The Delegate Fight: 2016

[Mr. Morden]

Erc, what is the %age of all Republican delegates who will go into the convention unbound?  According to Upshot here:

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/02/27/upshot/republican-delegate-calculator-how-trump-can-win.html

it's 7%.  Does that sound right to you?  I assume that that consists of the delegates from states that don't hold preference votes like CO/ND/WY, plus the 3 party leaders from each state?  What about the delegates in states that directly elect their delegates, like Illinois?  Are they bound by the presidential preference they list on the ballot?

[Mr. Morden]

So are you basically in agreement with this guy on Twitter in terms of how you allocate the Republican delegates from each state?

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cch5Rr6WEAEoxh7.jpg:large

[Mr. Morden]

What happens with Carson's delegates when he endorses TRUMP? Do they go to TRUMP?

Nope. Candidates do not have control over their delegates in that fashion.

At the moment, it seems that his 6 delegates in Iowa and Virginia will be bound to him on the first ballot (Virginia is far less certain than Iowa).

In Nevada, he has two delegates, which he can choose to release entirely, or reallocate them 1 to Trump and 1 to Rubio.

None of these delegates are actually chosen by the Carson camp, so Carson will presumably have very little influence over any delegates he releases.

Are there any states where Rubio has delegates, where he'd lose them on the first ballot if he drops out of the race this week?  I'm thinking that he may want to "sort of drop out but not really", by ceasing to campaign but keeping his delegates in hand in order have leverage over forcing a contested convention down the road, should that opportunity arise.  If "suspending his campaign" would result in his delegates in certain states becoming free agents, then maybe he'll figure out a way to suspend his campaign without legally calling it that.

[Mr. Morden]

In the words of the immortal John Oliver, "How is this still a thing?"

How did he manage to become immortal?

[Mr. Morden]

Another delegate question:

Illinois (R): March 15

Overview
69 Delegates (2.79% of total)
Open Primary
15 At-Large (Winner Take All)
54 District (directly elected)

Delegate Allocation and Selection

A presidential preference poll is on the ballot; the winner of this poll wins all 15 At-Large delegates.  12 of these are chosen at the State Convention on May 22.

Additionally, voters directly vote for 3 delegates running for a slot within their CD; the delegate candidates have their Presidential preference listed on the ballot.  All current candidates have a complete slate of delegates.  The top three delegate vote-getters in each CD get their ticket punched to Cleveland.  Voters are not obliged to vote for delegates who match the candidate they voted for in the preference poll.  Often, there are some personally popular delegate candidates who can get elected on the strength of their name alone (e.g. in 2008, Dennis Hastert, a Romney delegate, was elected in his CD despite a McCain win there in the preference poll).

In the 2012 results here on Atlas:

https://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?year=2012&fips=17&f=1&off=0&elect=2

it says that in the 2012 GOP primary results in Illinois, there were 15 delegates "unallocated".  Is that a mistake?  Or does the delegate allocation process allow such a large number of unallocated delegates in Illinois?  (Were these district level delegates that expressed no presidential preference on the ballot?)  Would we be likely to see a repeat of that this time, or are the rules now different?

[Mr. Morden]

In 2012, there was a beauty contest, but it was ignored. In 2016, it will be used to pledge the statewide delegates. It appears that the delegate ballot will be down-ballot following senatorial and congressional nominations. Some voters will likely skip the delegate ballot.

If stereotypes are valid, this may hurt Trump. The Cruz campaign has probably done a better job of targeting supporters, and will make sure they understand the ballot. If Trump relies more on a mass appeal, it may be difficult to communicate the nuances.

Do we have any numbers from either 2008 or 2012 as to how many voters voted in the beauty contest but didn't vote in the delegate election (or didn't vote for a full slate of delegates)?

[Mr. Morden]

A typical Republican voter in a heavily Democratic district in Chicago is not a typical voter.  If it is a black district, they might be among the few black Republicans. If they are white, they might be living in a safe highrise (this might be an advantage for Kasich or Rubio). But Kasich doesn't have a full set of delegates. In IL-4 (the Hispanic, earmuffs district) there might be some residual white working class Republicans, who might vote for Trump. Since all Puerto Ricans are US citizens, this might be an advantage for Rubio or Cruz, except most voters are Democrats.

