Primary calendar / poll closing times and delegate allocation megathread (Christmas is saved!)

[RI]

Question for jimrtx, or anyone else who knows this stuff better than I do:

I was thinking about the longshot "no one finishes the primaries with a majority of delegates" scenario.  If you go to the Atlas's "results" page for the 2012 GOP primaries, Romney only has 51.3% of the delegates.  A whopping 29% are "unallocated".  Who are these unallocated delegates?  I'm assuming that some of them are the three party officials for each state, but also unbound delegates from caucus states, and unbound delegates from states like Pennsylvania which have wonky rules about delegate selection?

Given that the RNC now requires the straw poll results in caucus states to bind the votes of delegates in those states, I'm assuming that this "unallocated" number will be significantly smaller than 29% this time?  Any idea how much smaller?

And are these people likely to be pro-establishment candidates?  Or not?

Some of those are listed as unallocated because Dave only binds caucus delegates at the convention level, and he often doesn't have results for those. For example, Washington's 40 delegates are never allocated on the 2012 results page. Similarly with Iowa and Maine. There are also a bunch of "unallocated" delegates on some of the conventions pages, e.g. Minnesota, Missouri, and Colorado.

[Lyin' Steve]

Here’s FHQ’s summary of Republican delegate allocation by state:

http://frontloading.blogspot.com.au/2015/10/2016-republican-delegate-allocation.html

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Was this map drawn by hand?  Why couldn't they just use a normal US map?

[jimrtex]

Question for jimrtx, or anyone else who knows this stuff better than I do:

I was thinking about the longshot "no one finishes the primaries with a majority of delegates" scenario.  If you go to the Atlas's "results" page for the 2012 GOP primaries, Romney only has 51.3% of the delegates.  A whopping 29% are "unallocated".  Who are these unallocated delegates?  I'm assuming that some of them are the three party officials for each state, but also unbound delegates from caucus states, and unbound delegates from states like Pennsylvania which have wonky rules about delegate selection?

Given that the RNC now requires the straw poll results in caucus states to bind the votes of delegates in those states, I'm assuming that this "unallocated" number will be significantly smaller than 29% this time?  Any idea how much smaller?

And are these people likely to be pro-establishment candidates?  Or not?

I think the Atlas is wrong. Greenpapers shows a total of 2286 delegates. Atlas shows 2571 - and it is in the wrong column.

Further, I went through the individual states on the Atlas and found 496 delegates listed as unallocated. This is not too dissimilar to the shown in the Greenpapers. Greenpapers has more delegates pledged to Romney than Atlas. This may be a result of downstream pledges.

According to the Atlas, 17 states, AL, AZ, DE, FL, GA, ID, KS, MD, MI, NV, NH, NJ, ND, SC, UT, VT, and WI, pledged all their delegates. This might not be accurate. For example, Greenpapers, shows the 3 party officials in Alabama as uncommitted.

According to the Atlas, 18 states and 1 district, AR, AK, CA, CT, DC, HI, KY, MA, MS, NM, NY, NC, OH, OK, OR, RI, SD, TN, AND VA, had 3 unpledged delegates, presumably the party officials.

I would expect these delegates to be very pro-establishment. They may have spent decades getting to their position.

All the delegates from 9 states, CO(36), IA(28), ME(24), MN(40), MO(52), MT(26), NE(35), PA(72), WA(40), and NE(35), total 353 were officially unpledged.

Most of these were from caucus states. In the Iowa precinct caucuses, Romney and Santorum were quite close in the straw poll, with Paul somewhat behind. By the time the state convention rolled around, most of the national delegates were Paul supporters. Formally, the precinct caucuses only elect delegates to the county convention, which in turn choose delegates to congressional district and state conventions. It was left up to the precinct conventions to determine how or if they would use the straw poll results. If it was 40-30-20 (Paul), the Paul supporters might suggest a 1-1-1 split of county delegates. If the Paul supporters dominated, they might propose their delegates as a slate. Some persons elected as county delegates might not show up, and alternate might take their place.

