How might the GOP primary change if IRV was used?

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

It's all such a huge blob of candidates that we might see winners with about 15% of the vote. How would this change if IRV was in place?

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

I was bored, so here's a fairly simple yet not far fetched scenario for Iowa under IRV (assumes Ehrlich doesn't run):

Iowa Results (1st choice)

Walker: 14%
Cruz: 11.1%
Bush: 10%
Rubio: 9.4%
Huckabee: 9.1%
Carson: 7.6%
Trump: 6.9%
Paul: 6%
Santorum: 4.9%
Jindal: 4%
Kasich: 3.6%
Perry: 3.5%
Christie: 3.4%
Graham: 3%
Fiorina: 2%
Gilmore: 1.1%
Pataki: 0.4%

So, first we eliminate Pataki. His voters have Christie as their 2nd choice.

Walker: 14%
Cruz: 11.1%
Bush: 10%
Rubio: 9.4%
Huckabee: 9.1%
Carson: 7.6%
Trump: 6.9%
Paul: 6%
Santorum: 4.9%
Jindal: 4%
Christie: 3.8%
Kasich: 3.6%
Perry: 3.5%
Graham: 3%
Fiorina: 2%
Gilmore: 1.1%

Gilmore is the next to go. His voters have Jindal as their 2nd choice.

Walker: 14%
Cruz: 11.1%
Bush: 10%
Rubio: 9.4%
Huckabee: 9.1%
Carson: 7.6%
Trump: 6.9%
Paul: 6%
Jindal: 5.1%
Santorum: 4.9%
Christie: 3.8%
Kasich: 3.6%
Perry: 3.5%
Graham: 3%
Fiorina: 2%

Next is Fiorina. Her idiotic voters choose Trump as their 2nd choice.

Walker: 14%
Cruz: 11.1%
Bush: 10%
Rubio: 9.4%
Huckabee: 9.1%
Trump: 8.9%
Carson: 7.6%
Paul: 6%
Jindal: 5.1%
Santorum: 4.9%
Christie: 3.8%
Kasich: 3.6%
Perry: 3.5%
Graham: 3%

Next is Graham. His voters 2nd choices are evenly divided between Rubio (fellow immigration reform supporter) and Santorum (fellow "bomb everything" supporter)

Walker: 14%
Cruz: 11.1%
Rubio: 10.9%
Bush: 10%
Huckabee: 9.1%
Trump: 8.9%
Carson: 7.6%
Santorum: 6.4%
Paul: 6%
Jindal: 5.1%
Christie: 3.8%
Kasich: 3.6%
Perry: 3.5%

Say goodbye to Perry. His voters are split between Huckabee (2.5%) and Jindal (1%).

Walker: 14%
Huckabee: 11.6%
Cruz: 11.1%
Rubio: 10.9%
Bush: 10%
Trump: 8.9%
Carson: 7.6%
Santorum: 6.4%
Jindal: 6.1%
Paul: 6%
Christie: 3.8%
Kasich: 3.6%

Kasich is next. His voters are evenly divided between fellow moderates Bush and Christie.

Walker: 14%
Bush: 11.8%
Huckabee: 11.6%
Cruz: 11.1%
Rubio: 10.9%
Trump: 8.9%
Carson: 7.6%
Santorum: 6.4%
Jindal: 6.1%
Paul: 6%
Christie: 5.6%

Christie, despite receiving 2nd choice votes from Pataki and Kasich voters, is now eliminated. Some of his voters (3%) have no other preference and are removed from the tally. The other 2.6 choose Bush.

Bush: 14.4%
Walker: 14%
Huckabee: 11.6%
Cruz: 11.1%
Rubio: 10.9%
Trump: 8.9%
Carson: 7.6%
Santorum: 6.4%
Jindal: 6.1%
Paul: 6%
Exhausted: 3%

Majority = 48.5% (97/2)

Say goodbye to Paul - 1/4 of his voters choose Rubio, the rest have no further preference.