Where is Kasich missing delegates?  Looking at this list, I see 3 Kasich delegate candidates per district in every district.

[Mr. Morden]

I know you probably haven't thought this far ahead, yet, but is New York WTA or how are they divided up?

Bushie, Erc has already explained the delegate allocation rules for every state on the GOP side, yet you keep asking these questions.  Just go to the print version of this thread (so you can see everything on one page):

https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?action=printpage;topic=226605.0

and then search for whichever state you're interested in, and you'll find your answer for whichever state you care about.

[Mr. Morden]

Per request, posted my current projections for the remaining states on the tumblr.

Reposting them here.  Comments and critiques are very welcome.

So, based on how you worded some of your post, e.g.:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

it looks like what you’re calculating here is not just a prediction for the number of delegates that would be pledged to each candidate, but their pledged delegates *plus* the unpledged delegates who are likely to vote for them on the first ballot.  I'd actually be more interested in seeing those kept as separate categories (pledged delegates in one category, and unpledged but likely to vote for X, or maybe even already endorsed, in another category).

This might be too large a project for us, but can we put together a categorization of all of the unpledged delegates: In a scenario where the outcome on the first ballot would be in doubt, how many have already endorsed someone, how many are strong leaners towards one candidate or the other, how many do we have no clue about, etc.?  Many delegates haven't even been chosen yet, but enough have that we could potentially keep track of this in the different categories, and get some sort of feeling for how many pledged delegates Trump would need before he's within "striking distance" with the unpledged delegates.  Even if exact numbers are a big mystery, any sort of rough idea on the number for each category would be interesting.

[Mr. Morden]

There are a few exceptions to this.

New Hampshire (4 delegates): They are released if he is not a candidate before the convention; that said, Kasich picked these delegates and they may still vote for him anyway.

Vermont (8 delegates): These are released if he doesn't have his name placed into nomination.  These delegates are chosen by the State Convention on May 21, so Kasich doesn't necessarily have their loyalty.

Indiana, Montana, and South Dakota: In the event Kasich wins any delegates in these states (would require winning the state outright in the latter two cases, or any CDs in the former), they will also be released before the first ballot.

Isn’t Rule 40 actually kind of a problem for Cruz then?  Here’s my logic:

I’m assuming that Cruz’s strategy is to win on the second ballot.  Winning on the first ballot seems like it’ll most likely be impossible for him, since there are enough Kasich and Rubio delegates who are pledged to vote for them on the first ballot regardless of whether their names are placed into nomination or not.  As you said, those delegates will vote for Kasich or Rubio, and the Secretary of the Convention just won’t tally their votes.  But that’s OK for Cruz.  His goal on the first ballot is just to make sure that Trump doesn’t get a majority.  A delegate voting for Kasich or Rubio is just as good as one voting for Cruz in terms of denying Trump a majority.

So then, Cruz should be happy to see delegates pledged to Kasich and Rubio on the first ballot.  If any of them become free agents, then some could defect to Trump, and it could be enough to get him to 1237.  Therefore, if Rule 40 means that Kasich delegates in IN or VT (or Rubio delegates in other states) get released and can vote for anyone, then Cruz has some additional delegates who he needs to worry about—who he needs to make sure don’t vote for Trump.

[Mr. Morden]

Master Delegate Spreadsheet

I've started a viewable delegate spreadsheet, which features live updates of:

1) Summary delegate chart on the front page.

2) A list of all 2472 delegates

3) Trump Tetris

4) RNC Delegate Map

It can be found here.  Hope this helps!

Very cool Erc.  Just one extra thing that I was thinking of that would be useful: In another post you just made, about how Cruz loyalists controlled the delegate selection in states like MN and OK, that kind of thing would give us a clue as to who some of the "uncommitted" might actually support, right?

That is, as I understand it, you count 155 delegates (so far) not pledged to any candidate, but 33 of them have endorsed one of the candidates, so that leaves 122 for whom we're nominally uncertain about their loyalties.  But can you break down which of them were chosen in states where the delegate selection was controlled by Cruz loyalists (or loyalists of some other candidate)?  Do we have that kind of info, to help us decode the likely loyalty of those 122 delegates?

