group .

Trump addressed the likely role of third-party candidates, stating at a rally in Philadelphia in June prior to Biden’s decision to step aside: “Cornel West – he’s one of my favorite candidates, Cornel West. And I like it – I like her too. Jill Stein. I like her a lot. Do you know why? She takes 100 percent of (Biden). He takes 100 percent. Kennedy is probably 50/50, but he’s a fake.”

While Stein and West could pose a threat to Harris, RFK Jr threatens to do the same to Trump.

RFK Jr had run as an independent, but suspended his campaign and endorsed the former president, reportedly in exchange for a role in the possible future Trump administration.

Trump has rightly spent the last few weeks of the election cycle talking about giving RFK Jr. a free hand. to “do whatever he wants” and “go crazy” on women’s health, food and medicine, but the eccentric heir to the Kennedy dynasty could be in trouble for him . the polling stations.

Despite his efforts to remove himself, RFK Jr is still on the ballot in Michigan and Wisconsin.

The US Supreme Court ruled against revoking his emergency declaration late last month, in an attempt to avoid inadvertently harming Trump by collecting unwanted votes.

The decision forced Kennedy into the unusual position of going to X to plead with his fans not to vote for him on November 5.

Bernard Tamas, a political science professor at Valdosta State University, said The Guardian that this chance challenge could be called the “Nikki Haley effect.”

“Nikki Haley exited the primaries and still captured a significant percentage of the Republican vote,” Professor Tamas explained.

“If you take the many Republicans who are unhappy with Trump as a candidate, and if they don’t want to vote for Harris, they could end up voting for RFK, knowing full well he’s not even on the ballot. Actually just as a protest.”