2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: NEW JERSEY

This is part fifty-one of a series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation rules by state. The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2016 -- especially relative to 2012 -- in order to gauge the potential impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. For this cycle the RNC recalibrated its rules, cutting the proportionality window in half (March 1-14), but tightening its definition of proportionality as well. While those alterations will trigger subtle changes in reaction at the state level, other rules changes -- particularly the new binding requirement placed on state parties -- will be more noticeable. 

NEW JERSEY

Election type: primary
Date: June 7
Number of delegates: 51 [12 at-large, 36 congressional district, 3 automatic]
Allocation method: winner-take-all
Threshold to qualify for delegates: n/a
2012: winner-take-all primary

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Changes since 2012
Like California, New Jersey abandoned its February primary in 2012 for a cheaper, consolidated primary in early June. And like California, New Jersey will carry over the same rules from 2012 to 2016. The primary will fall on the Tuesday after the first Monday in June, the delegates will be directly elected on the primary ballot and the allocation will be winner-take-all based on the statewide results in the primary.


Thresholds
The winner-take-all method New Jersey Republicans utilize means there are no thresholds to qualify for delegates. The winner must have just one more vote than the runner-up to claim all 51 delegates.


Delegate allocation (at-large, congressional district and automatic delegates)
Not to belabor the point, but the plurality winner of the statewide vote is awarded all of the delegates in the Garden state according to New Jersey Republican Party rule 5(B)(3):

Note also, that the three automatic/party delegates are included in that allocation. Contrary to the majority of states, New Jersey Republicans did not have to make any adjustments to their previous formula in the aftermath of the RNC general counsels' office guidance on how automatic are to be allocated in instances where their allocation is/was not clear in state party rules.


Binding
As opposed to the ballots in some other states where delegates are directly elected -- Pennsylvania and West Virginia come to mind -- voters have a much easier time voting for their preferred candidate and the delegates on the ballot aligned with them. In fact, the candidates' names appear at the top of the ballot and their respective slates (of delegates) are listed immediately below. That ballot proximity -- delegates to candidates -- makes it much less likely that any ballot roll-off will occur and/or that delegates/delegate slates of another candidate would win.

Rule 6 of the New Jersey Republican Party rules for delegate selection and allocation bind all 51 delegates to the statewide primary winner for the first ballot. That is always true unless the winner declines to participate in the national convention or "makes known publicly" that he or she is no longer in the running for the nomination, then the delegates are unbound and free to choose whomever in the voting at the convention.

That is a more expansive view of the method by which delegates are released. There is no language about suspension or withdrawal. If not for the fact that New Jersey has such a late primary and that a presumptive nominee has already emerged, then the Garden state would appear to have a low bar for the release of delegates similar to those in Louisiana and Michigan.


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State allocation rules are archived here.


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2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: MONTANA

About those bound delegates

2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: CALIFORNIA

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2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: MONTANA

This is part fifty of a series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation rules by state. The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2016 -- especially relative to 2012 -- in order to gauge the potential impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. For this cycle the RNC recalibrated its rules, cutting the proportionality window in half (March 1-14), but tightening its definition of proportionality as well. While those alterations will trigger subtle changes in reaction at the state level, other rules changes -- particularly the new binding requirement placed on state parties -- will be more noticeable. 

MONTANA

Election type: primary
Date: June 7
Number of delegates: 27 [21 at-large, 3 congressional district, 3 automatic]
Allocation method: winner-take-all
Threshold to qualify for delegates: n/a
2012: non-binding primary/convention

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Changes since 2012
Little is different on the surface in Montana in 2016 as compared to the 2012 cycle. The primary in the Treasure state will still bring up the rear of the primary calendar on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in June as usual. However, unlike past cycles, the primary will carry more weight. As was the case in Nebraska, the state party in Montana dropped its formerly non-binding/advisory primary in order to comply with the new binding requirements added to the RNC rules during and after 2012.

Montana Republicans traditionally have sent an unbound delegation to the Republican National Convention, but to continue doing that while essentially ignoring the results of the primary would have run afoul of changes made to Rule 16(a)(1). Under the new rule for 2016, any statewide preference vote -- whether via primary or caucuses -- binds the delegates to the national convention in a manner to be chosen by the state party.

And in this case, Montana Republicans chose a route similar to the one in Nebraska: all delegates will be bound to the statewide primary winner. That is made all the simpler by the fact that with only one congressional district, Montana Republicans had no options at their disposal in terms of splitting the allocation between statewide and congressional district results. They are one in the same.


Thresholds
Since the Montana Republican Party has opted to hold a winner-take-all primary for their 27 delegates, there is no threshold of voter support a candidate must meet in order to qualify for delegates.


Delegate allocation (at-large, congressional district and automatic delegates)
All 27 delegates, regardless of distinction, are allocated to the winner of the June 7 primary under Montana Republican Party bylaws (Section III.F.3). While only a plurality is required to claim all of the delegates, the late date of the Montana primary and the fact that the field has winnowed (and a presumptive nominee has emerged) likely means that the winner will take more than a majority of the vote.


Binding
Delegates selected at the May 14 State Delegate Convention are bound to the winner of the June 7 primary through the first ballot at the national convention. That binding is contingent upon the Montana primary winner having his or her name placed in nomination. If that does not occur, then the  27 delegates are unbound on the first ballot. However, and again, given the late primary date and a field narrowed down to the presumptive nominee, it is likely that the Montana primary winner will have his or her name put in nomination. Stated differently, the presumptive nominee is likely to win the Montana primary. That presumptive nominee will have his or her name on the roll call ballot at the national convention.


