Will the GOP Allow Trump to be Nominated?

[Fuzzy Bear]

If Trump is in the game long enough to actually be leading in delegates in May of next year, he will probably end up with having received more primary votes than any other Republican.  Which is not to say he can't be stopped at the convention, and he would be.  I'm sure that Trump will not be able to get 50% of the delegates in caucuses or primaries, and it will be a Code Red to stop Trump.  The GOP will coalesce around a candidate at the last minute and Trump will be stopped.  That's the nomination endgame if Trump is in the game deep into May.

The problem for the GOP as a whole is that Trump is going to make the party screw him over in full view of America.  First, they'll screw him by blocking his nomination.  Second, they'll do it so late in the game as to ensure that he couldn't be on the ballot in all 50 states and DC, which will always weaken the viability of an Independent candidacy.

If Trump really had a majority of the primary votes, he could launch all sorts of legal battles to ensure his nomination.  He'd lose in the end, but the legal actions would all be news, all making the GOP looking as if they're stifling the will of the people.  If he forced the convention to nominate him, individual states could go the Dixicrat/Harry Byrd 1960 route and name unpledged electors or electors pledged to another Republican, but there could be legal action on that account, and that's an area where Trump might prevail legally.  There are so, so many ways for the GOP to stymie Trump, but there are so, so many ways for the GOP to make it ugly.

What's the closest thing I've ever seen to this?  Probably when two LaRouche supporters won nominations for statewide office as Democrats in 1986; this move caused Adlai Stevenson III to run as the Solidarity Party candidate.   Even that would be ugly; Stevenson lost an election he was poised to win.

[Fuzzy Bear]

They clearly don't want him. Of course, it would be suicide if he has enough delegates and they refuse to give it to him, but would they allow him to even advance to the primaries?

I don't know how they would prevent him from doing so, unless you're suggesting that they take a page from the Clinton playbook and give him the Vince Foster treatment?

I seriously would not rule this out.

Well the GOP has a candidate whose father is former director of the CIA.  If he could secretly fly to Paris to delay the release of the Iranian hostages long enough for Reagan to win the election, undoing Donald Trump ought not to tax him too much.