Of the 9 states, Greenpapers shows most of those from CO, MN, MO, NE, and WA as being hard delegates. This indicates that while they were not pledged on the basis of a caucus straw poll, they were pledged at a later level. These were pledged Romney 109, Paul 43, Santorum 22, and 19 unpledged. But the Minnesota delegation was 32 Paul, 2 Santorum. Colorado had 16 unpledged, 14 Romney, and 6 Santorum. On the floor vote, there were 8 abstentions. So it appears that there were at least 8 "Paul" delegates, but they weren't permitted to vote for Paul.

There were 6 states which had some unpledged delegates, IL(12), IND(16), LA(28), TX(6), WY(3), and WV(5). Those from Louisiana and Texas appear to be due to their allocation rules. Louisiana only allocated delegates to candidates who received more than 20%, but allocated unpledged delegates based on the total vote (eg if a candidate received 15% of the vote, he would not have any delegates, but "unpledged" would be awarded 15% of the delegates.

If the convention went multiple ballots, what you would likely find is that many of the "pledged" delegates may not be supporters of who they are pledged to. Texas delegates are chosen by the state convention. In Arkansas, delegates are chosen by special conventions after the primary. Delegate candidates can indicate who they support (they can even indicate multiple choices as long as they pay multiple filing fees), and presidential candidates may indicate their preferred candidates.

Looking over the Republican rules, the loophole of direct election of delegates still exists. Iowa Republicans had considered eliminating the straw poll, so they didn't have to allocate based on that, but they seem to have backed off on that. It's not clear whether the RNC rules require an initial poll at caucuses.

[Gass3268]

So do we have an official calendar yet or are we still waiting on some states?

[Mr. Morden]

So do we have an official calendar yet or are we still waiting on some states?

I'm actually not sure if New Hampshire has officially named its primary date.  This story:

http://edition.cnn.com/2015/11/03/politics/new-hampshire-primary-open-ballot/

from early November says:

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Has he subsequently named the date?  I’m not sure.  In any case, there’s no reason to believe he’d pick a date other than Feb. 9 at this point, as no other states are threatening NH’s position.

Other than that, I guess the answer is “every state has its primary date, but there’s nothing to stop any of them from changing it again if they wanted to”.  So the calendar is as “official” as it’s going to be.  And you can find that calendar in various places on the interwebs:

http://frontloading.blogspot.com.au/p/2016-presidential-primary-calendar.html
http://www.thegreenpapers.com/P16/events.phtml?s=c&f=m
https://ballotpedia.org/2016_presidential_nominations:_calendar_and_delegate_rules

Would people also like me to put a version of the calendar in the OP of this thread?  I can do it, though I might not have a chance to do so this week or next.  What do people prefer in terms of format?

Alternatively, if someone wants to write out the calendar in their own preferred format, I can put it in the OP, and it’ll save me the work.

[/]

LOL

[Mr. Morden]

What's the story on the North Dakota Republican caucuses?  The Green Papers suggests that they've been cancelled?

http://www.thegreenpapers.com/P16/events.phtml?s=c

But that doesn't match with the FHQ calendar:

http://frontloading.blogspot.com.au/p/2016-presidential-primary-calendar.html

Are they just going to hold a convention, but no caucuses?

I'm also unclear on what the Wyoming caucuses will be.  IIRC from 2008, they weren't real "caucuses".  More like a gathering of party leaders.  As in a convention, rather than caucuses.  Is that the case for 2016 as well?

[jimrtex]

What's the story on the North Dakota Republican caucuses?  The Green Papers suggests that they've been cancelled?

This 2016 Presidential Nominating Process (PDF) (from RNC) indicates that the caucuses will be much more informal and held over several months.

North Dakota legislative districts are pretty small since there are few people in North Dakota and 47 districts (15,000 or so per district). By avoiding polling, they don't have to pledge delegates, who are directly elected at the state convention.

[Erc]

So, I've been working through the exact processes of the first several states in preparation for some future posts, and a more overarching question has come up.

What on earth happens to delegates that are bound to candidates who withdraw or are not placed in nomination due to Rule 40?  Early versions of the GOP Rules at least provided for the former possibility, but the current one does not seem to.

