2012 Republican Delegate Allocation: Colorado

This is the seventh in a multipart series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation by state.¹ The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2012 -- especially relative to 2008 -- in order to gauge the impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. As FHQ has argued in the past, this has often been cast as a black and white change. That the RNC has winner-take-all rules and the Democrats have proportional rules. Beyond that, the changes have been wrongly interpreted in a great many cases as having made a 180º change from straight winner-take-all to straight proportional rules in all pre-April 1 primary and caucus states. That is not the case. 

The new requirement has been adopted in a number of different ways across the states. Some have moved to a conditional system where winner-take-all allocation is dependent upon one candidate receiving 50% or more of the vote and others have responded by making just the usually small sliver of a state's delegate apportionment from the national party -- at-large delegates -- proportional as mandated by the party. Those are just two examples. There are other variations in between that also allow state parties to comply with the rules. FHQ has long argued that the effect of this change would be to lengthen the process. However, the extent of the changes from four years ago is not as great as has been interpreted and points to the spacing of the 2012 primary calendar -- and how that interacts with the ongoing campaign -- being a much larger factor in the accumulation of delegates (Again, especially relative to the 2008 calendar).

For links to the other states' plans see the Republican Delegate Selection Plans by State section in the left sidebar under the calendar.


COLORADO

As unique as the Nevada caucuses were -- in terms of being the rare binding caucus -- the Colorado caucuses represent a different atypical attribute. The rules behind most caucuses are within the domain of the state parties, but in Colorado -- and as we will see later today, Minnesota as well -- the basic structure of the presidential precinct caucuses is derived from state law. While that state law dictates the date (or dates) on which the caucuses can be held, who can participate and where caucuses can be held among other requirements, the state parties are not without influence over the process. The Colorado state parties just have slightly less control over every aspect of the process than most of the remaining caucus states.

On the Republican side, the Colorado Republican Party has some latitude in allocating the 36 delegates apportioned to it by the RNC. The four step caucus process starts with the precinct caucuses tonight -- the only event other than the state convention on one uniform date -- and moves through county assemblies (February 17-March 28) and then congressional district assemblies (March 29-April 13) before finishing at the state convention on April 14. Delegates are chosen in the precinct caucuses to move on to the county caucuses, and so on through the remaining steps of the process.

• 21 of the national convention delegates from those who have moved on to that step will be selected at the congressional district assemblies (3 delegates for each of Colorado's seven congressional districts). 
• 12 of the remaining 15 delegates -- the at-large delegates -- are chosen at the state convention from among the delegates who have been selected to attend the state convention. 
• The final three delegates are the Centennial state's automatic delegates (the state party chair, the national committeeman and the national committeewoman). 

A few notes on the delegate selection process in Colorado:

1. Technically, the delegates selected throughout the process and more importantly those selected to go to the Republican National Convention in Tampa are unbound to any candidate. 
2. However, and this is an important point that is not receiving much attention today, if a delegate has pledged support for a candidate, then that pledge is valid until the candidate to whom that delegate is pledged withdraws from the race, releases his or her delegates or is not nominated.² 
3. Not to repeat what we said in the post on Iowa delegate allocation, but there are no formalized rules for selecting delegates at the precinct level to move on to the county assemblies. In other words, the number of delegates moving out of any given precinct caucus, may be proportionate to the vote for the candidates, but it is not required. It may be that those county assembly slots go to the folks that hang around at the meeting the longest. [This is the part that causes so many to say that organization matters in caucuses. Being organized enough to contact and make sure that your supporters claim those spots is a big deal.]
4. Due to the above, as FHQ has said in the past, it is naive to think that there is no transference of presidential preference from one caucus step to the next. But for Colorado, as was the case in Iowa, there is no requirement that it be proportional or winner-take-all.
5. Finally, the whole process will be complete and delegates will be selected to go to the national convention by April 14. That is a fairly big deal when taken with the "National Delegate Intent Form". Though Colorado delegates are unbound, not all are likely to be unpledged. No, FHQ doesn't want to get mired in a discussion of semantic, but those two -- unbound and unpledged -- are terms that can and often are (accurately) used interchangeably. The only truly unbound delegates from Colorado are the three automatic delegates and those unpledged delegates who emerge from the congressional district conventions.

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¹ FHQ would say 50 part, but that doesn't count the territories and Washington, DC.

² The catch here is that delegate preference is not necessarily known the night of the precinct caucuses. Delegate candidates can chose to run pledged to a particular candidate or unpledged, but that preference has to be made official 13 days prior to either the congressional district assemblies (in the case of congressional district delegates) or the state convention (in the case of at-large delegates). The Colorado Republican Party keeps tabs on this by requiring each potential national convention delegate file a "National Delegate Intent Form".

