Posted on 04/21/2016 3:30:04 PM PDT by Red Steel
HOLLYWOOD, FLA. — The Republican National Committee's rules committee on Thursday chose to punt on changing rules for how a presidential nominee is chosen in a contested convention.
In avoiding a high-profile battle to simplify the rules, the committee rallied behind chairman Reince Priebus's repeated insistence that no changes should be made before the July convention.
The committee adjourned just one hour after it began without making any changes, including one that could have made it more difficult for party leaders to nominate a "white knight" candidate — someone not currently in the race who could take on Donald Trump and Ted Cruz.
Committee members repeatedly warned against provoking the ire of the voters by suggesting rules changes just months before Republicans meet for the convention in Cleveland.
The meeting comes as GOP presidential front-runner Donald Trump has repeatedly assailed the entire primary process as rigged, and as many rule committee members cited intense media scrutiny in the run-up to what's typically a wonky and dry event.
"We are basically in the seventh inning of the ball game and its not right to change the rules of the ball game in the middle," Georgia committeeman and rules committee member Randy Evans said.
"This is a very hotly contested election and any change that we make will be viewed with a large degree of cynicism.”
The RNC's standing committee doesn't have the final say on the convention rules -- that's left to the delegates elected to the convention rules committee. But the standing committee can make temporary changes to the rules that would need to be agreed on by the convention delegates.
The lion's share of the debate centered on a bid by a longtime Oregon committeeman Solomon Yue to change the rulebook to Roberts' Rules of Order, a common rulebook in government meetings.
Yue believes the change would create more transparency while also clamping down on the ability of party leaders to insert an establishment alternative into the race.
But after about 45 minutes of debate, the vast majority of the hall voted against the bid and quashed it. John Ryder, Tennessee's national committeeman who also serves as Priebus' general counsel, joined the group of lawmakers who spoke out against it.
Ironically, the standing committee operates using Roberts' Rules — so it used Roberts' Rules to block Roberts' Rules.
Yue framed the move as a way to protect grassroots delegates from potential overreach by the convention chairman, likely to be Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.).
He went on to bash 2012 chairman, then-Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), for a controversial incident where he read the results of a motion off of a TelePrompTer instead of further examining a contested vote.
"This is a politically supercharged year and we can't afford do have another incident like we had in 2012," he said.
"That would roil the convention and this party as well as cause us to lose in November the white house fight.”
While Yue had previously had harsh words for Chairman Priebus' push to block his proposal — private letters from Yue and committee chairman Bruce Ash castigating the chairman leaked in the days before the meeting — he told reporters he was satisfied that his voice was heard and looked forward to reintroducing the change again in the future.
After the meeting ended, RNC chief strategist Sean Spicer needled the press for that narrative by walking up and down the press row to joke about the "chaos," or lack thereof.
The 56-member committee met in a packed conference room at the Diplomat Hotel & Spa in Hollywood, Fla. filled with reporters and the rest of the RNC.
Despite the controversy, the meeting remained businesslike and cordial, with one delegate even going as far to praise the decorum of the room.
The only brief controversy came when Ash asked the RNC's special counsel to walk through the implications of the change. One committeeman, Massachusetts' Ron Kaufman, successfully blocked him from taking the stage by noting that the rules only allow committee members to speak.
Members had briefly considered postponing the motion to a later meeting, which would have kept Yue's hopes alive, but it resoundingly rejected that move.
Washington committeeman Jeff Kent argued that postponement would only bring the issue closer to the convention's doorstep and that the committee should settle the issue in front of the media and the world.
"Everybody is watching, everybody can see what we do. I would hate for us to take action right now that would send this to what would be described as a smaller committee without the cameras around," he said.
"Let’s not punt this down the road.”
Earlier in the meeting, the committee withdrew two other potential rule changes.
One of those measures would have eliminated the "carve-out" allowing four states — Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada — to hold a primary or caucus before March 1 without penalty.
The other measure would have been a minor procedural change to how the RNC chairman and co-chairman are elected.
Enid Mickelsen, the Utah committeewoman who proposed the rules change at a previous meeting, told the committee she wanted to withdraw her resolution for another day.
"This is a discussion that we need to have again someday, but I would submit that this is not that day," she said in the opening minutes of the meeting.
"I will submit, Mr. Chairman, that in the supercharged political environment in which we find ourselves, this is not the time to be debating rules changes."
- Updated at 4:01 p.m.
How about Cruz and Trump in a run off if the Trumpster does not get the 1237 delegates.
Hmmmm are they listening or just being more stealth ?
The stupid party makes a smart move.
Some rule changes I would like to see down the road is no caucuses, no straw polls. Let the people choose with a statewide vote. None of the nonsense like in Pennsylvania where the voters only get to choose 17 of 71 delegates. Also I hear now that in Pennsylvania the voters are going to choose delegates instead of the candidate. How ridiculous is that?