Currently, Rule 16 states that states have to allocate and bind their delegates in some winner-take-all or proportional fashion, based on the results of the primary/caucus vote in that state.  Each delegate's vote must be consistent with this, and they are recorded accordingly by the Secretary of the Convention.

Some states attempt to give provisions to deal with this eventuality, but I'm not sure these are consistent with the overall dictum to bind and allocate delegates based on the vote.

The most egregious of these is South Carolina, a Winner-Take-All state, which simply gives the delegates to the second-place (or failing that, the third) if the first-place candidate is not placed in nomination.  Nevada allows candidates to choose to release or reallocate their delegates if they withdraw before the State Convention.  Most other states I've looked at (with the exception of Iowa) provide some means for candidates to release their delegates--or in the case of Alabama, for the delegates to release themselves.

Are these (largely common sense, SC excepting) state rules consistent with the National Rules, and withdrawn candidates' delegates may be released, as one would expect?  Or are they bound to abstain?

Also in Rule 16 is the line: "Except as provided for by state law or state party rule, no presidential candidate shall have the power to remove a delegate."  What does "remove" mean in this context?  Does it cover this eventuality?

This is not to mention the headache of an (unlikely) second ballot; are delegates still bound by the primary vote in their state, regardless of what the state rules say?  As this could lead to an infinite number of ballots, I imagine not, but this is an awkward area in the GOP rules.

[Mr. Morden]

Bill Gardner has finally set the New Hampshire primary date.  To absolutely no one's surprise, it'll be on Feb. 9:

http://www.wmur.com/politics/gardner-sets-primary-date-for-feb-9/37011504

[Mr. Morden]

Josh Putnam talks about the rule that supposedly prevents any candidate's name from being placed in nomination unless they have majority control of at least eight state delegations:

http://frontloading.blogspot.com.au/2015/12/the-real-import-of-rule-40-in-2016.html

As I'm understanding him, people have been acting as if this could be a big factor in the event of a contested convention.  But it's not actually clear that it would be, as that rule isn't locked in stone.  It could very well end up getting changed at the convention.

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

So, I've been working through the exact processes of the first several states in preparation for some future posts, and a more overarching question has come up.

What on earth happens to delegates that are bound to candidates who withdraw or are not placed in nomination due to Rule 40?  Early versions of the GOP Rules at least provided for the former possibility, but the current one does not seem to.

Currently, Rule 16 states that states have to allocate and bind their delegates in some winner-take-all or proportional fashion, based on the results of the primary/caucus vote in that state.  Each delegate's vote must be consistent with this, and they are recorded accordingly by the Secretary of the Convention.

Some states attempt to give provisions to deal with this eventuality, but I'm not sure these are consistent with the overall dictum to bind and allocate delegates based on the vote.

The most egregious of these is South Carolina, a Winner-Take-All state, which simply gives the delegates to the second-place (or failing that, the third) if the first-place candidate is not placed in nomination.  Nevada allows candidates to choose to release or reallocate their delegates if they withdraw before the State Convention.  Most other states I've looked at (with the exception of Iowa) provide some means for candidates to release their delegates--or in the case of Alabama, for the delegates to release themselves.

Are these (largely common sense, SC excepting) state rules consistent with the National Rules, and withdrawn candidates' delegates may be released, as one would expect?  Or are they bound to abstain?

Also in Rule 16 is the line: "Except as provided for by state law or state party rule, no presidential candidate shall have the power to remove a delegate."  What does "remove" mean in this context?  Does it cover this eventuality?

This is not to mention the headache of an (unlikely) second ballot; are delegates still bound by the primary vote in their state, regardless of what the state rules say?  As this could lead to an infinite number of ballots, I imagine not, but this is an awkward area in the GOP rules.

In most cases, when candidates withdraw from the race, they simply 'suspend' their campaigns, rather than actually ending them. This is done so 1) they can continue to raise money to help pay off their debt from the campaign, and 2) they can quickly re-enter if the frontrunner dies or something.