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2012 Republican Delegate Allocation: Nevada

This is the sixth in a multipart series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation by state.¹ The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2012 -- especially relative to 2008 -- in order to gauge the impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. As FHQ has argued in the past, this has often been cast as a black and white change. That the RNC has winner-take-all rules and the Democrats have proportional rules. Beyond that, the changes have been wrongly interpreted in a great many cases as having made a 180º change from straight winner-take-all to straight proportional rules in all pre-April 1 primary and caucus states. That is not the case. 

The new requirement has been adopted in a number of different ways across the states. Some have moved to a conditional system where winner-take-all allocation is dependent upon one candidate receiving 50% or more of the vote and others have responded by making just the usually small sliver of a state's delegate apportionment from the national party -- at-large delegates -- proportional as mandated by the party. Those are just two examples. There are other variations in between that also allow state parties to comply with the rules. FHQ has long argued that the effect of this change would be to lengthen the process. However, the extent of the changes from four years ago is not as great as has been interpreted and points to the spacing of the 2012 primary calendar -- and how that interacts with the ongoing campaign -- being a much larger factor in the accumulation of delegates (Again, especially relative to the 2008 calendar).

For links to the other states' plans see the Republican Delegate Selection Plans by State section in the left sidebar under the calendar.


NEVADA

FHQ has been fond of saying that the rules in the January and February primary and caucus states are no different in 2012 than they were in 2008. But we always say that in the context of the winner-take-all/proportional discussion. On that front, the statement is true, but in terms of the overall delegate selection rules, there is one state with one significant rules change: Nevada. No, the Nevada caucuses are still proportional as they were in 2008. For 2012, however, the Nevada Republican Party altered the binding mechanism within the Silver state caucuses. Instead of the Nevada Republicans being allocated based on what transpires at the state convention, delegates coming out of the state will now be bound to candidates based on the results of the precinct caucuses on Saturday night (February 4). [The ultimate delegate allocation will be proportional based on the precinct caucus vote.]

The reason for the change is twofold:
1) First of all, the first step of the caucus process in Nevada is binding and not non-binding like the vast majority of other caucus states. What will happen Saturday night, then, is not simply a straw poll vote on top of electing delegates to move on to the next step of the process. That is unique among this group of January and February caucus states (and the other caucus states too). The Nevada GOP made the decision last year as a means of drawing candidates into the state; something that did not happen in 2008 when the Nevada caucuses shared the same date as the South Carolina primary.² Of course, when that change was made Nevada was supposed to have been the third contest on the calendar. Florida's move into January and the subsequent Nevada spat with New Hampshire for calendar positions pushed Nevada back to the fifth slot just four days after Florida. That's a small window of time, but the candidates are out there this week, though they are splitting time there with time in the February 7 caucus states (Colorado and Minnesota).

2) The second reason for the move is not being talked about, but is fairly obvious. The early stage binding of the delegates is a means to an end. It heads off the problems that beset the Nevada caucus process in 2008: that Ron Paul delegates essentially derailed the convention and forced the State Executive Committee to select the delegates. By binding delegates based on the results of the precinct caucuses, the party heads off at least some of that problem (...though Ron Paul delegates will still make it through to the next stage).

But of course, there are some worries about whether the Nevada GOP can improve on their 2008 performance.

What does all of this mean for Saturday night? Well, the Nevada caucuses will be more than the straw polls we have witnessed in Iowa and will witness in most other caucus states. The results are binding -- more like a primary -- and unlike, again, most other caucus states, where the delegates will go to the convention unbound, the Nevada Republican delegates will be bound. This includes not only the at-large and congressional district delegates, but the automatic delegates as well (all 28 total Nevada delegates).

[NOTE: Nevada's Republican caucuses are closed to only registered Republicans. The final day to register prior to the caucuses was January 20.]

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¹ FHQ would say 50 part, but that doesn't count the territories and Washington, DC.

² Incidentally, that Las Vegas Review-Journal article was the link the Nevada Republican Party provided on its own website to explain the shift. That was true until just last month when all caucus-related links on the party's page got automatically sent to the new 2012 caucus site. Anyway, if it was good enough for the party before...

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2012 Republican Delegate Allocation: Florida

This is the fifth in a multipart series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation by state.¹ The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2012 -- especially relative to 2008 -- in order to gauge the impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. As FHQ has argued in the past, this has often been cast as a black and white change. That the RNC has winner-take-all rules and the Democrats have proportional rules. Beyond that, the changes have been wrongly interpreted in a great many cases as having made a 180º change from straight winner-take-all to straight proportional rules in all pre-April 1 primary and caucus states. That is not the case. 

The new requirement has been adopted in a number of different ways across the states. Some have moved to a conditional system where winner-take-all allocation is dependent upon one candidate receiving 50% or more of the vote and others have responded by making just the usually small sliver of a state's delegate apportionment from the national party -- at-large delegates -- proportional as mandated by the party. Those are just two examples. There are other variations in between that also allow state parties to comply with the rules. FHQ has long argued that the effect of this change would be to lengthen the process. However, the extent of the changes from four years ago is not as great as has been interpreted and points to the spacing of the 2012 primary calendar -- and how that interacts with the ongoing campaign -- being a much larger factor in the accumulation of delegates (Again, especially relative to the 2008 calendar).