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State allocation rules are archived here.


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2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: WEST VIRGINIA

This is part forty-six of a series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation rules by state. The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2016 -- especially relative to 2012 -- in order to gauge the potential impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. For this cycle the RNC recalibrated its rules, cutting the proportionality window in half (March 1-14), but tightening its definition of proportionality as well. While those alterations will trigger subtle changes in reaction at the state level, other rules changes -- particularly the new binding requirement placed on state parties -- will be more noticeable. 

WEST VIRGINIA

Election type: primary
Date: May 10
Number of delegates: 34 [22 at-large, 9 congressional district, 3 automatic]
Allocation method: loophole primary/winner-take-all
Threshold to qualify for delegates: n/a
2012: loophole primary

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Changes since 2012
The basic structure of the West Virginia Republican method of allocating, selecting and binding delegates to the 2016 Republican National Convention is the same as it was in 2012. The real election is still for the delegate candidates -- both at-large and in each of the three congressional districts -- directly elected on the primary ballot. In that way, the Mountain state is like Illinois (congressional district) before it. Delegate candidates file (or are filed by one of the presidential campaigns) to run for one of the 31 vacant delegate slots. Like Illinois, those delegate candidates are listed on the ballot with the presidential candidate's name (or uncommitted) next to theirs, and if elected are bound to that candidate at the convention.

Unlike the system out west in the Land of Lincoln, though, West Virginia Republicans elect both congressional district delegates and delegates at-large. The full allotment of at-large and congressional district delegates, then, is selected through direct election and bound based on any candidate affiliation made when the delegate candidates filed to run.

One other difference the West Virginia delegate selection process has with the one Illinois Republicans use is based on a rules change the WVGOP instituted for the 2016 cycle. The crux of the change is that the at-large delegates are not all that at-large anymore; at least not in the way that they have been in the past. For the 2016 cycle, those at-large delegates have been districtized or rather more appropriately countyized.

Let me explain. At-large delegates are delegates that are intended to be the top however many votegetters statewide in any selection process, whether primary or caucus/convention. Every voter votes on those positions. In a truly at-large system, that can result in an overly homogenized outcome. And that homogeneity tends to benefit some majority faction. In turn, that means that some geographic/regional, racial or political minority is disadvantaged in the process. Those groups end up not being represented in the government positions or delegate slots being filled.

Having a mixed system with both an at-large component and a congressional district element, as West Virginia Republicans have traditionally had, can overcome that problem. Can being the operative word. Those district delegates are supposed to ensure that there is at least some representation on the national convention delegation from all corners of the state. However, in West Virginia, there are only a handful of congressional district delegates -- nine across three districts -- and that does not always serve as a counterweight to the more than twice as many at-large delegates.

If, for instance, there are nine delegates from across the state and then 22 others elected statewide but predominantly from one populous area of the state, then the ultimate delegation is potentially lacking in diversity.¹ This seems to have been the case with West Virginia delegations to past Republican National Conventions. More populous areas were simply overly represented on the delegation. In some respects, that is supposed to be the case, but the needle was pushed more toward a delegation predominantly made up of delegates from only a few concentrated areas.

By adding a new rule for 2016, the West Virginia Republican Party has attempted to better calibrate the representativeness of its delegation. New for this cycle, then, are restrictions on the selection of at-large delegates. There will be a fuller discussion of the exact nature of the effect of these changes below, but suffice it to say, those restrictions are intended to bring about a more regionally balanced West Virginia delegation.


Thresholds
As the delegates are directly elected in West Virginia, there are no thresholds that a candidate must reach in order to qualify for delegates. For the presidential candidates, banking bound delegates is entirely dependent upon whether delegate candidates affiliated with them are elected.


Delegate allocation (at-large delegates)
Contrary to how the process has worked in the past, the selection/election and allocation of at-large delegates in West Virginia for 2016 is not truly at-large. There are a couple of restrictions the WVGOP has newly placed on the selection of at-large delegates:

1. After the top finisher -- the delegate candidate with the most votes statewide -- the top seven at-large finishers from each of the three congressional districts will win slots to the national convention.
2. Additionally, there can be no more than two at-large delegates from any one county with the exception, again, of the top at-large delegate candidate votegetter statewide.  

This has several implications. First, each congressional district will have at least seven delegates; ten if one counts the three congressional district delegates that are also being . One of the three will have eight (or 11) delegates as a bonus for having the top, unrestricted votegetter statewide hail from there. This ends up being far less "at-large" and a lot more districted. It is a move that is somewhat reminiscent of Missouri Republicans shifting a couple of at-large delegates to each of the eight congressional districts in the Show-Me state allocation process. Yet, the West Virginia maneuver more overly districtizes their plan relative to Missouri.

There are also campaign strategic ramifications from this change. Rather than having the freedom to quickly go into a state and assemble an unrestricted slate of delegates as campaigns have done in the past, 2016 campaigns have to be an order of magnitude more savvy about the process. There are additional hoops to jump through in terms of cobbling together a slate of delegate candidates who reside in areas more uniformly distributed across districts and without too many from one county. Without wide support across a state, then, a campaign has to rely on a deeper level of connection and organization within the state of West Virginia in order to put together a winning and ultimately eligible delegation.