'Suspending' is different from 'withdrawing' - withdrawing is almost never done in presidential contests, and indicates a permanent end to one's campaign. While suspensions are generally permanent, they are not required to be that way, and can theoretically be nothing more than breaks from campaigning. The rule (in most states) is that if you merely 'suspend' your campaign, your delegates stay with you, unless you officially release them. This is why Santorum and Gingrich had to officially release their delegates before the 2012 convention - since they only suspended their campaigns rather than actually ending them, their delegates were still pledged to them, and would have been forced to vote for Santorum/Gingrich at the convention if they had been left unreleased.

[Erc]

In most cases, when candidates withdraw from the race, they simply 'suspend' their campaigns, rather than actually ending them. This is done so 1) they can continue to raise money to help pay off their debt from the campaign, and 2) they can quickly re-enter if the frontrunner dies or something.

'Suspending' is different from 'withdrawing' - withdrawing is almost never done in presidential contests, and indicates a permanent end to one's campaign. While suspensions are generally permanent, they are not required to be that way, and can theoretically be nothing more than breaks from campaigning. The rule (in most states) is that if you merely 'suspend' your campaign, your delegates stay with you, unless you officially release them. This is why Santorum and Gingrich had to officially release their delegates before the 2012 convention - since they only suspended their campaigns rather than actually ending them, their delegates were still pledged to them, and would have been forced to vote for Santorum/Gingrich at the convention if they had been left unreleased.

Good point.  Many states do seem to cover the suspension possibility as well in their rules, though in many cases this is subject to interpretation, let alone the question of whether the state rules are even allowed to cover this possibility.

For example, New Hampshire keeps its delegates bound to a candidate “as long as he shall be a candidate before [the National] Convention.”  South Carolina rebinds its delegates to someone else if the candidate they were initially bound to is not placed in nomination.  Nevada actively asks its candidates if they want to keep their delegates; if they forget to respond (as may be likely for someone who has suspended their campaign), the delegates are released.

Also, of course, candidates who suspend their campaigns early (i.e. before mid-March) are incredibly unlikely to have their names placed in nomination due to Rule 40, as they won't have a majority of multiple states' delegations.  Even if they wanted to jump back in later, they wouldn't qualify for the national convention ballot, and it's unclear what becomes of their bound delegates then.  Of course, this assumes Rule 40 will be enjoining at the convention, which as Mr. Morden points out, is not clear at all.

[Erc]

Frontloading HQ raises a point, in the depths of a post about Texas, that it has been led to believe that the 3 RNC members from each state are supposed to be bound by the primary in each state as a result of RNC Rule 16(a)(1).  This seems to follow, as the RNC members are not elected by a statewide ballot.

Currently, however, many (if not most) states don't have a procedure for binding these delegates.  Will they all be given to the statewide winner? Allocated proportionally in early states? Should they just be considered to be extra At-Large delegates?  The RNC summary treats them separately, and sheds no light here.

If this interpretation is right, it gets rid of basically all the remaining Republican "superdelegates," excepting the few from states without any preference vote (CO/WY/ND, plus some of the territories).  This would, in principle, clear up some of the math, if we had any idea how they were going to be allocated.

[StatesPoll]

2016 Republican Nomination:
Delegates to the convention: 2,470*
Delegates needed to win the nomination (50%+1): 1,236votes
Total Number of Delegates votes from Winner-Take-ALL States: Total 930~942 votes(37.89%)
Proportional States : Total 1499~1502 votes(62.11%)

The number in parentheses = delegates. And,  % is the average number.