For links to the other states' plans see the Republican Delegate Selection Plans by State section in the left sidebar under the calendar.


FLORIDA


Why, or perhaps more appropriately how, is the Florida Republican presidential primary winner-take-all?

FHQ has been meaning to address this for a while now, so here goes.

Under normal circumstances -- those where the state of Florida actually follows the timing rules set by the two national parties -- Florida Republicans would allocate their delegates in much the same way that South Carolina did earlier in the cycle. Unpenalized, Florida would have allocated 81 delegates (three in each of the Sunshine state's 27 congressional districts) winner-take-all based on which candidate won each congressional district. The remaining 15 at-large delegates would have been allocated, well, those delegates would have been allocated based on the statewide results.² The rules indicate that those at-large delegates would have been allocated winner-take-all, but in this alternate universe, where Florida is actually obeying the rules, winner-take-all allocation would have been in violation of the RNC rules if the contest was held prior to April 1.

But, of course, Florida jumped into the territory of the "carve out" states and lost half of its delegation in the process. On September 30, when the Presidential Preference Primary Date Selection Committee chose to place the Florida primary back on January 31 -- where it started the year based on the state law passed in 2007 that was altered creating the above committee in 2011 -- it set in motion everything  witnessed in the time since. Sure, most of us were paying attention to where Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina would end up on the calendar after the Florida move, but in the meantime the RNC finalized plans to strip the Sunshine state of half of its delegates.

It was that move -- the official sanction -- that triggered the change to a straight winner-take-all allocation of the Florida delegates. [The same rule was triggered in 2008.] According to the final, unmarked paragraph in the Republican Party of Florida delegate selection rules, if the RNC fails to seat a full delegation from Florida, all the remaining delegates are designated at-large.³ That, in turn, meant that all 50 delegates would be winner-take-all based on the statewide vote as described in paragraph B of Rule 10. And that is in violation of rule 15b.2 that requires states holding contests prior to April 1 allocate delegates proportionally. [See definition of proportional here.]

In response to a second Florida violation, the RNC was quite limited in what the delegate selection rules allowed as far as further sanctions were concerned. Digging deep down into RNC rule 16e, all of the non-compliant states -- including Florida -- lost all three of their automatic delegates (rule 16e.1) and were further penalized, losing prime convention floor seating and hotel assignments as well as VIP passes (rule 16e.3). The only stone left unturned when the RNC once again confirmed these penalties at its winter meeting in New Orleans just after the New Hampshire primary was rule 16e.2, the rule that gave the RNC the latitude to further decrease a violating state's delegation.

No further sanctions are coming from the national party, but that doesn't mean that the saga is complete. Well, let me restate that: No further changes for Florida are coming from the national party unless the delegate selection process as currently laid out in the Sunshine state is contested by a registered, Republican residing, in this case, in Florida (Rule 22). Discussions of this sort of challenge have been going on since November and have continued recently. The recent Miami Herald account indicates that such challenges are supposedly to be adjudicated in May sometime.

...and as Marc Caputo at the Herald pointed out, that will likely occur after the nomination has been wrapped up.

As of now, however -- when it counts on Tuesday -- Florida Republicans will allocate their 50 delegates winner-take-all based on the statewide vote in a closed primary. But sure, IF things are still competitive then, it could be a real mess.

FHQ would advise not betting on that.

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¹ FHQ would say 50 part, but that doesn't count the territories and Washington, DC.

² The three automatic delegates would have given the Republican Party of Florida 99 total delegates.

³ The following is Rule 10 of the Republican Party of Florida rules. It covers the party's method of delegate selection.
Republican Party of Florida Delegate Selection Rules: Rule 10

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Are you following FHQ on Twitter, Google+ and Facebook? Click on the links to join in.

2012 Republican Delegate Allocation: Maine

This is the fourth in a multipart series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation by state.¹ The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2012 -- especially relative to 2008 -- in order to gauge the impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. As FHQ has argued in the past, this has often been cast as a black and white change. That the RNC has winner-take-all rules and the Democrats have proportional rules. Beyond that, the changes have been wrongly interpreted in a great many cases as having made a 180º change from straight winner-take-all to straight proportional rules in all pre-April 1 primary and caucus states. That is not the case. 

The new requirement has been adopted in a number of different ways across the states. Some have moved to a conditional system where winner-take-all allocation is dependent upon one candidate receiving 50% or more of the vote and others have responded by making just the usually small sliver of a state's delegate apportionment from the national party -- at-large delegates -- proportional as mandated by the party. Those are just two examples. There are other variations in between that also allow state parties to comply with the rules. FHQ has long argued that the effect of this change would be to lengthen the process. However, the extent of the changes from four years ago is not as great as has been interpreted and points to the spacing of the 2012 primary calendar -- and how that interacts with the ongoing campaign -- being a much larger factor in the accumulation of delegates (Again, especially relative to the 2008 calendar).