Those campaigns that do not pay attention to detail run the risk of having delegate candidates win more votes than other candidates, but losing out to popular losers because of potential regional clustering. The slate is too concentrated in one area, in other words, and thus does not qualify even if individual candidates from it receive more votes. If one presidential candidate has nine delegate candidates from one county, for example, then only two (or three if one of them is the top statewide finisher) would be able to sit in the final delegation.²


Delegate allocation (congressional district delegates)
Unlike the selection and allocation of the at-large delegates, the choosing of the congressional district delegates is more simplistic. There are no restrictions placed on the selection of those delegates. The top three finishers in each district -- among the congressional district delegate candidates³ -- are the three delegates who will represent the district at the national convention.


Delegate allocation (automatic delegates)
Finally, as opposed to past years, the West Virginia presidential preference vote in the primary will actually mean something. However, the upgrade is a minor one at best. As has been the case in a number of other states, the historical pattern has been to leave the three automatic delegates each state has unbound. A change in the binding rules and a further interpretation of them by the RNC general counsel's office has required states will ambiguous rules (with respect to the allocation of those party delegates) to allocate and bind them based on the statewide results. In most cases, that means treating those automatic delegates as if they are at-large delegates.

In West Virginia's case, though, that is impossible. The at-large delegates are directly elected on the primary ballot. Those automatic delegates are not. In such a scenario -- and it is a unique on to West Virginia -- those delegates are to be allocated to the statewide winner.

The winner of the preference vote -- typically a beauty contest vote -- will be allocated all three party delegates to add on to however many other aligned delegates have been elected.


Binding
There is some dispute over this between the RNC and the WVGOP, but the delegates are bound to the winning candidate (automatic delegates) or to the presidential candidate with whom they affiliated when filing to run as a delegate candidate. That bond, according to the RNC holds until the delegate is released. This is not a new interpretation on the part of the RNC. West Virginia delegates were similarly treated in 2012 as well: bound until released. The state party may be trying to toe the line in terms of talking up their unbound delegation, but the RNC will be treating them as bound at the Cleveland convention (unless the rules, particularly Rule 16, are changed).


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State allocation rules are archived here.


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¹ Lacking and diversity are, of course, in the eye of the beholder in this case. One person's perception of diversity is another's conception of unfairness.

² Most of these problems have been rectified by the Trump campaign dipping into some uncommitted delegate reserves aligned with the campaign.

³ Bear in mind that there are still distinct pools of delegate candidates here. There remain at-large and congressional district delegate candidates despite the restrictions placed on the election of the at-large delegates.


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2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: NEBRASKA

2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: INDIANA

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2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: NEBRASKA

This is part forty-five of a series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation rules by state. The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2016 -- especially relative to 2012 -- in order to gauge the potential impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. For this cycle the RNC recalibrated its rules, cutting the proportionality window in half (March 1-14), but tightening its definition of proportionality as well. While those alterations will trigger subtle changes in reaction at the state level, other rules changes -- particularly the new binding requirement placed on state parties -- will be more noticeable. 

NEBRASKA

Election type: primary
Date: May 10
Number of delegates: 36 [24 at-large, 9 congressional district, 3 automatic]
Allocation method: winner-take-all
Threshold to qualify for delegates: n/a
2012: caucus/convention/beauty contest primary

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Changes since 2012
There have been a number of changes since 2012 to the method by which Nebraska Republicans will select, allocate and bind delegates for 2016. Changes in national party rules and in state law prompted most of the alterations that been made over the last four years.

First, the custom in Nebraska has been to hold a primary as called for by state law, but to make its results only advisory to the selection of Republican national convention delegates. In other words, the sequence was to hold a May primary and then a July state convention. At the latter event, the national convention delegates were chosen (with the early primary election having no direct influence).

However, that practice, or rather that sequence, is not consistent with the delegate selection rules that came out of the 2012 Republican National Convention in Tampa. Under the revised Rule 16(a)(1), delegates are to be allocated and bound based on any statewide vote. Nebraska Republicans were sending bound delegates to past national conventions, but selecting those delegates at an event -- the state convention -- that essentially ignored the primary results. The change made in Tampa was intended to tie the allocation and binding to the most participatory election in a state.

That change served as a catalyst to state parties like those in Colorado, North Dakota and Wyoming, each of which opted to skip presidential preference votes at the beginning stages of their caucus/convention processes. Those moves were made in an attempt to preserve a tradition of sending unbound delegations to the national convention. Nebraska, though, does not fit into that category. The local practice among Republicans in the Cornhusker state has always been to send a bound delegation to the national convention, but select, allocate and bind those delegates in one fell swoop at the state convention.

The problem for NEGOP in the lead up to 2016 was that to comply with the newly tweaked national party rules, the state party either had to completely opt out of the statewide primary in May or to tie the results of the preference vote in that election into the delegate allocation and binding process. As it turned out, state government basically forced the hand of the state party by changing state law to require state parties to have the delegate allocation reflect the vote in the primary.

It was those changes -- to national party rules and state law -- that pushed the Nebraska Republican Party transition from a beauty contest primary to a winner-take-all primary election. The delegates to the national convention will still be selected at the state convention, but will be allocated based on the May 10 primary.