1. South Carolina Primary (50 ) — Winner take all
2. Florida Primary (99) — Winner take all
3. Illinois Primary (69) — Statewide delegates are winner take all, congressional district delegates elected directly on ballot and bound as they declare
4. Missouri Primary (52/49) – Winner take all above 50%, otherwise winter take all by congressional district
5. Northern Mariana Islands Caucuses (9) – Winner take all

6. Ohio Primary (66) –Winner take all
7. Arizona Primary (58) — Winner take all
8. Wisconsin Primary (42) — Winner take all statewide and by congressional district
9. Delaware Primary (16) — Winner take all
10. Maryland Primary (38) — Winner take all

11. Pennsylvania Primary (71/14) — Winner take all statewide, remaining delegates elected on ballot and unbound
12. Indiana Primary (57/54) — Winner take all statewide and by congressional district
13. Nebraska Primary (36) — Winner take all
14. California Primary (172/169) — Winner take all statewide and by congressional district
15. Montana Primary (27) — Winner take all

16. New Jersey Primary (51) — Winner take all
17. South Dakota Primary (29/26) — Winner take all

[Mr. Morden]

Here's a list of which states' GOP primaries are restricted to Republicans only, and which allow votes by Dems and Indies:

link

[couchpotato07]

Here's a list of which states' GOP primaries are restricted to Republicans only, and which allow votes by Dems and Indies:

Thanks for the info!

[Mr. Morden]

As I recall, there was some discussion in this thread a few months ago about the definition of proportionality that the pre-March 15 states are allowed to use.  Whoever said that the definition of proportionality that the states may use has changed since 2012, you were right.

As I understand it now, back in 2012, the “proportional” states could use a proportional allocation for the at-large delegates, but were free to make things WTA for the congressional district delegates.  But that’s disallowed now.  Most early March states, like Texas for example, are now using a congressional district allocation that would give 2 delegates to the winner of a CD, and 1 delegate to the second place winner of that CD (though that reverts to WTA if you get more than 50% of the vote in that CD).

So let’s say, hypothetically, that Cruz wins Texas by a lot, and wins nearly every congressional district, yet fails to win an outright majority in very many of them.  Then he could get something like 2/3rds of the CD delegates there.  So he could build up a big delegate advantage, well beyond what he would have if it was straight up proportional, but still far short of what he’d get if it was WTA.

In contrast, according to FHQ:

http://frontloading.blogspot.com.au/2015/12/2016-republican-delegate-allocation_22.html

Virginia has changed its delegate allocation to be statewide proportional:

http://frontloading.blogspot.com.au/2015/12/2016-republican-delegate-allocation_22.html

So from a delegate perspective, there’s not really that much to be gained from the candidates devoting a huge amount of resources to Virginia, as opposed to some of the other Super Tuesday states, like TX, GA, TN, etc., where flipping the right congressional districts could give you a decent return on your money.

[Erc]

Beginning to work through delegate allocation for both sides this year, and I noticed something a bit weird about the Democratic side:

The formula for the number of base number of delegates given to each state is given in the Call of the Convention (most recent version I could find is here)

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Where SDV represents the vote for the Democratic candidate in the given state in the given year, TDV represents the vote for the Democratic candidate nationwide in the given year, and SEV means the state's electoral vote.

Basically, this formula gives equal weight to total population (or its rough proxy in Electoral Votes) and number of Democrats (or its rough proxy in votes for Obama x 2 and Kerry).

Running the numbers and comparing them with the DNC's stated results (Appendix B of the call), the numbers seem a bit off, and not just due to rounding errors.  Some states are underrepresented by the DNC's calculation compared to the formula (TX by 11 delegates, FL by 5), while other states are overrepresented (Ohio by 5, NY/PA/MA by 4).

What seems to be going on here is that the DNC chose to use not the current EV figures, but the EV figures from 2004/2008!  This accounts for virtually all of the differences (apart from obvious rounding discrepancies and one oddity with NY which may be due to Fusion); note that in particular they are not averaging the EV counts over the last three elections, either.

Basically, the population weighting being done is on the basis of the outdated 2000 census, favoring the north and east over the south and west.

No one seems to have caught this so far; in particular, Texas (the state with the most to lose), goes along with the DNC's count in their delegate selection plan.

Blue states are overrepresented; red are underrepresented---this is essentially a map of which states lost or gained EVs in the 2010 reapportionment. 

It should be stressed this isn't a large effect: we're talking about 30-35 (base) pledged delegates here, or about 1% of the total.

