As voters head to the polls on Election Day, Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump are separated by razor-thin margins, both nationally and in the all-important swing states.

If the polls are accurate, only a relatively small handful of votes could play a decisive role in who emerges victorious.

While Green Party candidate Jill Stein is unlikely to win the presidency, it has been suggested that Stein and the Green Party are siphoning off votes that would likely have gone to Kamala Harris and the Democratic Party.

This is something the Democratic Party itself accused Stein of in one of its campaign ads, in which Stein’s face changed to Trump’s, with the message: “A vote for Stein is really a vote for Trump.”

But how exactly could Stein influence the Democratic Party’s chances of victory? Newsweek has visualized Stein’s potential impact in maps and graphs.

In the 2016 elections between Trump and Hillary Clinton, the latter narrowly lost two swing states: Michigan and Wisconsin.

In Michigan, Trump won 47.6 percent of the vote, Clinton 47.3 and Stein 1.1 percent.

In Wisconsin in 2016, Trump received 47.9 percent, Clinton 46.9 percent and Stein 1.1 percent. percent.

Theoretically, if those who voted for Stein had voted for Clinton, the then-Democratic candidate would have won both, although this in itself would not have been enough to secure Clinton the presidency.

With Trump and Harris separated by a hair in Michigan and Wisconsin, the Stein vote could be decisive again this year.

As of early Friday, Harris is just 0.8 points ahead of Trump in Michigan. A recent AtlasIntel poll showed Stein at two percent support.

In Wisconsin, Harris was only 0.6 points ahead of Trump, while Stein won one percent of the vote, according to AtlasIntel research.

Absorbing the Green Party’s share of the vote would consolidate Harris’ shaky lead.

In 2016, the winner in Wisconsin was determined by a margin of only about 20,000 votes.

These states are also home to significant Muslim populations, many of whom support Stein over Harris because of the Biden administration’s position on Israel’s war in Gaza.

For example, according to 2020 research by the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI), four percent of the 1,749,000 residents of Wayne County, Michigan were Muslim.

“The Democrats cannot win without the support of the American Muslim community. And that community has left the station and will not return unless the Democrats decide that it is more important to them to win the election than to carry out the genocide,” Stein said. said in an interview with Newsweek.

A recent report from the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) shows that Stein led Harris among this group in several swing states, including Michigan, Wisconsin and Arizona. Stein led 40-12, 44-49 and 35-29 respectively.

“These new survey results make clear that Muslim American voters have the potential to shape outcomes in several key battleground states and are still up for grabs in the 2024 elections,” Robert S. McCaw, CAIR’s director of government affairs, said in the report . .

“Candidates running for office cannot afford to overlook the issues that matter most to Muslim Americans. Ignoring this community or taking their vote for granted could be a costly mistake, especially in swing states like Michigan, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Arizona, Nevada and Wisconsin. where elections are often won by small margins.”

Newsweek has contacted the Harris and Stein campaigns via email for comment.

Do you have a story we should discuss? Do you have questions about the 2024 presidential election? Contact [email protected]