Bush: 14.4%
Walker: 14%
Rubio: 12.9%
Huckabee: 11.6%
Cruz: 11.1%
Trump: 8.9%
Carson: 7.6%
Santorum: 6.4%
Jindal: 6.1%
Exhausted: 7%

Majority = 46.5% (93/2)

Jindal's voters are divided as follows:

Huckabee: 3%
Cruz: 2%
Santorum: 1.1%

------------

Huckabee: 14.6%
Bush: 14.4%
Walker: 14%
Cruz: 13.1%
Rubio: 12.9%
Trump: 8.9%
Carson: 7.6%
Santorum: 7.5%
Exhausted: 7%

Still no one near a majority. Say goodbye to Frothy! His voters are evenly divided between Walker, Cruz, and Huckabee.

Huckabee: 17.1%
Walker: 16.5%
Cruz: 15.6%
Bush: 14.4%
Rubio: 12.9%
Trump: 8.9%
Carson: 7.6%
Exhausted: 7%

Say goodbye to Carson! Half of his voters choose Trump, 25% choose Walker and 25% choose Huckabee.

Huckabee: 19%
Walker: 18.4%
Cruz: 15.6%
Bush: 14.4%
Rubio: 12.9%
Trump: 12.7%
Exhausted: 7%

Trump is finally eliminated. All of his voters have no further preference.

Huckabee: 19%
Walker: 18.4%
Cruz: 15.6%
Bush: 14.4%
Rubio: 12.9%
Exhausted: 19.7%

Majority = 40.2% (80.3/2)

Rubio's voters are divided between Bush (8%) and Walker (4.9%).

Walker: 23.3%
Bush: 22.4%
Huckabee: 19%
Cruz: 15.6%
Exhausted: 19.7%

Cruz voters are 75% Huckabee, 25% Walker.

Huckabee: 30.7%
Walker: 27.2%
Bush: 22.4%
Exhausted: 19.7%

At this point, most Bush voters don't care anymore, but some (4.5%) chose Walker.

The Final Results:

Walker: 31.7%
Huckabee: 30.7%
Exhausted: 37.6%

Majority = 31.2% (62.4/2)

So, it turns Walker's 3 point victory in the first choice votes to a 1 point victory in the final results under this scenario.

[Mr. Morden]

PPP often offers a full breakdown of second choices for supporters of all candidates in their primary polls, so you could use one of their most recent polls to do this exercise.  Of course, things will change drastically in the next six months, and several candidates will have dropped out by then, but this is just for fun anyway.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Thanks!

IRV would probably be a massive boon for the Repugs tbh. It would certainly decrease the nastiness between candidates if they all want to suck up preference deals; and eliminate a lot of the toxicity of the primaries.

(Of course, if I was in charge of reforming primaries I would have one enormous, largely simultaneous IRV primary. Much less mess, and end the ridiculous charade of pretending random States (Iowa?) are representative of America as a whole.)

[Mister Mets]

IRV would likely help Rubio and Walker, since both candidates are relatively well-known and liked by the party faithful. There is a cap on the voters willing to support Jeb Bush (and others), and voters will have limits on how many candidates they can remember to rank, so someone struggling to get four percent is unlikely to benefit because they don't have the name recognition.

[Leinad]

Rubio and Walker are appealing to both moderates and conservatives. No one else can really say that.

I'll do it based on the RCP average:

Jeb Bush - 16.3%
Scott Walker - 10.5%
Ben Carson - 9.8%
Marco Rubio - 9.3%
Mike Huckabee - 7.8%
Rand Paul - 7.3%
Donald Trump - 6.8%
Ted Cruz - 4.0%
Rick Perry - 3.8%
Chris Christie - 3.3%
Rick Santorum - 2.3%
Carly Fiorina - 2.0%
John Kasich - 1.5%
Bobby Jindal - 1.3%
Lindsey Graham - 1.3%

Graham's out. 0.5% to Jeb, 0.5% to Rubio, and 0.3% to Santorum.

Jeb Bush - 16.8%
Scott Walker - 10.5%
Ben Carson - 9.8%
Marco Rubio - 9.8%
Mike Huckabee - 7.8%
Rand Paul - 7.3%
Donald Trump - 6.8%
Ted Cruz - 4.0%
Rick Perry - 3.8%
Chris Christie - 3.3%
Rick Santorum - 2.6%
Carly Fiorina - 2.0%
John Kasich - 1.5%
Bobby Jindal - 1.3%

Jindal's out. Cruz gets 0.4%, while Huckabee, Santorum, and Perry each get 0.3%.