It should additionally be noted that in order to complete the delegate selection process in time for the July national convention, the state convention in Nebraska had to be shifted from July to the weekend after the primary in May. The primary/state convention sequence is still in place, but the meaning of the two contests has transformed and the window between them has significantly shrunk since 2012.


Thresholds
The move to a winner-take-all primary means that there is no threshold either for qualifying for delegates to trigger a winner-take-all allocation. Very simply, the plurality winner statewide is entitled to an allocation of all 36 Nebraska delegates.


Delegate allocation (at-large, congressional district and automatic delegates)
Win the most votes statewide and win all of the delegates. The statewide winner takes them all.


Binding
Nebraska delegates by state party rule are bound for two ballots at the national convention. The only exception to that is if the winning candidate to whom the Nebraska delegation has been bound receives less than 35 percent of the vote on the first ballot. They would become unbound early if those conditions were met.

The selection process is different in 2016 than it has been in the past. Though not a part of the section of the state party constitution pertaining to the selection of national convention delegates (Article VII, Section 3), the new winner-take-all provision the Nebraska GOP is utilizing this cycle is an extension of the broad powers granted to the Nebraska Republican Party State Central Committee in that section. Article VII, Section 3(f) allows the NEGOP SCC to adopt any rules to implement Section 3 so long as they are consistent with the national party rules and state law.

FHQ mentions that because the addendum to the constitution that lays out the winner-take-all allocation method also has a bearing on the selection process. The last sentence of the lone paragraph of guidance on the 2016 allocation method reads:

Only candidates for National Convention Delegate and Alternate Delegate who have been pledged to the Presidential candidate who won the Nebraska Primary may be elected to the National Convention.

All other descriptions of the selection process included in the Rule 16(f) filing the Nebraska Republican Party submitted to the Republican National Committee are silent on this matter. However, the above clause is restrictive, limiting the pool of delegates to those pledged to the primary winner.

Of course, there is something of an out buried in all of this. Before 2016, national convention delegate candidates had the option of filing as pledged to a candidate or simply uncommitted.¹ That uncommitted option is gone for 2016. Instead, the form delegate candidates have to complete and submit to the state party require that candidate to either pledge to a particular candidate or to pledge to the winner of the primary. The latter is a kind of TBD -- to be determined -- option.

But what that means is that the winning candidate may or may not have delegates sympathetic to him or her at the national convention. A winning candidate having sincere delegates behind them long term at the convention is dependent upon how many of those delegates selected are specifically pledged to the winner. If they filed as Cruz or Kasich or Trump delegates, then yes, but if they filed as pledged to a winner to be determined later (via the primary), then they may not be as loyal.

The practical implication here is that if, say, Cruz wins the Nebraska primary, then the Trump and Kasich delegate candidates are sidelined. Only the Cruz and "pledged to the winner" delegate candidates would be eligible to be elected to one of the national convention delegate slots.

Again, regardless of that distinction, those 36 delegates are bound through at least one ballot and perhaps two if the Nebraska primary winner receives more than 35 percent on the the first vote.

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State allocation rules are archived here.


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¹ An uncommitted delegate elected at the state convention would attend the national convention unbound.


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2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: PENNSYLVANIA

This is part forty-two of a series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation rules by state. The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2016 -- especially relative to 2012 -- in order to gauge the potential impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. For this cycle the RNC recalibrated its rules, cutting the proportionality window in half (March 1-14), but tightening its definition of proportionality as well. While those alterations will trigger subtle changes in reaction at the state level, other rules changes -- particularly the new binding requirement placed on state parties -- will be more noticeable. 

PENNSYLVANIA

Election type: primary
Date: April 26 
Number of delegates: 71 [14 at-large, 54 congressional district, 3 automatic]
Allocation method: winner-take-all (at-large/automatic), directly elected (congressional district)
Threshold to qualify for delegates: n/a
2012: loophole primary

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Changes since 2012
Looking back over the post-reform era, Pennsylvania is the model of consistency. On the calendar, the Keystone state has rarely packed it up and moved away from its traditional fourth Tuesday in April primary position. And even then, the only break in the pattern was a shift to just the first Tuesday in April for the 2000 cycle. For delegate allocation/selection, Pennsylvania Republicans have always used some variation of the loophole primary method that allows delegates to be directly elected.

However, it is on that front -- delegate allocation/selection -- where Pennsylvania Republicans have made some changes since 2012. The primary date is still the same, and the bigger question was how many states would join Pennsylvania, rather than whether and where the primary in the commonwealth would be moved.¹ Yet, due to changes in the Republican National Committee delegate selection rules, Republican Party of Pennsylvania had to change business as usual for 2016.

The RNC -- or rather the delegates at the 2012 convention -- closed off many of the unbound delegate loopholes: eliminating non-binding caucuses and primaries. However, the national party allowed those states -- whether parties and/or governments -- to continue directly electing delegates and exempted any delegates that filed and ran as uncommitted delegates. If a delegate candidate in Illinois or West Virginia filed to run as a delegate aligned with Cruz or Kasich or Trump, then that delegate candidate from either of those states is bound to that candidate.

But Pennsylvania is different. The delegate candidates do not align with a campaign when filing and are uncommitted on the ballot. Directly elected congressional district delegates, then, are unbound. That is the same as it has always been in Pennsylvania, and the RNC change did not alter that.

