Posted on 04/15/2016 2:18:44 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
After Ted Cruz won every delegate up for grabs at the Colorado Republican convention, Donald Trump began complaining that the process at such conventions is unfair. His claim is that party insiders should not be making these choices, but rather that the power should be vested with the voters. As a consequence, Cruz is “stealing" delegates from Trump, and in so doing defying the will of the voters.
Trump's accusations are specious and disingenuous. The process that has been playing out is perfectly legitimate. Trump's real problem is that he is being outhustled by the Cruz campaign.
The Republican nomination process operates along two tracks. The first—which garners most of the attention—is the binding of convention delegates to a presidential candidate, through primaries and caucuses. When one sees news reports that Trump has 743 delegates, Cruz has 545 delegates, and Kasich has 143 delegates, these are the number of delegates obliged by the party rules to vote for that candidate on the presidential ballot in Cleveland.
But only a handful of the actual delegates have been selected so far. That is the second track, and it happens in three ways. Some delegates are directly chosen by the candidates, and others are directly voted upon by primary voters. But the overwhelming majority are selected by the party organizations in the states and territories, through a series of party conventions, usually held at the congressional district and state levels. In a few cases—Colorado, Wyoming, and some of the territories—these conventions are also tasked with binding the delegates. But most party conventions simply pick the people who will be delegates in Cleveland, leaving the task of binding to the voters in the primaries and caucuses.
Trump has been complaining that all of these conventions are unfair because his kneejerk reaction is to whine about anything that does not go his way. These conventions present two problems for him. In Colorado and Wyoming, Trump lost out on opportunities to win delegates pledged to him (i.e., the first track). But in other convention battles—for instance in Iowa, North Carolina, and Virginia—his problem has to do with the second track, in particular the growing number of Trojan horse delegates.
These Trojan horse delegates are obliged by party rules to vote for Trump on the presidential ballot, but they are otherwise loyal to Cruz. Just because they are required to vote for Trump for the presidential nomination does not mean they need to back him on other matters before the convention. Trojan horse delegates are free to vote with Cruz on disputes over rules or delegate credentials. They can also support Cruz on matters presented to the convention floor. All of that is important, as Cruz will undoubtedly try to tweak the convention rules to make it more difficult for anybody else to win the nomination. Crucially, the bulk of convention delegates are only bound to presidential candidates for a specified number of ballots. By a fourth or fifth ballot, almost all of them would be free to vote for whomever they prefer. Delegates loyal to Cruz but bound temporarily to Trump could ultimately deliver the nomination to the Texas senator.
Naturally, Trump thinks this is grossly unfair. This is nonsense. Nobody changed the party rules in the middle of this process, and nobody fed the Cruz campaign inside information that was not available to the Trump team. The rules have been a matter of public record all along. The Cruz campaign took the time to understand them and use them to its advantage.
Party conventions are open processes. Delegates to these gatherings are not handpicked by party bosses. They are regular Republicans who participate because they have the time and interest to do so. The Cruz team put in the effort to organize regulars loyal to its candidate; the Trump campaign failed to do so. Consider, for instance, the Colorado convention held earlier this month. Delegates to that convention were chosen at precinct caucuses held on Super Tuesday—and any registered Republican was invited to attend. That the Trump campaign failed to get its supporters to those caucuses is not the fault of the Cruz campaign, the Colorado Republican party, or anybody else except the Trump campaign.
The Republican party does not belong to its presidential candidates in the way that Trump presumes. In important respects, it still belongs to the party regulars who attend these conventions. Starting in the 1970s, the party organization began sharing authority with voters to select the presidential nominee, but sovereignty was never handed over to the electorate lock, stock, and barrel. The delegates to the national convention, chosen mostly by these state and district conventions, have always retained a role—not only to act when the voters fail to reach a consensus, but to conduct regular party business.
This is hardly antidemocratic, by the way. Party organizations such as these are a vital, albeit overlooked part of our nation's democratic machinery. The party regulars at the district, state, and national conventions do the quotidian work of holding the party together between elections: They establish its rules, arbitrate disputes, formulate platforms to present to the voters, and so on. It would be impossible to have a party without these sorts of people doing work the average voter doesn't care about.
And these people are hardly the "establishment" in any meaningful sense of the word. Consider the process in Colorado. There was a hierarchy at play, no doubt—delegates at precinct caucuses voted for delegates to district and state conventions, who voted for delegates to the national convention. But the process was open to any registered Republican, and more than a thousand people served as delegates at the state convention. There were some big political players involved, naturally, but by and large they were just average people. The same goes for the state conventions in places like Wyoming and North Dakota. These meetings in Cheyenne and Bismarck are in no way beholden to, or the equivalent of, the power players working on K Street.
Trump might retort that Cleveland delegates should never be unbound from him, that they should be required to vote for him through the duration of the convention. But how would the party ever reach consensus in a scenario where no candidate won a majority and every delegate is bound forever? If the voters cannot agree among themselves, then somebody has to find the middle ground. The convention delegates, chosen through a fair and open process at the precinct, district, and state levels, are an obvious choice to complete this task. And this indeed will be their job in Cleveland.
Trump could have worked harder to win loyal delegates at these local conventions. He might also have broadened his appeal, so that he stood a better chance of winning a majority of pledged delegates on the first ballot. But he did neither and now is trying to delegitimize the process. His complaint is the only thing that is illegitimate. The truth is that this process of selecting delegates is fair and proper. It just hasn't worked out to Trump's liking so far.
Why not? I was hoping a curve ball would change the pace of this game.
