One of my new favorite people is Curly Hoagland, a long-time
member of the Republican National
Committee and unpledged delegate from North Dakota who has had his fifteen
minutes of fame lately on cable TV.
Hoagland's shtick is to quote the rules of the Republican National
Committee concerning the selection of delegates to the July Convention and then
to say, ominously, that we shall not know who actually has 1237 delegate votes until the first
ballot is taken at the convention. The
current primary contests, he says, are just "beauty contests."
Well!
So I took a look at the rules of the Republican National Committee. Here is Rule 16(d)(2):
"Only persons eligible to vote who are deemed as a
matter of public record to be Republicans pursuant to state law or, if voters
are not enrolled by party, by Republican Party rules of a state, shall
participate in any primary election held for the purpose of electing delegates
or alternate delegates to the national convention or in any Republican caucus,
mass meeting, or mass convention held for the purpose of selecting delegates to
the county, district, or state conventions, and only such legal and qualified
voters shall be elected as delegates to county, district, and state
conventions; provided, however, that in addition to the qualifications provided
herein, the applicable Republican Party rules of a state may prescribe
additional qualifications not inconsistent with law, which additional
qualifications shall be adopted before October 1 in the year before the year in
which the national convention is to be held and published in at least one (1)
newspaper having a general circulation throughout the state, such publication
to be at least ninety (90) days before such qualifications become effective."
A number of the Republican primaries allow Independents and
even Democrats to vote, and the exit polls indicate that Trump has been winning
large majorities or pluralities of those voters.
Curly has a point.
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