“The committee adjourned just one hour”
A multi-million dollar 3 day party for a 1 hour meeting. What a ridiculous waste of money.
How about Cruz and Trump in a run off if the Trumpster does not get the 1237 delegates.
How about realizing that Cruz is MATHEMATICALLY ELIMINATED!
The people chose Donald Trump! Deal with it!
“The people chose Donald Trump! Deal with it!”
Trump has only won about 40% of the vote. IOW, 60% of “the people” chose someone else! Deal with it!
you mean “how about we keep having run-offs until Cruz wins”?
This is a very hotly contested election and any change that we make will be viewed with a large degree of cynicism
**********************************************************
No shiite, Sherlock.
You’ve only been manipulating the nominating process to get an amnesty candidate in every election since the last amnesty. Only a half billion dollars have been spent trying to stop Trump.
Why would anyone be suspicious?
If Trump does not get 1237, he is also mathematically eliminated.
Trump is leading both Republicans and Democrats this year.
Trump has—
“ ** More primary wins than any candidate (18)
** More overall state wins than any candidate (21)
** The highest percentage of primary wins (82%)
** The highest percent of overall state wins (64%)
** The highest percent of primary delegates (68%)
** The highest percent of overall delegates (60%)
** And Trump now leads all candidates in the highest percent of overall votes (58%).
UCANSEE2 wrote: “Trump is leading both Republicans and Democrats this year.”
I wish that were true but Trump is losing to both Hillary and Bernie in the RealClearPolitics average. In fact, Trump does worse than Cruz and that other guy.
TomGuy wrote: “Corrected: ‘60% of “the people” chose someone else others!’”
Thanks for the grammar lesson. The fact remains, it’s difficult to justify the statement that “the people” have chosen Trump when only 40% of “the people” have actually voted for Trump and ‘others’ have received 60% of the vote.
That's exactly what happens in a contested convention. If all delegate's votes are tied to how the vote went in each state, no one would ever get a majority. They would continue to vote for the same person each time, no matter how many ballots.
In a contested election, after the first vote, if no one has 1237 delegates, delegates are free to vote their conscience. This is what the people who are complaining are upset about. The process has been in place for a long time, since there used to be many different candidates names raised at the convention.
The process at the state level was put into place to limit the number of candidates presented to the delegates at the convention.
All the shouting and carrying on that is going on now, is to intimidate delegate to vote for the person who has the most delegates going into the convention. That is not how the process works.
The delegates themselves have their own preference, but will vote how they were pledged during the first vote. Generally they will vote their own preference on the second ballot. If their is still a plurality, then they are supposed to vote what is good for the party and nation. Eventually a nominee is selected.
How the delegates that have been assigned to the people who have dropped out(suspended their campaigns), like Rubio, Carson, etc.,is the interesting twist in the process. I don't believe any candidate can pledge their delegates to a particular candidate who did not drop out.
All the shouting about stealing delegates is a lot of sound and fury signifying nothing, other than to allow someone to continually scream that the process is broken, and call other nominees names.
The simplest statement about the entire process is that the delegates, sent by each state, decide who the nominee will be. The delegates are selected in many different ways, each state party decides how the process is done in their state, since the delegates represent the state level Republican Party.
Also I hear now that in Pennsylvania the voters are going to choose delegates instead of the candidate. How ridiculous is that?>>>. i didn’t hear that but we are trying to identify delegates leanings. i’ve been regestered dem for the past 8 years so i can’t remember what the republican side looks like. I’ve tried to get a picture of the ballot for review but have not been successful. might go to city hall tomorrow at lunch.
There are a lot of people out there who couldn't vote for their choice, when the time came in their state, because their nominee dropped out. They voted for their second choice. Now you would be telling them that even their second choice has no chance against the plurality nominee.
With this going on, people tend to drop out of the process.
Most delegates pay their own way to the convention. They are tied to a nominee for the first ballot, by the process in their state. After that they should be able to vote their conscience.
Remember when Perot ran, and Bill Clinton was voted into office with a plurality, but declared he had a mandate for his policies. Remember Obama declaring himself King and Dictator, despite voters by Congressional district, and then in the Senate, saying stop Obama.
Plurality elections, whether at the convention or in the General Election are sickening.
The other Clinton won twice with about 43% of the vote.
If the Bernie people do as they say and stay home or vote for Trump, Hillary could have a big problem.
If the GOPestablishment vote for Hillary over Trump, Hillary could have an easy win.
If the blue-collar unions and others who feel disenfranchised by the Dems vote for Trump, he could have a big landslide win.
If, If, If...
It is way to early to get a fix on November, until the 2 party nominees are decided. Trump and his supporters don’t follow the typical demographics of previous elections, and that makes it difficult for the polsters.
Except that many of them had John Kerry winning in 2004 and Romney in a landslide in 2012.
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