[Mr. Morden]

Cruz wins this on the second, or at worst, third, ballot, unless Trump can scrape over the finish line on the first ballot.  And I sincerely doubt Cruz would let him do that, even if the resulting tactics would lead to riots.

Sorry, can you explain what you mean by the sentence I bolded above?  You sincerely doubt Cruz would let Trump do what?  Win narrowly on the first ballot?  How does Cruz stop him from doing so if he has the numbers?  Use the "nuclear option" of changing the rules so that all the delegates are unbound on the first ballot, or something like that?

[Mr. Morden]

Cruz wins this on the second, or at worst, third, ballot, unless Trump can scrape over the finish line on the first ballot.  And I sincerely doubt Cruz would let him do that, even if the resulting tactics would lead to riots.

Sorry, can you explain what you mean by the sentence I bolded above?  You sincerely doubt Cruz would let Trump do what?  Win narrowly on the first ballot?  How does Cruz stop him from doing so if he has the numbers?  Use the "nuclear option" of changing the rules so that all the delegates are unbound on the first ballot, or something like that?

Yeah, I honestly think Cruz uses the nuclear option if necessary, and he knows he has the support of 1400 delegates or so.

Even if he has the support of that many delegates in terms of who their preferred candidate is, is he really going to have the support of that many delegates in favor of engaging in highly controversial procedural shenanigans like the "nuclear option"?  I am skeptical.  Even among the delegates who support him, won't there be plenty of people who are not really diehard Cruz-istas, but are instead just people who like Cruz the best among the remaining field?  People who will do their own thing on procedural votes?

[Mr. Morden]

Erc, do the #s in this WaPo article sound plausible to you?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/cruz-likely-to-block-trump-on-a-second-ballot-at-the-gop-convention/2016/04/13/6553e724-00bc-11e6-9d36-33d198ea26c5_story.html

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[Mr. Morden]

This story talks about Cruz's organizational advantage in California, and wonders if Trump is actually going to have a full delegate slate there (or for that matter, Kasich):

https://www.yahoo.com/news/unconventional-no-1-the-gops-veep-problem-183429119.html

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[Mr. Morden]

So Erc, now that a new batch of Rubio delegates are being declared free agents on the first ballot, what's the latest estimate of the total number of delegates at the convention who are likely to be unpledged on the first ballot?

[Mr. Morden]

OK, so sounds like we're looking at about 7% of all the delegates being free agents on the first ballot.

[Mr. Morden]

The Cruz campaign claims that their Pennsylvania delegate operation is so good that they're going to get more than half the delegates even if he comes in a distant third in the popular vote:

link

OTOH, this story paints a rather different picture:

http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2016-election/trump-s-new-delegate-strategy-takes-root-pennsylvania-n558681

[Mr. Morden]

On the Pennsylvania delegate battle:

http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/277077-gop-reps-boosting-trumps-insider-game-in-pennsylvania

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[Mr. Morden]

So, regarding the loyalties of all those delegate candidates in Pennsylvania.  The Cruz campaign is apparently handing out lists of their preferred delegate candidates at Cruz rallies, and will have people across the state handing out the list at polling places on Tuesday.  Supposedly, this is the list:



The Trump campaign is following suit.  Here’s a Trumpian list:

http://www.kellerfordelegate.com/#!know-your-delegates/s4vv7

There are other lists out there trying to establish delegate loyalties, but they don’t all agree with each other.  Examples:

http://www.mcall.com/news/local/elections/mc-pa-republican-delegates-presidential-picks-20160420-story.html
http://www.hannity.com/articles/election-493995/pennsylvania-primary-delegate-guide-14631159/
http://triblive.com/politics/politicalheadlines/10253036-74/district-whoever-wins

I guess we’ll have to wait and see on Tuesday if either candidate manages to get their people elected, or if the voters just pick the first three names on the ballot or something.

[Mr. Morden]

PA TL;DR:

Trump: 20
District Winner: 18
Uncommitted: 12
Cruz: 3
Kasich: 1

Of those "District Winners," Trump will obviously win most of them; PA-7 seems the one he's most likely to lose at the moment.

