Would a Brokered Convention Stop Donald Trump?

breitbart ^ | 14 Jan 2016 | Roger Stone

[dennisw]

Will the GOP establishment steal the 2016 nomination from Donald Trump even if the magnate arrives in Cleveland with the most pledged delegates but short of the 50 percent he'd need to be nominated?

Is a back-room deal in the works to have a "brokered convention" to deny Trump the GOP nod? I think there is such a plan and it must be exposed.

Donald Trump is our last hope to make Washington work for us - not the lobbyists, special interests and billionaire donors who control the corroded two-party system. As Trump says: "America is going to hell!"

I am a veteran of nine national Republican presidential campaigns, including the floor of the 1976 Republican National Convention for Ronald Reagan. My sources inside the Republican party are warning me:

The insiders have a stunning plan to stop Trump even if he wins the primaries.

The plan involves stalling Trump short of a majority on the first ballot, since many of the delegates pledged to him would no longer be legally bound to support him on subsequent ballots. There are many, many Trojan Horse delegates inserted by the GOP establishment who could bolt from Trump after that first ballot.

Remember, up until March 14 all primaries have proportional delegate allocation. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) 97% , Chris Christie, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) 79% , Jeb Bush and the rest will be winning delegates, too.

There are 278 Super Delegates who are GOP establishment insiders, likely opposed to Trump. They constitute 4 percent of the convention. Thus, Trump must win 54 percent of delegates elected in caucuses and primaries to guarantee he could block a plot to stop him.

[Cboldt]

-- There are an awful lot of VERY angry people now; this is different from other times. --

There have been an awful lot of angry people for the last 20 years. What is different now is that Trump gives then hope that the applecart can actually be upset.

The nominating conventions and general election are going to be epic.

[jonrick46]

There is an alternative, should the GOPe snatch our chosen candidate from the nomination:

www.thewrite-in.com

The Write-In will provide the American people the opportunity to vote for a "citizen candidate" from a chosen group of 20 candidates, through live weekly voting. "America is the greatest country in the world." REALLY? As citizens of America, we hear these words time after time and every time we hear this we should be checking our wallets. The notion of America is automatically associated with the word greatness, although recently that has been downgraded to "just all right". There are songs proclaiming we are awesome just for being American, but what is the justification for America's hubris? This country and the governing body was to ensure the freedom of the people and to have a chance at a future free from tyranny. Tyranny is here on our own doorstep brought to you by your representatives in Washington, DC. and being helped along by citizens in this country that choose to pay little or no attention to what the politicians are doing to them. The definition of the "freedom" the people were allegedly promised has become political doublespeak for SLAVERY. Citizens should have the choice to not only have a dream, but to actualize that very same dream! How is this possible when our elected representatives spend more time listening to the Corporations that pay them, than listening to their own constituent Citizens now that are seldom working towards their own aspirations and are more likely to be working for someone else's goals. We settle for less because we feel we don't have a choice. We stick with a menial job just to live or just because we have achieved a small degree of comfort. There is no choice in that! Go with the predetermined path or suffer. America is run by politicians, for the profitability of the Corporations. Now, when most politicians retire or are voted out they have become part of the elitist rich.The people have been lead to think and believe they have no voice. It is believed our concerns fall on deaf ears. Ya think? When was the last time any of us saw Jeb Bush, Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump or Joe Biden, or anyone currently running for President, standing on a freeway entrance with a sign reading Homeless Veteran, Out of Work, Anything Helps. NBC News Tom Brokaw said, the WWII generation was our 'greatest' generation. Yes, they are/were the greatest, but almost gone from our earth. The next "great generation" is alive and well here now but is going to be the mixture of The MILLENNIAL generation, Generation X and Baby Boomers. The truth is, America's citizens do possess the power and capability to effect change and now is the time to exercise it to the fullest. Never in our nations history has there been a more volatile cocktail of frustration with what our political system has become. The unprecedented collective power to knock conventional politics off it's pedestal is here. The Write-In will provide the American people the opportunity to vote for a "citizen candidate" from a chosen group of 20 independent, fresh-thinking women and/or men leaders, through live weekly voting, to handpick the citizen's true candidate for President of the United States in 2016. The Write-In is "American IdolTM" meets a political revolution and how the two-headed bully that is Big Politics discovers just how far it has to fall. One thing is for sure, the "citizen candidate" selected by the people, won't have the label attached to them reading, "Bought and paid for". America could not be more ready for The Write-In.

[Techjock]

The everyone elses are thinning out. Cruz will be a threat in the evangelical winner takes all states. The scorched earth intra-party attacks could result in unintended consequences for Trump if he requires brokered partnership to win the convention.