For links to the other states' plans see the Republican Delegate Selection Plans by State section in the left sidebar under the calendar.


MAINE

With Maine Republicans kicking off their 2012 caucusing this afternoon, it may be appropriate for FHQ to step in and offer a glimpse at the delegate selection rules in the Pine Tree state.

In terms of scheduling, the Maine Republican Party provided municipalities with a window of time -- February 4-11 -- in which to hold municipal-level caucuses. A majority of the 97 municipalities were able to comply, but 22 caucuses will fall outside of that window. Eighteen of those 22 will fall between January 28 and February 3 while the remaining four will occur after the February 11 when the presidential straw poll results from the February 11 or before caucuses will be made public. As FHQ detailed a day ago, those four post-window caucus sites have opted not to participate in the straw poll. Maine Republican Party Executive Director Mike Quatrano informed FHQ that the party felt as if the 93 caucuses on or before February 11 would accurately reflect the opinions of Republican caucusgoers across the state. That is probably true. In any event, those first 93 caucuses will be the only ones with votes tabulated as part of the state party's results release on February 11.

In light of local caucus times, what impact will that municipal-level caucusing have on the allocation of the 24 Maine delegates? As was the case in Iowa, a presidential preference straw poll vote will be taken and delegates will be selected to move on to the net step of the caucus process -- the May 5-6 state convention. Also like the January 3 Iowa caucuses, the 24 delegates chosen at the May convention will go to the Republican National Convention in Tampa unbound. In other words, neither the municipal caucuses nor the state convention will have any direct impact on the preferences of the delegates representing the state at the national convention. Now, as FHQ has argued, it is naive to think that there is no transference of presidential preference from one step of the caucus process to the next. That is why it is incumbent on the campaigns to be organized in caucus states; to ensure that caucusgoers sympathetic to your campaign progress through the process. From a campaign perspective, the goal, then, is to maximize the number of those 24 delegates that are yours.

For those tracking the delegate count in this Republican nomination race, February 11 will mean very little. Well, the May state convention will mean very little, too, in that the results will in no way impact the binding of delegates. Each delegate will head to Tampa free to choose whomever they please.

[Note to news organizations: Do not attempt to allocate the Maine delegates proportionally based on the results released on February 11. That would be both inaccurate and misleading. The straw poll will be an indicator of support for a candidate or candidates and will be a feather in their caps, but will not add to anyone's delegate total.]

Thus far, FHQ has compared the Maine process with the process witnessed in Iowa a few weeks ago. One noteworthy difference between the two contests is that in Maine the caucuses are semi-closed to any person outside of the Republican Party.² Potential caucusgoers, if challenged, have to take an oath that they are Republicans. It is not clear how frequently challenges are issued, but there is a mechanism whereby registration is verified.

This process is no different than the one utilized four years ago by the Maine Republican Party.

For more see the Maine Republican Party caucus information page.

UPDATE: Of the 24 delegates Maine was apportioned by the RNC...

• ...15 delegates are at-large and chosen (ultimately uncommitted) at the state convention on the weekend of May 5-6.
• ...6 delegates are congressional district delegates chosen at congressional district caucuses held in conjunction with the May state convention.
• ...3 delegates are automatic, but two of those have already endorsed Mitt Romney.

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¹ FHQ would say 50 part, but that doesn't count the territories and Washington, DC.

² Both unregistered and unenrolled voters can participate in the caucuses. Unregistered and unenrolled voters can both register to vote in the caucuses and enroll with the Republican Party. An unenrolled but registered voter may opt to enroll with the Republican Party and participate immediately. One can change enrollment -- from Democrat to Republican or vice versa -- but there is a 15 day waiting period before being able to participate (see Maine Code Title 21-A, Section 144).

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A Follow Up on South Carolina Republican Delegate Allocation

Iowa...New Hampshire...on to South Carolina.

FHQ has fielded several questions over the last several days on how exactly the South Carolina Republican Party will allocate its apportioned delegates to the Republican National Convention in Tampa following the sanctions that cut the Palmetto state delegation in half. We have already covered what the South Carolina Republican Party rules have to say on the matter -- exempt from the new proportionality requirement and winner-take-all statewide and by congressional district -- but that does not give us any clear indication of how the process would work once the penalty has been levied against the state delegation.

FHQ exchanged emails with South Carolina Republican Party Executive Director Matt Moore earlier this week, and he confirmed that the party would use the same rules it used in 2008 under similar circumstances. Instead of having 50 total delegates with 26 at-large delegates allocated winner-take-all based on the statewide vote and an additional 21 delegates (3 delegates per each congressional district) allocated winner-take-all according to the vote on the congressional district level, the formula will reduce by nearly half the those totals while remaining winner-take-all.