The latest versions of the Democratic allocations appear to have fixed these problems!  Apart from possible one-delegate rounding errors in Colorado, Indiana, and New York, the math seems to check out.  Never fear, Texas Democratic Party!

[Mr. Morden]

Just thought I'd flag this.  Fivethirtyeight recently came out with a new demographic model that envisions that the GOP race condenses to a Cruz-Rubio-Trump battle.  Making various assumptions about which demographics each will appeal to, they create a table of "delegate benchmarks" for all three candidates, listing how many delegates they would need at each stage of the race in order to be on pace to get a majority of delegates by the end:

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/beware-a-gop-calendar-front-loaded-with-states-friendly-to-trump-and-cruz/

[Likely Voter]

Question for someone who knows the latest Iowa Dem rules: how likely is it for one candidate to win more delegates without winning more votes (especially if the top vote winner's support is highly concentrated in a handful of areas)

[Mr. Morden]

OK, I guess the voting is coming up soon.  Originally, I had been intending to dig somewhat deeper into delegate rules, but I guess I'm not actually going to do that.  I've pretty much covered whatever delegate thoughts I had earlier in the thread.

So what do you guys want me to do with this thread?  Should I keep it stickied, or is it not really important enough for that?

Should I put up the primary calendar in the OP?  As I said earlier, you can find the primary calendar on FHQ, the Green Papers, and other websites, so I'm not sure how much it would add, but if people want me to do it, I will.  If so, let me know what format you would prefer.

[Landslide Lyndon]

Question for someone who knows the latest Iowa Dem rules: how likely is it for one candidate to win more delegates without winning more votes (especially if the top vote winner's support is highly concentrated in a handful of areas)

That's what happened in 2008 at the Nevada caucuses. Clinton won 51-46 IIRC but Obama won more delegates because he dominated the scarcely populated northern part of the state.

[Joe Biden 2020]

OK, I guess the voting is coming up soon.  Originally, I had been intending to dig somewhat deeper into delegate rules, but I guess I'm not actually going to do that.  I've pretty much covered whatever delegate thoughts I had earlier in the thread.

So what do you guys want me to do with this thread?  Should I keep it stickied, or is it not really important enough for that?

Should I put up the primary calendar in the OP?  As I said earlier, you can find the primary calendar on FHQ, the Green Papers, and other websites, so I'm not sure how much it would add, but if people want me to do it, I will.  If so, let me know what format you would prefer.

I still think keeping the calendar itself posted somewhere including convention dates and locations would be helpful so people who are browsing for education or just lurking don't have to keep fishing around with too many websites.  You don't have to put the delegates each state offers as I think there is already a thread on that, but at least keep the schedule up.  If you don't want people posting on it and messing it up, you can always lock it, but leave it stickied as kind of just a reference document.

[Mr. Morden]

OK, I guess the voting is coming up soon.  Originally, I had been intending to dig somewhat deeper into delegate rules, but I guess I'm not actually going to do that.  I've pretty much covered whatever delegate thoughts I had earlier in the thread.

So what do you guys want me to do with this thread?  Should I keep it stickied, or is it not really important enough for that?

Should I put up the primary calendar in the OP?  As I said earlier, you can find the primary calendar on FHQ, the Green Papers, and other websites, so I'm not sure how much it would add, but if people want me to do it, I will.  If so, let me know what format you would prefer.

I still think keeping the calendar itself posted somewhere including convention dates and locations would be helpful so people who are browsing for education or just lurking don't have to keep fishing around with too many websites.  You don't have to put the delegates each state offers as I think there is already a thread on that, but at least keep the schedule up.  If you don't want people posting on it and messing it up, you can always lock it, but leave it stickied as kind of just a reference document.

Well, OK, I could post the primary calendar in the OP.  (Or better yet, if someone else wants to do it, send it to me, and I'll post it for you.)  What format should I use though?  Here's what I had four years ago:

https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=128721.0

...with different colors for primaries and caucuses.  But that was just the GOP calendar, because the Democratic side wasn't contested in 2012.  What about this time?  Different colors for the different parties?  Most states have the primary/caucus on the same day for both parties, but some of them have it on different days.