What changed is the treatment of the similarly traditionally unbound at-large and automatic delegates. In the past, the at-large Pennsylvania delegates were selected by the PAGOP state central committee, but without regard for the vote in the primary election.² Furthermore, those delegates were to remain unbound as if the primary had only been advisory at best or a beauty contest at worst.

Of course, that practice was and is not consistent with the changes to the national Republican delegate rules 2016. The Republican Party of Pennsylvania could leave well enough alone with the congressional district delegates, but had to tether the selection and allocation of the at-large and automatic delegates to the results of the statewide primary. Instead of being unbound as in 2012 (and before), those 17 delegates will be allocated to the winner of the Pennsylvania primary in 2016.

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One other small change is that there were a handful of two and four delegate congressional districts in 2012 to go along with mostly three delegate districts. There is complete uniformity across districts in 2016. All 18 will have three delegate slots at stake.


Thresholds
As the congressional district delegates are directly elected and the at-large and automatic delegates are allocated to the winner of the primary statewide, there are no thresholds at play in the Pennsylvania primary.


Delegate allocation (at-large and automatic delegates)
The 71 delegates are not pooled in Pennsylvania, and as such, different delegates are allocated/treated differently. Pennsylvania, like Illinois, South Carolina, Wisconsin and others both separately allocates at-large and automatic delegates and awards them all to the statewide winner.


Delegate allocation (congressional district delegates)
While the Pennsylvania process has a winner-take-all element to it, the plan also contains a wholly unique method of selecting -- not allocating -- congressional district delegates. Unlike other loophole primary states, Pennsylvania delegate candidates have no official affiliation with a particular presidential candidate or their campaign. That is official in that there is no pledge process associated with filing to run as a delegate candidate. As the delegate candidates are running as uncommitted -- unofficially pledged to a candidate or not -- they are treated as unbound by the RNC as a result. The 54 unbound delegates on the line in the primary in the Keystone state represents the largest cache of unbound delegates in any state. In light of the very close chase for 1237 delegates, that means that the election of these delegates takes on an added level of importance.

It is important to note that, though delegate candidates can pledge to a presidential candidate, that in no way binds them to that candidate. And while they can change their minds if/once elected, those delegates tend to be loyal to the candidate to whom they have pledged (if they have pledged).


Binding
It is clear, then, that the majority of delegates -- nearly three-quarters of them -- are unbound coming out of the Pennsylvania primary. Those congressional district delegates would be free to shift alliances with candidates before the convention and before the first ballot vote at the convention. However, the remaining 17 delegates will be locked in and bound to the winner of the statewide primary for the first ballot at the convention according to Rule 8.3 of the Rules and Bylaws of the Republican Party of Pennsylvania. Should the first ballot prove inconclusive -- no candidate gets to the 1237 delegates needed -- then those 17 delegates would become unbound and join the remainder of the Pennsylvania delegation in that distinction.

The at-large delegates will be selected by the Pennsylvania Republican state central committee at a previously scheduled May 21 meeting.


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State allocation rules are archived here.


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¹ There was an effort to move the Pennsylvania primary from April to March that had the support of some Republicans in the state legislature, but that proposal faced opposition from both state parties and was basically dead on arrival in Harrisburg.

² That is not a fair characterization of the process really. Typically, the selection of the at-large delegates has been done after the point at which a presumptive nominee had emerged. That places less emphasis on ensuring that delegate candidates are either proportionally is disproportionately selected from various competing campaigns when the end result is that everyone will head to the national convention to vote for the eventual nominee. In truth, the Pennsylvania primary has tended to be on or after the point at which a presumptive nominee has emerged. That, in turn, increases the likelihood that the Pennsylvania winner is the presumptive nominee and takes the bulk of the delegate to the national convention anyway.


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2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: DELAWARE

This is part forty of a series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation rules by state. The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2016 -- especially relative to 2012 -- in order to gauge the potential impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. For this cycle the RNC recalibrated its rules, cutting the proportionality window in half (March 1-14), but tightening its definition of proportionality as well. While those alterations will trigger subtle changes in reaction at the state level, other rules changes -- particularly the new binding requirement placed on state parties -- will be more noticeable. 

DELAWARE

Election type: primary
Date: April 26 
Number of delegates: 16 [10 at-large, 3 congressional district, 3 automatic]
Allocation method: winner-take-all
Threshold to qualify for delegates: n/a
2012: winner-take-all primary

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Changes since 2012
The aim often in states with small delegations is to maximize the impact of a contest by using winner-take-all rules (rather than proportionally dividing up a small number of delegates). That had traditionally been the case during competitive Republican cycles with the primaries in Washington, DC as well as in Delaware. Republicans in the First state were able to continue that tradition in 2012 when Democrats in control of the state government moved the primary from early February to late April. The late April date fell outside of the proportionality window and allowed Delaware Republicans to allocate the full allotment of delegates to the winner.

That has been the way of things in Delaware stretching back to 1996 when the Delaware primary was created. It was winner-take-all in 2012 and will be again in 2016. That is a long way of saying that nothing has changed in Delaware for the 2016 cycle.

Well, one thing has changed. Rather than allocating 17 delegates as was the case four years ago, First state Republicans will only allocate 16 delegates to the winner of the April 26 primary.


Thresholds
As Delaware is a winner-take-all contest -- the fourth on the calendar and first since Arizona -- there are no thresholds to qualify for delegates.