Here's how it works:

• The three national delegates -- to which the SCGOP rules do not refer -- are eliminated in any state violating the RNC rules on presidential primary timing. The SCGOP chair and both the Republican National committeeman and committeewoman will still go to the convention but will not have voting powers on the floor.
• Instead of apportioning 3 delegates per congressional district, under the penalties, the South Carolina Republican Party will allot each district two delegates. That reduces the number of congressional district delegates from 21 to 14 -- a reduction of only one-third.
• The statewide at-large delegate total will bear the brunt of the penalty; decreasing from 26 delegates to just 11. That is a penalty of more than half of the original total of at-large delegates. The winner of the statewide vote -- whether by plurality or majority -- will be allocated all 11 delegates.

Again, this was the same method of delegate allocation that the SCGOP used following the penalties imposed when the state party moved the Palmetto state presidential primary into January in 2008. The result was that John McCain won 18 of the available 24 delegates -- 12 for the statewide win while splitting evenly the six congressional district votes with Mike Huckabee for the remaining 6 delegates. A narrow win (~4%) in 2008 netted McCain a 3:1 advantage in the delegate count coming out of the state. The statewide at-large delegates make the difference.

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Republican Delegate Allocation Rules: 2012 vs. 2008

Let the questions be answered.

The RNC released yesterday the final piece of the puzzle in terms of how delegates will be allocated in the race for the Republican presidential nomination.¹ Now, FHQ has been saying all along that, theoretically, the changes to the delegate selection rules would not affect states and subsequently the candidates and their efforts to win more delegates all that much. Again, theoretically. At issue has been whether a state had to in some way abandon either straight winner-take-all delegate allocation or a hybrid system with winner-take-all allocation of at-large (base and bonus) delegates and congressional district delegates for a more proportional method in states with contests before April 1. Some change was inevitable, but because the rules change was treated as black and white -- that Republican winner-take-all states now had to be proportional before April 1 -- the impact of the change has been consistently overstated.

Well, now the unknown is known and we can examine just how much of a change has occurred in state delegate selection rules relative to 2008. Since so many states shifted back the dates on which their primaries and caucuses will be held in 2012, the number of straight winner-take-all states -- those that allocate all of their delegates based on the statewide vote -- was fairly limited. Florida, Arizona, Vermont and Virginia were forced to depart from their past method of allocation. [Of course, already penalized for holding contests before the first Tuesday in March, both Florida and Arizona opted to continue with straight winner-take-all rules under the rationale that they could not be penalized further.] Still other states had winner-take-all allocation but had that split up between the at-large delegates and the congressional district delegates. That latter group of states had in place a set of rules that were already fit for a change. The straight winner-take-all states had a much greater move to make.

With that said, though, what have states done to comply with the new rules on delegate allocation? More importantly, what could states do to comply? Let's take the second question first. There are two main responses that states could have made to most easily comply with the new RNC rules.

One option is to simply keep the same old winner-take-all rules -- straight or hybrid -- and make winner-take-all allocation dependent upon one candidate clearing the 50% mark in the statewide vote. If no candidate reaches that level, the allocation is proportional. But even that has been interpreted to widely varying degrees. For a straight winner-take-all state like Virginia, they could have put in that threshold and moved on. However, for a hybrid winner-take-all state like Ohio, where the winner-take-all allocation is based on votes both statewide and within the congressional district, that sort of threshold was only necessary -- according to the RNC rules -- on the at-large (base and bonus) delegates based on the statewide vote.

The second option is for states to either just switch to straight proportional allocation or to shift to allocating the at-large (base and bonus) delegates proportionally, leaving the congressional district delegates to be allocated winner-take-all. FHQ has always operated under the assumption -- let's call it an unofficial hypothesis -- that state parties would do whatever is necessary to comply with these sorts rules changes, but make the least amount of change possible. That is why I say it is harder for a straight winner-take-all state than a state that already has the allocation split into statewide and congressional district votes. There are easier outs for the latter simply because they can stay relatively close to what they had previously than a straight winner-take-all state. Regardless, either type of state could, at a minimum, make the allocation of the at-large (base and bonus) delegates proportional and be done. At the opposite end of the spectrum, states could just make everything proportional and break with a winner-take-all past.

Fine, so what have the states done?

Well, in looking at the table below, FHQ has a few observations. The first, and perhaps the biggest, is that the states on the calendar through February have made no changes to their delegate allocation from 2008. They were already compliant with the 2008 method or were penalized for an early primary or caucus date and stuck with the 2008 rules knowing the RNC would not punish them further (...or daring the national party to do so). There is a chance, then, that if this nomination race resolves itself quickly, the rules changes will have no impact. Well, the new winner-take-all/proportional rules will not have had an impact. The new calendar restrictions -- no states before the first Tuesday in March other than the exempt states -- will play a bigger role in that scenario.