I would also vastly prefer to see someone win fairly, with the required delegate count, whoever it be...
Colorado was a travesty... and no they didn’t play by “the rules”. Arizona was an eye opener. Trump won by 2 to 1 over Cruz yet all the Trump delegates are actually Cruz operatives. That is a travesty as well.
The GOPe and Cruz are making a mockery of the system and destroying the credibility of the Republican party. What more should we expect from a bunch slime ball attorneys?
Most of those delegates are factory workers, mailmen, telemarketers, farmers, small business owners and housewives. I doubt that many of them are lawyers.
The slime ball attorney I was referring to are Cruz and the GOPe. But whether the Cruz operatives call themselves factory workers, mailmen, telemarketers, farmers, small business owners and housewives is completely irrelevant and mostly not accurate. I have been involved in local Republican party politics, the people I meet at meetings are mostly NOT factory workers, mailmen, telemarketers, farmers, small business owners and housewives.
Surprise! A lot of us here have been involved in the party. This is a conservative political forum.
Not all states have conventional "primary" elections, and it goes against the rights of states to be forced to conform to a "uniform" system, even if imposed by the GOP.
Remember that the grass roots STATE GOP'ers set the rules for their various methods of selecting nominees. In Ohio, I did receive a ballot, but could not vote for any actual candidate, only for the "delegates" representing the various contenders (at that time, there were still about 12, including many who had recently "suspended") at the nominating convention.
Please consider that your vote counts as much as anyone else's in your state, however your primaries are run.
Also consider that understanding how the various state "primaries" and caucuses are run does not equate to "hustling, stealing, manipulating, cheating and exploiting" the voters OR the other candidates out of their due votes.
So far the "GOP Elite" (whoever they are?) have not fared well...I will vote for whoever wins at the convention, and I doubt it will anyone other than Trump or Cruz!
I'm sure MY opinion has been heard and my candidate vote has been recorded "by proxy" with our state convention delegates, and that's good enough for me for now! Delegates ARE bound on at least the 1st vote, and I would not want it to be otherwise.
Interesting note: on the Democrat side, Bernie Sanders has had a remarkable record of state "wins", all things considered...but almost all "caucuses". At least in the GOP we don't have "super delegates" - which is what's totally tipping the balance for HRC so far.
What do you think Cruz should do, refuse the delegates!? The fight isn’t with Cruz. Trump looks like a whiney playground loser over this. He makes me sick.
So 2nd DivisionVet, i live in Maryland. I noticed that the ballot includes a vote for the candidate and a second vote for choosing three delegates. so does this mean my vote for the candidate drives the 1st ballot and the subsequent ballots are driven by my choice of candidates (which do indicate who they support). i still dont get why people would vote for unbound candidates and there were plenty of them on the ballot.
You’re just upset because you aren’t familiar with the new rules Trump is playing by, and how his ground game is different than the one you expected to be played against your pick.
Cruz needs to do his homework if he’s going to run against Trump.
“WHO they are flooding us with, tells us WHY. It ain’t the best. It is the worst. And it is about replacing all of you with cheap labor, ending the middle class, and balkanizing us.
They are so addicted to cheap labor, not only will they, and are, overwhelming us with illiterate foreigners and those who will never assimilate but only balkanize us and eventually we will have Yugoslavia like civil war right here, I am telling you right now - THEY WOULD REINSTATE SLAVERY IF THEY COULD for their cheap labor drug, and don’t put it past them to try.”
TRUTH
“Had this been any other candidate other than Trump, no one would be defending the actions of these candidates in attempting to win at the convention against the overwhelming front runner.”
Truth
If Trump’s ground game is to destroy the integrity of the Republican party, then yes, I do not like that.
Believe as you wish, but that is horse manure Trump is feeding you. Trump is a serial Liar like Hillery his BFF.
Well then, unless things are radically different where you live... you know very well that your characterization of who you find at party meetings is a cliché and not accurate. I have always respected you and your point of view a great deal.
All kinds of people participate. When I was an almost full-time volunteer at county headquarters I was also a night shift security patrolman at an Air Guard base.
We have all been hearing for a while how brilliant Cruz is in his "ground game". How efficient. How he uses the system to his advantage. How he didn't make the rules, but is just the best at playing by them. ..
The question you asked though seems to imply he did NOT actually have a great ground game for working the delegates. That he is an innocent beneficiary of a system that just happened to give him an advantage in delegate assignment and delegate loyalty beyond what he received from the voters. I am not sure whether you meant to imply this or not, but let us consider both viewpoints...
On the first view, At best the Cruz side ought acknowledge Trump simply out played him in the contest of campaign competence. That Cruz was penny wise but pound foolish. That he got rope-a-doped by a superior strategist who used Cruz's own strong suit against him.
On the second view, Cruz isn't as clever as people thought, nor as pro-active. I simply don't think this is the case. There is a lot of evidence that Cruz is very smart, very organized, and very ahead of the other candidates in the morally shady business of delegate wrangling
Trump looks like a whiney playground loser over this. He makes me sick.
Perhaps this is the way his opponents wished he looked, but the national polls after the Colorado stuff seem to show a bump for Trump.
We live near a large military base. The largest number of people at our local Republican Party are professionals and retried professionals followed closely by business owners and retired business owners, followed by retired military officers and their wives and then a gaggle of attorneys who take every opportunity to remind the rest of us that they are smarter and better than we are.
Trump didn’t come up with this, its how it’s been reported from the get go. The state GOP changed the rules in August to exclude voters. It’s a fact.
Nahhhh... Not Slavery. They have already reinstated ENSLAVEMENT.
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