Delegate allocation (at-large, congressional district and automatic delegates)
This, too, is easy enough to interpret. At a minimum, the plurality winner of the Delaware primary will be allocated all 16 of the national convention delegates apportioned to the state by the RNC.


Binding
According to Article XI, Section 3 of the the Delaware Republican Party bylaws:

"On the first ballot for the National Party's presidential candidate at the Republican National Convention, each delegate or alternate entitled to vote shall vote for the candidate who wins a plurality of the votes cast in the presidential primary..."

The only exception to that is in the event that the winning candidate in Delaware withdraws from the race prior to the convention and/or releases his or her delegates. In that case, the rules unbind the delegates, allowing them to vote for a candidate of their preference. However, given that the Delaware primary is on the back half of the calendar and the field of candidates has winnowed, it is less likely that the winner will relinquish his delegates prior to the first ballot vote.

A slate of 16 delegates is selected by the Delaware Republican Party Executive Committee, presented to and voted on by the state convention. Importantly, Article XI, Section 4 of the state party bylaws states that, "Presidential candidates shall not nominate or propose any delegates or alternate delegates."

As such, Delaware is another example of a state where the candidates and their campaigns have no direct influence over the delegate selection process. In fact, in Delaware, the candidates are at the mercy of the state party with respect to the selection process.


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State allocation rules are archived here.


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2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: ARIZONA

This is part thirty-five of a series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation rules by state. The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2016 -- especially relative to 2012 -- in order to gauge the potential impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. For this cycle the RNC recalibrated its rules, cutting the proportionality window in half (March 1-14), but tightening its definition of proportionality as well. While those alterations will trigger subtle changes in reaction at the state level, other rules changes -- particularly the new binding requirement placed on state parties -- will be more noticeable. 

ARIZONA

Election type: primary
Date: March 22 
Number of delegates: 58 [28 at-large, 27 congressional district, 3 automatic]
Allocation method: winner-take-all
Threshold to qualify for delegates: n/a
2012: winner-take-all primary

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Changes since 2012
Much of what has already been written about Florida applies to Arizona as well. Like the Republicans in the Sunshine state, the 2012 presidential preference election in Arizona was scheduled in a non-compliant position on the primary calendar. Like Florida, Arizona Republicans traditionally have allocated the delegates apportioned them by the Republican National Committee in a winner-take-all fashion and did so in 2012. And as was the case with Florida four years ago, Arizona, too, was guilty of violating the rules of the Republican Party twice; once based on the timing of the primary and again for allocating all of the Arizona delegates to the winner of the statewide primary before the March 31 close of the 2012 proportionality window.

The problem then from the perspective of the Republican National Committee was that the national party rules only equipped the party to penalize one of those two violations. Arizona lost half of its delegation for the timing violation, but the RNC had minimal tools at its disposal to prevent a winner-take-all allocation in the Grand Canyon state.

The RNC changed that dynamic for the 2016 cycle by upping the penalty for a timing violation and adding a 50% penalty for would-be rogue states seeking to deliver more than a (Republican Party definition of) proportional share delegates from within the proportionality window on the early part of the calendar.

Those changes from the national party level, though they were not finalized at the time, seem to have triggered a change in Arizona. In the spring of 2014, the state legislature there passed legislation (that was ultimately signed into law) shifting back the date of the 2016 Arizona primary. The move from a late February non-compliant position in 2012 to a late March slot for 2016 pushed the primary back far enough that it was not only rules-compliant but outside of the proportionality window. That, in turn, allowed the state party to continue with its traditional winner-take-all allocation formula.


Delegate allocation (at-large, congressional district and automatic delegates)
The shorter version of the above is that the Arizona primary is later in 2016 and the delegation is not penalized as a result. What is the same is the winner-take-all allocation of delegates. As has been the case with other winner-take-all states, the process is quite simple and stands in stark contrast to some of the complexities in the more proportional states.

There is not a lot to this. The candidate who wins the statewide primary -- regardless of whether that is with a majority or plurality of the vote -- wins all 58 delegates on the line in the Arizona primary.


Binding
Comparing the delegate allocation/selection process across states, some state parties defer more to state law than others. Some state parties, such as the New Hampshire Republican Party, opt into the guidance provided in state law on the timing of the primary, the filing of slates of delegates and the formula for allocating delegates to candidates based on the results of the primary. However, in other states -- South Carolina, for instance -- the only factor covered by state law is that the state picks up the tab for the primary. Everything else is set by the state party.

The Arizona process is closer to New Hampshire than South Carolina on that continuum. State law in the Grand Canyon state dictates much of the process. That includes the date of the primary, but also provides instruction on the allocation, obligation and release of delegates. The Arizona Republican Party defers to that guidance.

As such, the state party allocates delegates in a winner-take-all manner and binds those delegates to that candidate until he or she is nominated. There are, of course, exceptions as the winner in the Arizona primary is not necessarily the same candidate who will ultimately be nominated at the national convention.

If a candidate who has won in Arizona (and thus has been allocated all of the delegates) withdraws from the race and/or releases those delegates (before the convention), then they are freed from the bond and able to pledge to vote for a still-active candidate of their preference (and change that pledge thereafter if they so choose). Those delegates are unbound.

If the winner of the Arizona primary takes those bound delegates into the national convention, they are only bound to that candidate through the first roll call ballot.

