If Trump doesn’t win on the first ballot, he’s probably screwed.
The basic reason is simple. Most of the 2,472 delegates with a vote in Cleveland probably aren’t going to like Trump.
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In most states, the process to select the men and women who will serve as delegates is separate from presidential balloting. In Massachusetts, for instance, Trump won 49 percent of the GOP vote on March 1 — his highest share in any state to date — to earn 22 of the state’s 42 delegates. But the people who will serve as delegates haven’t been chosen yet. That will happen at a series of congressional district conventions later this month and then a Republican state meeting in May or June. According to Politico, most of those delegates are liable to favor Ted Cruz or John Kasich rather than Trump. Twenty-two of them will still be bound to Trump on the first ballot, but they can switch after that. The same story holds in a lot of other states: in Georgia, Louisiana and South Carolina, for instance — also states that Trump won.
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...Trump isn’t totally safe even if he locks up 1,237 delegates by the time the final Republicans vote. The delegates have a lot of power, both on the convention floor and in the various rules and credentials committees that will begin meeting before the convention officially begins. If they wanted to, the delegates could deploy a “nuclear option” on Trump and vote to unbind themselves on the first ballot, a strategy Ted Kennedy unsuccessfully pursued against Jimmy Carter in 1980.
Although I’d place fairly long odds against this thermonuclear tactic, there’s also the possibility of piecemeal skirmishes for delegates. In South Carolina, for instance, delegates might unbind themselves on the pretext that Trump withdrew his pledge to support the Republican nominee.
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A final possibility is “faithless delegates,” where individual delegates simply decline to vote for Trump despite being bound to do so by party rules. It’s not clear whether this is allowed under Republican rules, but it’s also not clear what the enforcement mechanism would be.
I don’t want to make too much of these “nuclear” possibilities, given that such efforts would be blatantly undemocratic and would risk a huge backlash from Republican voters. Still, even 1,237 delegates isn’t quite a safe number for Trump, especially if he’s just barely above that threshold.
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The basic problem for Trump is that all the rules will be written and interpreted by the delegates, delegates who mostly don’t like Trump. They have a lot of power to wield at their discretion.
That’s not to say the rest of the voting doesn’t matter — it would be much easier, both procedurally and ethically, to block Trump from getting the nomination if he comes into the convention with 1,100 delegates instead of 1,300.http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/its-probably-first-ballot-or-bust-for-donald-trump-at-the-gop-convention/
The basic reason is simple. Most of the 2,472 delegates with a vote in Cleveland probably aren’t going to like Trump.
...
In most states, the process to select the men and women who will serve as delegates is separate from presidential balloting. In Massachusetts, for instance, Trump won 49 percent of the GOP vote on March 1 — his highest share in any state to date — to earn 22 of the state’s 42 delegates. But the people who will serve as delegates haven’t been chosen yet. That will happen at a series of congressional district conventions later this month and then a Republican state meeting in May or June. According to Politico, most of those delegates are liable to favor Ted Cruz or John Kasich rather than Trump. Twenty-two of them will still be bound to Trump on the first ballot, but they can switch after that. The same story holds in a lot of other states: in Georgia, Louisiana and South Carolina, for instance — also states that Trump won.
...
...Trump isn’t totally safe even if he locks up 1,237 delegates by the time the final Republicans vote. The delegates have a lot of power, both on the convention floor and in the various rules and credentials committees that will begin meeting before the convention officially begins. If they wanted to, the delegates could deploy a “nuclear option” on Trump and vote to unbind themselves on the first ballot, a strategy Ted Kennedy unsuccessfully pursued against Jimmy Carter in 1980.
Although I’d place fairly long odds against this thermonuclear tactic, there’s also the possibility of piecemeal skirmishes for delegates. In South Carolina, for instance, delegates might unbind themselves on the pretext that Trump withdrew his pledge to support the Republican nominee.
...
A final possibility is “faithless delegates,” where individual delegates simply decline to vote for Trump despite being bound to do so by party rules. It’s not clear whether this is allowed under Republican rules, but it’s also not clear what the enforcement mechanism would be.
I don’t want to make too much of these “nuclear” possibilities, given that such efforts would be blatantly undemocratic and would risk a huge backlash from Republican voters. Still, even 1,237 delegates isn’t quite a safe number for Trump, especially if he’s just barely above that threshold.
...
The basic problem for Trump is that all the rules will be written and interpreted by the delegates, delegates who mostly don’t like Trump. They have a lot of power to wield at their discretion.
That’s not to say the rest of the voting doesn’t matter — it would be much easier, both procedurally and ethically, to block Trump from getting the nomination if he comes into the convention with 1,100 delegates instead of 1,300.http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/its-probably-first-ballot-or-bust-for-donald-trump-at-the-gop-convention/
