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.
Seems to include challenging the integrity of some aspects of the Republican party. As to destroying this integrity, let us consider a thought experiment. What if the Republican party magically and suddenly conceded to all his challenges. It seems to me the results would be that:
* Republican politicians would no longer do favors for big campaign donors.
* Delegate slots won by a candidate would always be filled by delegates loyal to that candidate, and never assigned by the candidate's political enemies.
* Republican primaries and caucuses would be organized in a way conducive to broad participation by Republicans in the state.
* If at the convention a candidate has a significant lead, but only a plurality that is close to a majority, and polling indicates they would have had a majority in a two candidate race, then delegates who are unbound should come together to support the leading candidate in the interest of party unity and respect to the voters.
Albeit, these things would be favorable to Trump in the current election cycle. Perhaps he could challenge other things not as favorable to him. But putting the particulars of this election cycle aside, by themselves it seems to me that they would strengthen the integrity of the Republican party and certainly would not destroy it.
What I am saying is Cruz did not make the rules. Had no control over what they did. He played by their rules and won. You can skirt around it all you want but Trump did not do any of that. He just thought he would skate in there and scoop the delegates for himself and when that didn’t happen he cried foul when there was none. It showed his incompetence and he threw a fit. If it had turned out favorably for him you wouldn’t have heard a peep from him. And he still turns my stomach. I do not want him as my President.
All registered Colorado republicans were allowed to vote at their precinct convention and advance to the next levels. Those who show up elect the delegates at each level. I don’t hear people complaining about the Nevada Caucus which isn’t much different.
It’s little use to complain about someone being allowed to complain. Nor is it very convincing to justify a moral proposition by appealing to something other than people’s sense of fairness. Nor is it persuasive to possit one’s own negative feelings for an individual as grounds of determining what is just.
You’re right I do have negative feelings about his actions. They are gut feelings. I’ve got to stop paying attention to thus stuff. Be a little more detached. The problem is I don’t see the situation as being unfair. The rules were out there for a long time and the facts of what took place put the lie to the notion of “winning winning” and “all the best and smartest people” and “listening to my self and my great brain”. It seems to me that he jumped into this thing on a whim, unprepared. There will be nobody to sue if things go wrong on the world stage, and we will be the ones paying the price for his screwups.
You’re on the wrong side of the issue.
Says you.
History will repeat what I say in a year or two.
You are simply a tyrant.
Says you in the predictable manner of name-calling.
Kasich can't win either even if Cruz dropped out.
The problem with Cruz dropping out is that if he did, the anti-Trump vote would have no distractions or decisions to make. You vote Kasich or you vote Trump. At that point, the establishment would not have to hedge their bets between the most viable candidate to stop Trump and the candidate they like the most.
The character of the campaign would change without Cruz, as would the news coverage of Kasich, who would become the candidate who had to be interviewed, discussed, and inevitably praised for his moderate views and electibility. Even (especially?) as a Trump voter, I'd prefer to keep Cruz in the race.
Cruz is only surviving because he is getting conservative support who still regard him as anti-establishment.
So, in effect, the establishment are running two candidates against Trump in order to keep him from getting the majority, since one can't beat him.
Cruz is getting that support because his entire record in government is that of a conservative - not a conservative who is as popular with voters as Trump, but still a 97% to 100% conservative if you look at his record instead of at campaign rhetoric. However, election dynamics change when there are only two candidates left. I do not want Kasich to drop out and leave just Cruz, but neither do I want Cruz to drop out and leave just Kasich - unless both go at the same time.
Don't be so confident that Trump would crush Kasich, the last man standing, as easily as he crushed the rest of them. Trump had the advantage of divided opposition before. With that gone, the dynamic could be different. If Kasich support jumps in these final few primaries, that can be used as justification for nominating him if Trump falls short. I want to avoid that disaster, and the best way to avoid it is for both Cruz and Kasich to stay in.
[Note: I do not consider a Cruz nomination a disaster, but I consider it extremely unlikely. Cruz thinks he can play the establishment, but I expect them to betray him if Cruz stops Trump.]
The Establishment has seen that and now are backing two candidates, one representing the anti-establishment view (Cruz) the other one the establishment one (Kasich).
I want Kasich to drop out because he cannot win the majority of the delegates and is therefore only remaining in the race to fight a convention battle.
Likewise with Cruz when he is mathematically eliminated.
I doubt few Cruz voters would vote for Kasich, I know Trump voters wouldn't.
What the establishment is attempting to do is what it has always done to get their guys elected, divide conservatives, in this case religious conservatives (Cruz) and popularist ones (Trump), while Kasich slides through untouched.
If Kasich were leading the RNC would be putting all kinds of pressure for both Trump and Cruz to drop out for the good of the Party.
Some states have been anti-establishment, but others were pro-establishment. I do not want to give the pro-establishment forces a chance to unite. If the last few primaries are a two-man race presented as an up or down referendum on Trump, even people who don't like Kasich might vote for him to try for a "compromise" candidate at the convention. Party leadership would even argue that they were justified in treating that as a public rejection of the Trump nomination. The rules changes to deny Trump the nomination would be "to meet the public demand". No, thank you.
You ask “Who is the keeper of the spirit of the primaries?”
The “keeper of the spirit” of the rules is found in the preamble to the national GOP rules. The national rules set up the guidelines for state primaries. Here’s what it says:
“BE IT RESOLVED...
It is the intent and purpose of these rules to encourage and allow the broadest possible participation of all voters in Republican Party activities at all levels and to assure that the Republican Party is open and accessible to all Americans.”
Does anybody think that the Colorado and Wyoming procedures pass muster?
Both Cruz and Kasich need to drop out.
The best thing for Trump as a candidate is for both Cruz and Kasich to drop out, but that isn’t going to happen. Kasich will stay forever. If Kasich stays, the best thing for Trump is for Cruz to stay too. That doesn’t guarantee a Trump win, but a three-person race gives Trump the best odds short of both rivals dropping out. Trump voters should not resent Cruz for staying. As a Trump voter who has analyzed more political races than you can imagine, I want Cruz to stay for as long as Kasich does.
It is far more likely that they would support Trump then Kasich or at least sit the primaries out.
And if Cruz voters (that's 30% of republicans, so even a fraction of Cruz voters would be a big deal) sit out the general election too? We all know what that would mean - Hillary would put the final nail in the coffin for American freedom. Why not stick to the issues and give the personal attacks a rest? No one will be offended if you attack Cruz for his positions on gun rights, on Obamacare, on education, or even on abortion. Give it a shot:
http://www.ontheissues.org/Ted_Cruz.htm
https://www.tedcruz.org/issues/
http://www.proliferecord.com/ - not perfect, but better than the other candidates this year.
Oh, my! If you read his positions, his ratings, and his voting record, it's hard to find anyone better on the major issues. I'm still voting for Trump because I want the Republican Convention decided on the first ballot, but besides being counterproductive, the attacks on Cruz are avoiding issues for a very good reason. Ted Cruz is the most consistent conservative to generate significant support since Ronald Reagan.
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