That means that the selection process -- the part of this that fills the delegate slots allocated to the winner with actual human beings -- is important if the overall primary season has proven inconclusive in terms of identifying a presumptive nominee. Arizona is a state where the Republican Party does not require the submission of delegate slates/candidates by the presidential campaigns at any point in the process. Instead the campaigns (and not just the winning one) are forced to fight to fill as many of those delegate slots -- regardless of the binding -- with supporters in the district caucuses and at the state convention.

Arizona, then, files into that category of states where the candidates and their campaigns have a less direct influence over who their delegates are. That gives rise to the possibility that a delegate who supports one candidate may be bound to another for the first ballot at the national convention.


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State allocation rules are archived here.


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2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: OHIO

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2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: OHIO

Updated 3/23/16

This is part thirty-four of a series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation rules by state. The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2016 -- especially relative to 2012 -- in order to gauge the potential impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. For this cycle the RNC recalibrated its rules, cutting the proportionality window in half (March 1-14), but tightening its definition of proportionality as well. While those alterations will trigger subtle changes in reaction at the state level, other rules changes -- particularly the new binding requirement placed on state parties -- will be more noticeable. 

OHIO

Election type: primary
Date: March 15 
Number of delegates: 66 [15 at-large, 48 congressional district, 3 automatic]
Allocation method: winner-take-all
Threshold to qualify for delegates: n/a
2012: proportional primary

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Changes since 2012
There have been changes to both the date and allocation method used for the Ohio Republican primary in 2012 for the 2016 cycle. Unlike the winding path the North Carolina legislature took the primary and allocation method on in the Tar Heel state, Ohio legislators had a clear intent in their actions in 2015. The Republican-controlled legislature moved a bill through both chambers to shift back the date of the presidential primary in the Buckeye state by a week -- from the first Tuesday after the first Monday in March to the second Tuesday after the first Monday in March. It was a subtle change, but one designed to give the Ohio Republican Party the ability to choose a winner-take-all allocation plan if it wanted. While the primary move was only a shift of a week, that change pushed the Ohio primary out of the proportionality window.

That, in turn, allowed the Ohio GOP the ability to make a change from the "2012 proportional" plan the party used four years ago to the winner-take-all method the party will utilize in 2016. For the last cycle, Ohio Republicans retained a winner-take-all method at the congressional district level (according to the vote within the district), but allocated the state's small allotment of at-large delegates proportionally based on the statewide vote. The was rules-compliant in 2012, but would not have qualified as proportional in 2016. Rather than keep the primary on what would have been March 8 and have to revise the 2012 plan -- to make it "2016 proportional" -- the primary was shifted back and a winner-take-all method was adopted.

Those changes brought Ohio to the same date as the Florida primary and with the same winner-take-all method. It also meant the two biggest truly winner-take-all states were scheduled for the day after the close of the proportionality window.


Delegate allocation (at-large, congressional district and automatic delegates)
Like Florida, the delegate allocation for Ohio Republicans is elementary. If a candidate wins the statewide vote, then that candidate win all 66 delegates from the states. There is no rounding, no threshold and no backdoor. Win the vote, win the delegates.


Binding
The Ohio Republican Party rules are mostly silent on the matter of the release and/or binding of delegates. Article X, Section 1(d), the special rule added to make the allocation winner-take-all for just 2016, awards all 66 delegates to the winner of the statewide Ohio primary. That is the extent of the binding. Not included is information on how delegates would be released in the event that the winner of the primary withdraws from the race in addition to any description of how long those delegates would be bound at the national convention. Unlike other states, the number of ballots bound is not specified in the Ohio Republican Party rules.

While there are some gaps in these areas, Ohio is a state where state party rules overlap to some degree with Ohio state law on these matters. As such, the Ohio Republican Party is in consultation with Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted's office to reconcile the differences across the rules/laws and to determine the details on the remaining release and binding issues.


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State allocation rules are archived here.


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2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: NORTHERN MARIANA ISLANDS

This is part thirty-two of a series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation rules by state. The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2016 -- especially relative to 2012 -- in order to gauge the potential impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. For this cycle the RNC recalibrated its rules, cutting the proportionality window in half (March 1-14), but tightening its definition of proportionality as well. While those alterations will trigger subtle changes in reaction at the state level, other rules changes -- particularly the new binding requirement placed on state parties -- will be more noticeable. 

NORTHERN MARIANA ISLANDS

Election type: caucus
Date: March 15 
Number of delegates: 9 [6 at-large, 3 automatic]
Allocation method: winner-take-all
Threshold to qualify for delegates: n/a
2012: non-binding caucus

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Changes since 2012
Unlike in the other nine delegate territories, the Republican Party in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands has more clearly defined rules on the allocation and particularly the binding of its delegates to the Republican National Convention. Whereas the delegates in the American Samoa, Guam and the Virgin Islands have unbound delegations, the Republicans in the Northern Marianas will allocate their nine delegates to the winner of the territorial caucuses on March 15.¹

That is not only a departure from the other territories but from how the process operated in 2012 in CNMI when the delegation headed to Tampa unbound.


Delegate allocation (at-large and automatic delegates)
There will be two votes that participants in the caucuses in the Northern Marianas will cast. The first is for presidential preference and the second to elect the six at-large delegates from the islands. That first vote binds the delegates chosen in the second vote to the winner of the caucuses.