If, however, the race stretches into March, that is when we may start seeing the winner-take-all/proportional changes influence the race. Looking at the March states and matching 2012 to 2008, the most frequent response to the rules changes was for states to tack on a conditional element to their allocation rules. Ohio, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Vermont and Virginia -- all Super Tuesday states -- added a conditional element to their allocation rules. Winner-take-all allocation is dependent upon a candidate receiving over 50% of the vote, statewide and/or on the congressional district level.² This is an important point. That 50% threshold is really going to play a role if the field has been winnowed down to just two candidates. Actually, FHQ has made this point before: The fewer candidates there are, the more likely it is that someone breaks 50% of the vote, and subsequently takes all the delegates in any of these conditional states. Those January/February states become very important. In fact, that lull throughout much of February may be a killer for any candidate clinging to just a modicum of viability at that point. Voters will start limiting their choices to those who are most likely to win and if the likes of Bachmann and Santorum and whoever are not already out, that stretch will be very difficult to survive through.

Obviously, in a scenario where there is a Clinton/Obama-type struggle for the 2012 Republican nomination, these rules are going to matter. But if Romney wins Iowa and wins where he is "supposed to" after that, the former Massachusetts governor will win the nomination and the rules won't play that much of a role. Looking at both the changes to the calendar and the changes the states have made, I can see something in the middle of those two extremes being most likely. The early contests get split, but it favors Romney, the February dead period puts significant strain on the candidates trying to stay in the race but without the resources to make it happen, and Romney breaks 50% in some of these conditional winner-take-all states on March 6. That would put a significant amount of pressure on any other candidates from a delegate math perspective. At that point, it becomes a matter of making up the delegate deficit for any non-Romney candidate. Some later winner-take-all contests would theoretically help, but there are very few straight winner-take-all states to completely shut out Romney as the calendar enters April. There are a handful, but likely not enough.

The bottom line is that there are no changes to the rules up front. Those start kicking in in March. But at that point, it could be too late for those changes to make any difference. If anything, history tells us that the nomination will wrap up sooner rather than later (...and that has been true in strictly proportional Democratic races with similar calendars). The question now is how long will this race last? The race needs to last long enough for the rules to kick in, which will, in turn, draw the race out even further. That is not how people have been thinking about this. Instead, the standard thought is that the new rules will prolong the process.

Now the process just has to get to a point where those rules would matter. We shall see.

2008 vs. 2012 Republican Delegate Allocation
January
State	Total Delegates	District Delegates	Base Delegates	Bonus Delegates	Automatic Delegates	2012 Rules1	2008 Rules2
IA	28	12	10	3	3	Caucus3	Caucus
NH	12	--	--	--	--	Prop.	Prop.
SC	25	--	--	--	--	WTA/CD	WTA/CD
FL	50	--	--	--	--	WTA	WTA
February
State	Total Delegates	District Delegates	Base Delegates	Bonus Delegates	Automatic Delegates	2012 Rules1	2008 Rules2
NV	28	12	10	3	3	Prop.	Prop.
CO	36	21	10	2	3	Caucus	Caucus
MN	40	24	10	3	3	Caucus	Caucus
ME	24	6	10	5	3	Caucus	Caucus
AZ	29	--	--	--	--	WTA	WTA
MI	30	--	--	--	--	WTA/CD--Prop./at-large	WTA/CD--Prop./at-large
March
State	Total Delegates	District Delegates	Base Delegates	Bonus Delegates	Automatic Delegates	2012 Rules1	2008 Rules2
WA	43	30	10	--	3	Caucus	WTA/CD--Prop./at-large
AK	27	3	10	11	3	Prop.	Prop.
GA	76	42	10	21	3	Top 2/CD--Prop./at-large	WTA/CD
ID	32	6	10	13	3	Caucus (80% Prop.)	Prop.
MA	41	27	10	1	3	Prop.	Prop.
ND	28	3	10	12	3	Caucus	Caucus
OH	66	48	10	5	3	Conditional WTA/at-large--WTA/CD	WTA/CD
OK	43	15	10	15	3	Conditional WTA	WTA/CD
TN	58	27	10	18	3	Conditional WTA*	Conditional WTA
VT	17	3	10	1	3	Conditional WTA/at-large--WTA/CD	WTA
VA	49	33	10	3	3	Conditional WTA/at-large--WTA/CD	WTA
VI	9	--	6	-	3	Caucus	Caucus
WY	29	3	10	13	3	Prop./CD--Convention/at-large	Prop./CD--Convention/at-large
KS	40	12	10	15	3	WTA/CD--Prop./at-large	WTA/CD
AL	50	21	10	16	3	Conditional WTA	Conditional WTA
AS	9	--	6	--	3	Caucus	Caucus
HI	20	6	10	1	3	Caucus	Caucus
MS	40	12	10	15	3	Prop.	Conditional WTA
MO	52	24	10	15	3	Caucus	WTA
PR	23		10	10	3	Caucus	Caucus
IL	69	54	10	2	3	Loophole	Loophole
LA	46	18	10	15	3	Caucus/CD--Prop./at-large	Caucus/CD--Prop./at-large
April
State	Total Delegates	District Delegates	Base Delegates	Bonus Delegates	Automatic Delegates	2012 Rules1	2008 Rules2
MD	37	24	10	--	3	WTA/CD	WTA/CD
TX	155	108	10	34	3	Prop.	Conditional WTA
DC	19	--	10	6	3	WTA	WTA
WI	42	24	10	5	3	WTA/CD	WTA/CD
CT	28	15	10	--	3	Conditional WTA/at-large--WTA/CD	WTA
DE	17	3	10	1	3	WTA	WTA
NY	95	81	10	1	3	Conditional WTA/at-large--Top 2/CD	WTA
PA	72	54	10	5	3	Loophole	Loophole
RI	19	6	10	--	3	Prop.	Prop.
May
State	Total Delegates	District Delegates	Base Delegates	Bonus Delegates	Automatic Delegates	2012 Rules1	2008 Rules2
IN	46	27	10	6	3	WTA/CD	WTA/CD
NC	55	39	10	3	3	Prop.	Prop.
WV	31	9	10	9	3	Loophole	WTA/CD--caucus
NE	35	9	10	13	3	Convention	Convention
OR	28	15	10	--	3	Prop.	Prop.
AR	36	12	10	11	3	Conditional Prop.	Conditional Prop.
KY	45	18	10	14	3	Prop.	Prop.
June
State	Total Delegates	District Delegates	Base Delegates	Bonus Delegates	Automatic Delegates	2012 Rules1	2008 Rules2
CA	172	159	10	--	3	WTA/CD	WTA/CD
MT	26	3	10	10	3	Caucus	Convention
NJ	50	36	10	1	3	WTA	WTA
NM	23	9	10	1	3	Prop.	Prop.
SD	28	3	10	12	3	Prop.	Prop.
UT	40	12	10	15	3	WTA	WTA
No Date
State	Total Delegates	District Delegates	Base Delegates	Bonus Delegates	Automatic Delegates	2012 Rules1	2008 Rules2
GU	9	--	6	--	3	Caucus	Caucus
MP	9	--	6	--	3	Caucus	Caucus
1 Source: Republican National Committee Counsel's Office 2 Source: The Green Papers 3 Key: WTA = winner-take-all; WTA/CD = winner-take-all by congressional district and statewide; conditional WTA = winner-take-all if candidate clears 50%, proportional otherwise; top 2 = top two candidates all allocated delegates if no candidate receives a majority; prop. = proportional; caucus = caucus; convention = convention; loophole = delegates directly elected (on primary ballot)