So if this holds up....of the ~180 delegates who will be unbound on the first ballot, do you have a revised estimate as to how many would likely vote for Trump on the first ballot?

[Mr. Morden]

PA TL;DR:

Trump: 20
District Winner: 18
Uncommitted: 12
Cruz: 3
Kasich: 1

Of those "District Winners," Trump will obviously win most of them; PA-7 seems the one he's most likely to lose at the moment.

So if this holds up....of the ~180 delegates who will be unbound on the first ballot, do you have a revised estimate as to how many would likely vote for Trump on the first ballot?

Whatever he gets in PA, plus 4.  (So, around 39 total.)

Of the remainder, some could be convinced (some of the 12 remaining PA uncommitted, probably a couple in ND and LA and some insular folks); any more than around 20 gets difficult unless he's already winning the nomination.

Last week you said:

Absolute maximum is probably around 75, most of them from PA.

So that's what you'd still be guessing today?  If the unbound delegates hold the balance of power, then probably only ~40-50 will vote for Trump, with the possibility of it going up to ~75 in the best case for Trump?

[Mr. Morden]

So if Trump clinches on the 1st ballot but Cruz has a majority on the floor in Cleveland, Cruz effectively gets to set the 2020 delegate rules, right?  And he would obviously consider himself the next-in-line for the nomination.  So look for Texas to have 750 delegates awarded WTA to the statewide winner in 2020, while the all of the Northeast states combined get to elect 200 formally unpledged delegates at conventions, with convention meetings to be held from 1-7 am on a Monday morning in the least populous county in each state?

In the primary yesterday, Democrats received 66.4% of the vote in  Rhode Island; 66.0% in Maryland; 60.7% in Connecticut; 57.7% in Delaware; and 51.5% in Pennsylvania.

Why should any of the states other than Pennsylvania have any delegates?

Because presumably having GOP operations helps in those states even though they're not winning the presidency. Republicans have won statewide office in all of those other states, but if you cut them out of the process of nominating the president, it's hard to imagine they wouldn't feel at least somewhat demoralized and cast adrift. I don't disagree that solid Democratic states (in a presidential sense) shouldn't have as much of a say, but by that token, neither should solid Republican ones, if their goal is to win. They should be pitching their nominee to who performs best in swing states.

But a primary electorate is different from a general election electorate.  The winner of a primary election in Ohio isn't inherently more electable nationally than a primary winner in Illinois, for example.

Also, electability isn't the only thing that matters.  In the exit polls, we're seeing voters favor many other qualities over electability.  Shouldn't a Democrat or Republican living anywhere in the country have a reasonably equal say, if possible, in expressing their preference for their party's nominee, based on whatever criteria they like?

[Mr. Morden]

Right now it seems like allocation is roughly weighted more in favor of safe Republican states.

Well..."weighted more in favor of safe Republican states".  The existing allocation formula is rather screwy, sure, but I should note that if you allocated the delegates to make the electoral power per primary voter equal, you would in fact have more delegates in more Republican states, since there are more Republicans there.  Makes sense that Florida gets more delegates than New York, even though they have similar population.  There are more Republican voters in Florida.  And the reverse for the Dems.  More Dem. voters in New York, so more delegates there for the Dems makes sense.

And actually, the much bigger discrepancy comes with respect to how delegates are allocated within states.  At least the Dems allocate different numbers of delegates to different congressional districts, based on party strength in the CD.  Most of the states on the Republican side give three delegates to every CD, even if there are a tiny number of Republican voters there.  This means that Republicans living in heavily Democratic CDs have vastly more power than those living in Republican CDs.  Harry Enten talks about that here:

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/trumps-right-that-the-gop-primary-is-unfair-it-favors-him/

[Mr. Morden]

It continues to amaze me that Trump pulled off 3/4ths of the PA unpledged delegates.  He's still getting creamed in that type of contest everywhere else.

I'm not sure what you mean by "that type of contest".  The PA unpledged delegates were directly elected by the voters, whereas all of these other events involve selection by "party insiders".  Seems pretty clear why Trump did better in the former than the latter.