[faithhopecharity]

I am not a member yet of the Donald bandwagon here, but...
any attempt by the GOP-E to steal the nomination from him would result in millions of people staying home, not is voting...an almost guaranteed loss for the GOP (unless Hillary does similarly to old Bernie the Red).

a ‘party bosses and hacks’ election choice of, say, Hillary versus Jeb/Kasich/Christie/? would see less voting than the race for Podunk dog catcher.

even the possibility of this happening...raises the (very old) question of why we allow our representative government to be so much in the hands of just two political parties (remembering that some of our founders opposed even allowing parties to begin with)

[faithhopecharity]

“However [political parties] may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.” George Washington

[Techjock]

Yes and their supporters won’t support Trump and maybe not Cruz either. The fruits of Trump’s scorched earth tactics.

[faithhopecharity]

There is nothing which I dread so much as a division of the republic into two great parties, each arranged under its leader, and concerting measures in opposition to each other. This, in my humble apprehension, is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our Constitution.

JOHN ADAMS, letter to Jonathan Jackson, Oct. 2, 1789

[CharleysPride]

Stop him from the nomination by theft and deceit and they create a Third Party Candidate.

I think the gOPEC knows what mistake that would be.

[Be Careful]

I have thought all along that we should have at the ready an alternative movement called “We the People Will Write-In” and that it should become be very apparent to the GOPe that we will not vote for a Dirty Tricks candidate.....our votes will go to a Trump or Cruz write-in. They will have a lot to lose....both the election and their corrupt party.

[Techjock]

For every non-establishment supporter like you, pledging not to support the establishment selection, there is an equal and opposite establishment supporter pledging not to support Trump or Cruz. This is a very real and potentially catastrophic problem for our party this year. Mutually assured destruction regardless of who comes out the primary victor. I’ve voted for the republican nominee in every presidential cycle since 1992. I assure you I will not be voting for Donald Trump. I wonder how many of the 70% of the republican primary voters that currently support other candidates feel the same as I do. My suspicion is a pretty high percentage.

[Techjock]

The damage is already baked in. The RNC should have let Trump and his supporters run independently. Or better yet, join the Democrat Primary.

[faithhopecharity]

ps: I think that a main reason Mr. Trump (and Bernie) are getting so much public support is that the public is fed up with all the lies and deceit and corruption in the Clinton Machine and in the GOP-E

[Neu Pragmatist]

The question is , will Cruz endorse and support Trump or Jebbie when the time comes ?

[faithhopecharity]

If a political party does not have its foundation in the determination to advance a cause that is right and that is moral, then it is not a political party; it is merely a conspiracy to seize power.

DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER, speech, Mar. 6, 1956

[TontoKowalski]

I will be shocked if all the talk of a brokered convention doesn't come to a complete halt.

The prime objective of the "establishment" is self-preservation. ALL of the energy is with the Trump/Cruz part of the party. ALL of it.

Assuming things continue in that vein, the GoP will be faced with something that looks like the 1968 Dem convention should they attempt a smokey backroom deal, and they know it. It would wreck the party for a decade.

[TontoKowalski]

Eventually, someone in "the establishment" is going to pause and take a look at record numbers of voter registrations, the influx of independents, the groundswell of grassroots support, and they're going to think:

There's a lot of upside to this, especially if this guy has coattails.

I look for endorsements from the politicos to start rolling in soon. If not before South Carolina, then shortly thereafter.

[stilloftyhenight]

GOPe, a brokered convention will NOT BE TOLERATED!

Trump: 35.1%-—92,103 votes—10 delegates
Kasich: 15.9—41,645 votes—3 delegates
Cruz: 11.6%—30,416 votes...2 delegates
34 precincts 2go

[Boogieman]

Well, if you call a brokered convention “stealing” the election right in the first sentence, it’s pretty obvious what the author’s conclusion is, eh?

Consider this though: what if, in the Twilight Zone, Jeb Bush somehow is leading the pack with 30% of the vote, while a bunch of conservative candidates are splitting the other 70%. Jeb sweeps up the most electoral votes, but is still short of the 50% he needs to win. If the other conservative candidates endorsed the top conservative and told their delegates to vote for him, would they be “stealing” the election from Jeb? Or would handing the nomination to someone that less than 50% of the party wanted as the nominee be “stealing” the election from the conservatives?

[Boogieman]

It all depends on how quickly the losers drop out. I can see this shaping up into a 3 man race in the next few weeks.

[TontoKowalski]

Also, to quote Marco Rubio, "It's time to dispel the fiction..."

That all those "establishment" votes are going to eventually consolidate behind one establishment candidate.

One topic on the CNN exit poll was that there was a late defection from Rubio, post debate. About half of those voters went to Kaisich, and about half went to Trump.