Jeb Bush - 16.8%
Scott Walker - 10.5%
Ben Carson - 9.8%
Marco Rubio - 9.8%
Mike Huckabee - 7.8%
Rand Paul - 7.3%
Donald Trump - 6.8%
Ted Cruz - 4.0%
Rick Perry - 3.8%
Chris Christie - 3.3%
Rick Santorum - 2.6%
Carly Fiorina - 2.0%
John Kasich - 1.5%

And there goes Kasich. 1.0% to Jeb, 0.5% to Christie.

Jeb Bush - 17.8%
Scott Walker - 10.5%
Ben Carson - 9.8%
Marco Rubio - 9.8%
Mike Huckabee - 7.8%
Rand Paul - 7.3%
Donald Trump - 6.8%
Ted Cruz - 4.0%
Rick Perry - 3.8%
Chris Christie - 3.8%
Rick Santorum - 2.6%
Carly Fiorina - 2.0%

Fiorina departs as well. Not sure where her votes go to, so I'll send 1.0% to the Donald and 0.1% to each and every other candidate.

Jeb Bush - 17.9%
Scott Walker - 10.6%
Ben Carson - 9.9%
Marco Rubio - 9.9%
Mike Huckabee - 7.9%
Rand Paul - 7.4%
Donald Trump - 6.9%
Ted Cruz - 4.1%
Rick Perry - 3.9%
Chris Christie - 3.9%
Rick Santorum - 2.7%

That's it for Santorum. 2.1% goes to Huck and 0.4% to each Cruz and Perry.

Jeb Bush - 17.9%
Scott Walker - 10.6%
Mike Huckabee - 10.0%
Ben Carson - 9.9%
Marco Rubio - 9.9%
Rand Paul - 7.4%
Donald Trump - 6.9%
Ted Cruz - 4.5%
Rick Perry - 4.3%
Chris Christie - 3.9%

Christie's out. I'll go ahead and give 3.5% to Jeb, and then 0.2% each to Walker and Rubio for people that just can't support a Bush trilogy.

Jeb Bush - 21.4%
Scott Walker - 10.8%
Marco Rubio - 10.1%
Mike Huckabee - 10.0%
Ben Carson - 9.9%
Rand Paul - 7.4%
Donald Trump - 6.9%
Ted Cruz - 4.5%
Rick Perry - 4.3%

End of Perry. 3.5% goes to fellow Texas conservative Ted Cruz, while the other 0.8% goes to fellow socially conservative Governor Huckabee.

Jeb Bush - 21.4%
Scott Walker - 10.8%
Mike Huckabee - 10.8%
Marco Rubio - 10.1%
Ben Carson - 9.9%
Ted Cruz - 8.0%
Rand Paul - 7.4%
Donald Trump - 6.9%

That's it for Trump! I'll give 1% each to Cruz, Rand, Carson, and Walker for being either anti-establishment or pro-business. The rest is exhausted.

Jeb Bush - 21.4%
Scott Walker - 11.8%
Ben Carson - 10.9%
Mike Huckabee - 10.8%
Marco Rubio - 10.1%
Ted Cruz - 9.0%
Rand Paul - 8.4%

Rand's out! ! Most of his ballots are exhausted. 2% to Cruz for the Tea Party connection (fellow wacko-birds, according to McCain), and 0.5% to Carson, Walker, and Rubio.

Jeb Bush - 21.4%
Scott Walker - 12.3%
Ben Carson - 11.4%
Ted Cruz - 11.0%
Mike Huckabee - 10.8%
Marco Rubio - 10.6%

That's it for Rubio! 3.5% each to Cruz, Bush, and Walker. The other 0.1% is exhausted.

Jeb Bush - 24.9%
Scott Walker - 15.8%
Ted Cruz - 14.5%
Ben Carson - 11.4%
Mike Huckabee - 10.8%

Huckabee's time has come to an end as well. 8% to Cruz, 2.5% to Carson, and 0.3% to Walker.

Jeb Bush - 24.9%
Ted Cruz - 22.5%
Scott Walker - 16.1%
Ben Carson - 13.9%

That's full time for Dr. Ben. 4% to Cruz, 4% to Walker, 1% to Jeb, the rest is exhausted.

Jeb Bush - 24.9%
Ted Cruz - 22.5%
Scott Walker - 16.1%

Well, Walker would obviously be the second-choice for everyone in that, but instead it would go to one of the others. Not sure how exactly that would split, although I'd guess Jeb would win.