Despite everything, if you're in the US, you should still vote
(lemmy.blahaj.zone)
When given a choice between a millitary industrial neoliberal with a rainbow voting base and a fascist who is one elon musk golf session away from banning HRT, the best option is certainly not to refuse to play out of protest
That's not how tallying responses works at all. If you can put a tick in "Apples" or "Pears" on a list that collects the nominal data for fruit choice, you writing in "Sausages" is neither a vote for Apples nor for Pears.
Trump actually gets votes through 1) electoral fraud of various kinds, some of them still legal because the status quo is shit, and 2) appealing to bigots by being a huge bigot. Voting third party, or not voting at all, is not actually the problem. Focus on removing people from society who want bigots in power, and also focus on making electoral fraud impossible.