This works because almost all the US uses first-past-the-post elections for the Presidential general election. So you get outcomes like this:
Scenario 1:
Biden: 10 votes
Trump: 9 votes
Kennedy/Stein/West: 0 votes
Biden wins the state
Scenario 2:
Biden: 9 votes
Trump: 9 votes
Kennedy/Stein/West: 1 vote
Tied vote, decided by game of chance/lawsuit
Scenario 3:
Biden: 8 votes
Trump: 9 votes
Kennedy/Stein/West: 2 votes
Trump wins the state
This is why you see huge financial support from Republican billionaires for third party candidates who have no chance of winning.
He’d probably be at least as awful a president as Trump, though it’s a different West who is on the ballot in some states this year.
Sorry—my comment was in reference to this not being a new playbook since that’s exactly what the GOP did with hawking Kanye as a candidate. He would never win but maybe he would steal votes from the democrats.
Definitely the same playbook. It’s been used for decades at this point.