On Tuesday, Nov. 8, millions of people will be casting their vote for the next President of the U.S. For many voters, the candidate they cast their ballot for will seem like the obvious choice—but for others, neither Hillary Clinton nor Donald Trump seem like palatable nominees.

Unsure voters might find solace in knowing that there are more than two parties running in this election. If you don’t like the two main candidates, why not advocate for a third party candidate like Gary Johnson or Jill Stein?

Well, the short answer is that voting for a third party splits the vote, making it easier for a candidate like Trump to win.

For many, Trump is the worse of two evils. Clinton may be “corrupt” and “crooked,” but Trump is a man known for being racist, sexist, islamophobic and  homophobic. Sadly, voting third party will help him win this election.

In the U.S., we elect the president via the electoral college. This is a system where a specific number of delegates represent their state and cast their vote for the candidate with the most votes in that state. In total, there are 538 votes to be won in the electoral college. A candidate must have 270 of those votes to become the next president.

According to polling data from the Huffington Post, The New York Times, CNN and FiveThirtyEight, Hillary Clinton is currently leading in the polls. In many states, she is expected to win by more than eight percent, but in nine states, Clinton is projected to win by less than six percent of the vote. Those nine states are worth 121 electoral votes.

If people in these states were to vote third party, Trump might gain the majority and win the electoral votes for those states. If that were to happen, he would become the next president.

The graph below shows the percentage of electoral votes going to Trump and Clinton.

As stated before, many people don’t want to cast their vote for either Clinton or Trump. These voters could decide to vote for Johnson or Stein because they are less corrupt and some voters might even choose to cast their vote for former candidate Bernie Sanders if they were previously supporters of his campaign.

If people vote for these candidates and Clinton loses those nine states, the electoral votes would go to Trump, making the chart look something like this:

If you don’t want to vote for either candidates because of moral principles, please consider the effects of voting third party. A third party vote makes each vote for Trump that much more powerful. A third party vote allows Trump to become the next President of the U.S.

If you are considering a third party vote because you hate Clinton but you know Trump is a bad candidate, think about which candidate will be worse for the country. Will it be a career politician with experience in foreign affairs and an understanding of the constitution or a failed businessman who calls Muslims terrorists and Mexicans rapists?

Citizens of the U.S. are given the right to choose their Commander in Chief. We get to go out and vote. We get to choose the direction in which our country will head. So, why throw that opportunity away with a protest vote? This is a pivotal election. With this new president, the country will either regress or continue on its charted course. A protest vote will only help ensure that the U.S. will fail to move forward as a leading nation.