The case against ‘Dump Trump’
Here at Unconventional we’ve been watching the whole “Dump Trump” phenomenon pretty closely.
We’ve explored the history of dark-horse convention candidates. We’ve explained the theory that Republican delegates are already technically free to nominate someone else in Cleveland, despite the widespread belief that they are bound by the results of the primary votes in each state. We’ve interviewed North Dakota Rules Committee member Curly Haugland, who has written an entire book on the subject. And we previewed the rebels’ actual convention plans with Kendal Unruh, the leader of Free the Delegates — the most-organized Dump Trump effort to date.
Now, for the sake of fairness, we’d like to examine the other side of the equation. Here’s why — despite the thousands of people who’ve participated in their calls and the hundreds of delegates who’ve apparently signed on — the Dump Trump forces will still face nearly insurmountable odds in Cleveland.
Let’s start with the math. When assessing The Donald’s current chances of emerging from the RNC as the Republican nominee, there are four figures you have to factor in:
1,542. 899. 57. 18.
The first (1,542) is the number of delegates Trump won during the primaries — well over the 1,237 required to cement one’s presumptive-nominee status. The second (899) is the number that all of his rivals won combined. (Another 31 delegates are unallocated.) In accordance with various state laws and party rules, Trump’s delegates have committed to vote for him on the first ballot; the same goes for the other candidates’ delegates.
To block Trump on the first ballot, his detractors would have to deny him a 1,237-vote majority by persuading at least 306 Trump delegates to break their commitments and vote for someone (anyone) else. That’s a tall order.
To actually choose a different nominee, meanwhile, every single one of these non-Trump delegates would then have throw his or her weight behind the same (currently nonexistent) alternative candidate — and another 32 delegates would have to join the cause as well.
In our interview, Kendal Unruh claimed that more than 400 delegates have told her that they will not vote for Trump in Cleveland — no matter what. But how many of them were planning to vote for Trump to begin with? Again, 899 delegates have already committed to cast their initial ballots for Ted Cruz, John Kasich, Marco Rubio, and other candidates not named Donald Trump. In all likelihood, Unruh has recruited most of her 400 comrades from this delegate pool — meaning that Trump’s massive delegate majority is still intact.
As a member of the Rules Committee, Unruh plans to flip Trump delegates by passing a so-called “conscience clause,” which she believes will provide them with the cover they need to break their commitments and vote for a different candidate.
This is where the numbers 57 and 18 come in. The Rules Committee has 112 members; Unruh needs 57 votes to pass her new rule. The problem is that she only has 18 (at most).
“I’ve got 12 solids, four soft, then, of course, Guy and I,” Unruh told Unconventional on Thursday. (Guy is Guy Short, her fellow Rules Committee member from Colorado.)
Unruh’s chances of getting to 57 are slim; most of the rest of the Rules Committee is not predisposed to rebellion. Last week, Politico reached out to all 112 members to see where they stood on the idea of dumping Trump. Here’s what they discovered:
Among the 32 committee members who responded, 25 said they would fight efforts to stop Trump’s nomination. Another 33 members of the panel have been previously on record as endorsing Trump or rejecting efforts to rip the nomination away from him at the convention.
That means at least half of the Rules Committee is publicly committed to helping Trump win the party’s nod at the convention, enough to defeat any insurgent proposal. In addition, of the 47 who haven’t publicly endorsed Trump and didn’t respond to a POLITICO inquiry, 33 hail from states and territories where Trump won the popular vote or local conventions.
In other words, at least 91 Rules Committee members have either openly rejected a Dump Trump rule change or would be extremely likely to do so in Cleveland. For now, at least, Unruh’s math doesn’t add up.
Making matters worse for the Dump Trump crowd is the fact that the (previously disengaged) RNC and the (previously disorganized) Trump campaign are now teaming up to fight back.
“While party people are not necessarily Trump people, and Trump people are not necessarily party people, the two sides are now locked in a marriage of convenience,” The New York Times’ Jeremy Peters reported Sunday. “Mr. Trump is trying to protect his nomination, while the party is trying to protect the integrity of its nominating process.”
Together, according to Peters, they have hired “about a dozen operatives to ensure that the nominating vote goes off without a hitch.” Associates of RNC Chairman Reince Priebus are interrogating rookie delegates about their intentions; Priebus loyalists are running the Rules Committee and working to bar unpredictable delegates from other key convention bodies. Meanwhile, RNC lawyers are helping state bosses deflate local Dump Trump efforts, which has led GOP chairs to warn (and even threaten) wavering delegates in Minnesota, Washington and elsewhere.
If the Trump campaign continues on its current trajectory — trailing in the polls, occasionally stumbling, but basically holding itself together — the Manhattan mogul won’t get fired in Cleveland. The conscience clause will fail. Unruh & Co. will issue a “minority report.” Even if that measure somehow attracts the 28 Rules Committee votes required for it to proceed to the convention floor, it will stand almost no chance of passing once there. The drama could be divisive. Rogue delegates may kick and scream during the balloting process. But ultimately, they won’t sink Trump.
At this point, the only way that Trump will implode at the convention is if his campaign implodes first. And the only person who can control that is Trump himself.
None of which, however, has stopped his opponents from releasing…
