And who, exactly, is going to pull such a bloc together? Across months of campaigning, the Republican establishment, such as it is, couldn’t manage to unite around a single candidate ordevelop a strategy to stop Donald Trump. Cruz is the only not-Trump candidate left standing precisely because the Republicans who most dislike him couldn’t coordinate, plot effectively or successfully elevate a more electable alternative.
But now we’re supposed to believe that those same incompetents are going to magically turn into convention Machiavels, capable of running a secret-but-not-really-secret whip operation on behalf of Ryan or Rubio while Cruz and Trump just stand by helplessly and let it happen?
.. Ted Cruz wants it — oh, how he wants it. And if he can keep Trump from the magic number, it’s hard to see the delegates giving it to anyone but him.
Republican Leaders Map a Strategy to Derail Donald Trump
“The burden is on Trump, not the party, if he fails to clinch the nomination,” said David Winston, a Republican pollster who advises the House leadership. “He has presented himself as the ultimate dealmaker, and it’s on him to close this one.”
.. “The burden is on Trump, not the party, if he fails to clinch the nomination,” said David Winston, a Republican pollster who advises the House leadership. “He has presented himself as the ultimate dealmaker, and it’s on him to close this one.”
How to Steal a Nomination From Donald Trump
In many states, primaries and caucuses are just the most public face-off in a multi-step process to select the individual delegates who will choose the party’s nominee. Only a small share of the 2,472 total convention delegates are free to pick the candidate of their choice, regardless of the election’s outcome, on the first ballot, while about three-quarters of them are gradually freed to do so on subsequent votes. That means there is a small pool of so-called unbound delegates who are pure free agents, but a much larger number who can be recruited throughout the spring as double agents—delegates who arrive in Cleveland pledged to Trump, all the while working in cahoots with one of his opponents and confessing their true allegiances once it is safe to do so.
.. “Forty-four states give the delegation-selection authority to a state convention or state executive committee, with no requirement that the candidate have a say in choosing delegates,”
.. During the nominating season, this often means a governor can freely stack an at-large slate with cronies, expecting a rubber-stamp from a subservient party committee. In Iowa, where Governor Terry Branstad in 2014 helped to reclaim the state party after an unexpected takeover from supporters of Ron Paul, Republican officials actively discourage their rank-and-file from even understanding how the state’s 18 at-large delegates will be selected.
.. but Trump is powerless to fill that slate with his own people. To serve as a national delegate from South Carolina, one has to have been a delegate to the 2015 state convention—held more than a month before Trump announced his candidacy
.. Bush ultimately won the popular vote handily in Pennsylvania, even though candidates loyal to Reagan seized 50 of the state’s then-77 delegate slots ..
.. “If there is to be a contested or brokered or open convention—whatever you want to call it—Pennsylvania will be at the epicenter because of that huge share of unbound delegates,”
.. There is nothing in the RNC’s rules that prohibits delegates from cutting a deal for their votes, and lawyers say it is unlikely that federal anti-corruption laws would apply to convention horse-trading. (It is not clear that even explicitly selling one’s vote for cash would be illegal.)
.. Trump’s slate in Illinois contains “a food service manager from a juvenile detention center, a daycare worker from a Christian School, an unemployed paralegal, a grocery store warehouse manager, one brave advocate for urban chicken farming, a dog breeder, and a guy who runs a bait shop.” Could some of them be tempted to flip their votes if a generous campaign, super-PAC, or individual donor picked up the costs of their week in Cleveland?
.. Thus far, Priebus has been docile toward Trump, who early on made being treated equitably by the national party a precondition for promising not to run as an independent in the general election. But if Trump doesn’t finish with a clear majority of delegates, Priebus will face immense pressure from party officials and donors to undermine him.
.. Investigators deployed by an opponent’s campaign or super-PAC can seek out cases of “disorganization and confusion”—as Romney lawyers described it when they successfully challenged the results of a 2012 Maine convention taken over by Paul supporters—to knock out Trump slates nationwide.
.. Reports of caucus-site irregularities in Nevada—ballot shortages, unreliable check-in procedures, supposedly neutral election officials wearing Trump garb in violation of party rules—were quickly forgotten when Trump carried the state by a convincing margin of more than 20 points. But anti-Trump forces may now be eager to revisit them.
.. Before the official festivities start in Cleveland, the committee would have to rewrite Rule 40 for anyone other than Trump or Cruz to even be considered by delegates.
.. In 2012, chairman John Boehner decided to hold a voice vote instead of a roll call on pro-Romney rule changes; even though the pro-Paul supporters were clearly the loudest, Boehner reflexively ruled in Romney’s favor.
..Trump supporters within the arena who see the vise closing on his chances to be nominated could respond in rage. Trump himself will likely be egging on an insurrection, from within the hall and amplified by his running commentary on Twitter and in broadcast interviews.