NOTE: FHQ should note that this RNC release is not a death knell for our examination of the state-by-state rules. The above is a 30,000 foot view of the process, but there is still a lot under the hood that is worth talking about in greater detail. That obviously could not be forced into on giant post. Continue to be on the lookout for that in the coming weeks under the 2012 Republican Delegate Allocation series label.

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¹ Below is the summary of delegate allocation from the Republican National Committee:
2012 RNC Delegate Summary

² Tennessee has a higher 66% threshold. It will be very difficult to a candidate to get to that mark in a multicandidate field.

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2012 Republican Delegate Allocation: South Carolina

This is the third in a multipart series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation by state.¹ The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2012 -- especially relative to 2008 -- in order to gauge the impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. As FHQ has argued in the past, this has often been cast as a black and white change. That the RNC has winner-take-all rules and the Democrats have proportional rules. Beyond that, the changes have been wrongly interpreted in a great many cases as having made a 180º change from straight winner-take-all to straight proportional rules in all pre-April 1 primary and caucus states. That is not the case. 

The new requirement has been adopted in a number of different ways across the states. Some have moved to a conditional system where winner-take-all allocation is dependent upon one candidate receiving 50% or more of the vote and others have responded by making just the usually small sliver of a state's delegate apportionment from the national party -- at-large delegates -- proportional as mandated by the party. Those are just two examples. There are other variations in between that also allow state parties to comply with the rules. FHQ has long argued that the effect of this change would be to lengthen the process. However, the extent of the changes from four years ago is not as great as has been interpreted and points to the spacing of the 2012 primary calendar -- and how that interacts with the ongoing campaign -- being a much larger factor in the accumulation of delegates (Again, especially relative to the 2008 calendar).

For links to the other states' plans see the Republican Delegate Selection Plans by State section in the left sidebar under the calendar.


SOUTH CAROLINA

[NOTE: See also our additional examination of the post-sanctions delegate allocation in South Carolina.]

One note that FHQ has failed to mention to this point in the series is that there is a subsection to Rule 15 in the Rules of the Republican Party that not only carves out an early -- February, in theory -- position for Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina, but it also exempts those four states from the proportionality requirement to which every other state is party. That exemption means very little in Iowa and New Hampshire as FHQ has shown, but in South Carolina, the rule is of great consequence in light of state party rules on the matter of allocation (see Rule 11.b).

The South Carolina Republican Party, by rule, allocates its national convention delegates on a winner-take-all basis by congressional district and statewide. Unlike some subsequent states FHQ will examine soon, however, South Carolina -- because of that exemption -- will not have to set a minimum threshold (50% of the vote or greater) by which winner-take-all allocation is triggered. If a candidate wins the statewide vote by one vote (with, say, 20% of the vote) that candidate is entitled to all of the at-large delegates (26 delegates before the 50% penalty for hold a primary before February). The same holds true for votes on the congressional district level (3 delegates per 7 congressional districts; 21 in total before the 50% penalty). Note also that there is no minimum vote percentage floor required to win delegates. That said, it is unlikely in a slightly (to greatly) winnowed field post-Iowa/New Hampshire that a candidate will win South Carolina with less than 30% of the vote. Both John McCain and Mike Huckabee cleared that threshold in 2008 in a very narrow victory for McCain. That isn't to say such an outcome cannot happen, but it isn't, perhaps, likely.

Through the first three contests, then, there is no change in the allocation rules in 2012 versus 2008. The sequence is the same, the spacing between contests is similar -- albeit without a Michigan primary between New Hampshire and South Carolina -- and the rules are the same. The only difference -- potentially -- are the dynamics of the race.

That may or may not change with the next state on the list: Florida. Things may get quirky with the Sunshine state.

Delegate allocation score: 0 [No change from 2008.]
Cumulative allocation score: 0 [No change through three contests from 2008.]

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¹ FHQ would say 50 part, but that doesn't count the territories or account for the fact that there is no public information on Republican delegate selection in some states at this point.

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2012 Republican Delegate Allocation: New Hampshire

This is the second in a multipart series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation by state.¹ The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2012 -- especially relative to 2008 -- in order to gauge the impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. As FHQ has argued in the past, this has often been cast as a black and white change. That the RNC has winner-take-all rules and the Democrats have proportional rules. Beyond that, the changes have been wrongly interpreted in a great many cases as having made a 180º change from straight winner-take-all to straight proportional rules in all pre-April 1 primary and caucus states. That is not the case. 


The new requirement has been adopted in a number of different ways across the states. Some have moved to a conditional system where winner-take-all allocation is dependent upon one candidate receiving 50% or more of the vote and others have responded by making just the usually small sliver of a state's delegate apportionment from the national party -- at-large delegates -- proportional as mandated by the party. Those are just two examples. There are other variations in between that also allow state parties to comply with the rules. FHQ has long argued that the effect of this change would be to lengthen the process. However, the extent of the changes from four years ago is not as great as has been interpreted and points to the spacing of the 2012 primary calendar -- and how that interacts with the ongoing campaign -- being a much larger factor in the accumulation of delegates (Again, especially relative to the 2008 calendar).


For links to the other states' plans see the Republican Delegate Selection Plans by State section in the left sidebar under the calendar.


NEW HAMPSHIRE

Who thought New Hampshire Secretary of State Bill Gardner's only job was to, well, depending on who you ask, either set the date of the presidential primary in Granite state or tear a hole in the space/time continuum by ruining the calendar every four years? Obviously, any secretary of state has additional duties, but the secretary of state in New Hampshire has a role to play in the allocation of delegates to the national presidential nominating conventions as well. In some states that allocation method is set by the state parties and in others it is set by state law.

Now, FHQ doesn't want to get into a broad discussion of this, but the state party has the ultimate say in how its delegates are allocated to the candidates for the national convention. Where state law governs this process, it is usually done with the blessing of the state parties. Court challenges on this sort of political matter typically are settled in favor of the party. The nominating function is after all a party function. Most often where these conflicts arise is over the issue of who can participate in primaries (opened or closed).² Rarely have we seen this come up in the area of primary dates or delegate allocation, but that could theoretically happen as well if a state party wanted to bring a challenge to court.

Needless to say, New Hampshire is one of those states where the allocation method is codified in the New Hampshire revised statutes. The law -- RSA 659:93 -- grants the secretary of state the power to:

"...apportion delegates to the national party conventions among the candidates voted for at the presidential primary by determining the proportion of the number of votes cast for each presidential candidate to the total votes cast for all presidential candidates of the same political party, rounded to the nearest whole number."

Furthermore, the law sets a minimum percentage of the vote whereby candidates qualify for delegates (10%).

With the penalty for holding a contest prior to February, New Hampshire's total delegation will be only 12 delegates, so there won't be a whole lot to go around. Regardless, like Iowa, there have been no changes to the allocation method on the Republican side in New Hampshire. The proportional method that is in place was in place in 2008 and stretching all the way back to at least the 1984 cycle (The last revision to the law was in 1981.). The new Republican National Committee rules regarding delegate selection, then, had no effect on New Hampshire. The Granite state was proportional already.


Delegate allocation score: 0 [No change from 2008.]
Cumulative allocation score: 0 [No change through two contests from 2008.]

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¹ FHQ would say 50 part, but that doesn't count the territories or account for the fact that there is no public information on Republican delegate selection in some states at this point.

² The precedent for this is the Tashjian case in which Connecticut state law restricted primary participation to partisans only. The Connecticut Republican Party challenged that law, wanting to add independents to the mix and won based on a parties right to freedom of association under the first amendment.

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