Binding
Delegates will be bound to the winner of the Northern Marianas caucuses through the first ballot at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland. After that, the delegates are released. If the winner of the caucuses withdraws before the convention, then the delegates vote as a group on who to support as a nine member group on the first ballot. Should the first ballot be inconclusive, then the delegates are freed of their bond to the original winner or the replacement choice of the delegation and can support any candidate they prefer (as individuals).


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State allocation rules are archived here.


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¹ Yes, the Virgin Islands would have had bound delegates had any delegates committed to candidate been elected. The rules there -- carried over from 2012 -- did not necessarily call for the binding of delegates. That is a function of an interpretation of the Virgin Islands rules by the RNC given the new rules on binding for 2016.


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Recent Posts:
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2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: ILLINOIS

This is part thirty of a series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation rules by state. The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2016 -- especially relative to 2012 -- in order to gauge the potential impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. For this cycle the RNC recalibrated its rules, cutting the proportionality window in half (March 1-14), but tightening its definition of proportionality as well. While those alterations will trigger subtle changes in reaction at the state level, other rules changes -- particularly the new binding requirement placed on state parties -- will be more noticeable. 

ILLINOIS

Election type: primary
Date: March 15 
Number of delegates: 69 [12 at-large, 54 congressional district, 3 automatic]
Allocation method: winner-take-all (at-large/automatic), directly elected (congressional district)
Threshold to qualify for delegates: n/a
2012: loophole primary

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Changes since 2012
The basic infrastructure of the Illinois Republican Party delegate allocation/selection process is the same in 2016 as it was in 2012. It is still a loophole primary, that primary is still on the third Tuesday in March, there are still 69 delegates at stake, and congressional district delegates are still elected directly on the presidential primary ballot.¹

However, there are a few subtle and not-so-subtle differences. There are a couple of things that fall into that latter, not-so-subtle category. First, the at-large and automatic delegates -- 15 delegates total -- are allocated to the statewide winner of the primary. Those delegates were all unbound in 2012. Second, while the congressional district delegates continue to be directly elected, they are being considered bound to the candidate they aligned with when filing (or being filed) to run as a delegate candidate. In 2012, those delegates were considered unbound. And if a delegate has filed to run as an uncommitted delegate, then those delegates, if elected, would also be unbound at the 2016 convention. The affiliation with a candidate upon filing is the key.

One subtle difference between the 2012 and 2016 processes in Illinois is that for 2016 there are three delegates being elected in each of the 18 congressional districts across the Land of Lincoln. Four years ago, there were a handful of districts that elected just two congressional delegates and other, more populous districts that balanced that out by electing four congressional district delegates.² The majority of districts still elected just three delegates in 2012, but that has been standardized for this current cycle.

The other small difference is an echo of the winner-take-all allocation of the at-large delegates discussed above. As the Illinois Republican Party suggests...

No, that is not some nod to the vote early, vote often maxim that was the hallmark of the bygone days of Chicago machine politics (though FHQ did chuckle at that segment upon reading it for that very reason). Instead, that statement is a function of how the process works in Illinois. Voters have traditionally voted for a presidential candidate and also congressional district delegates to go to the national convention on the presidential primary ballot. Two types of votes.

However, in the past, that presidential preference vote was largely meaningless. It has never really had a direct bearing on how the delegates would be selected at the state convention.³ This time it does. The allocation of delegate slots to candidates is a direct reflection of who has won the statewide vote in the primary. The results are binding.


Delegate allocation (at-large and automatic delegates)
At-large delegates will continue to be selected at the May state convention, but will be bound based on the statewide vote in the presidential primary. And those 15 delegates will be bound to the winner on top of that.

Nine at-large delegates and nine at-large alternates will be chosen at the Illinois state convention. Additionally, the national committeeman and national committeewoman will be elected at that convention. Participants in that state convention, then, will select 11 delegates and 9 alternates to fill the slots allocated to the statewide winner in the March 15 primary.

The state party chair position is not elected at the state convention, so the current chair will ultimately serve as an automatic delegate to the national convention. That is the only delegate not elected as part of the 2016 process. All three of the automatic delegates -- the state party chair, the national committeeman and the national committeewoman -- all serve as delegates with no alternates.


Delegate allocation (congressional district delegates)
The nature of the loophole primary -- the direct election of congressional district delegates -- as FHQ described in the context of the 2012 Illinois primary, is that the statewide winner usually ends up with a disproportionate share of the delegates. In other words, the loophole primary historically has been neither truly proportional nor truly winner-take-all. The allocation tends to end up somewhere in between with the winner taking a greater share of delegates than their share of the statewide vote.

That pattern may or may not hold in a more competitive, multi-candidate race. Trump supporters would theoretically vote for Trump and Trump delegates. All of the other voters in the Not Trump category may find it difficult to choose which other candidates delegates to support. Barring any clear direction there, the vote for Not Trump congressional district delegates will tend to be diluted as compared to Trump's. For example, Cruz supporters may not have as clear an indication that they need to support Kasich or Rubio delegates in a district where Cruz may be at a disadvantage. That is a long way of saying that there is an organization hurdle that the Not Trumps have to overcome in Illinois with which the Trump campaign is not faced.


Binding
The Illinois Republican Party rules bind the different types of delegates in a different manner. Since the congressional district delegates are directly elected (and bound to a candidate with whom they have aligned if they have aligned), those elected delegates are bound until released by the candidates. However, the at-large and automatic delegates are bound to the statewide winner through the first ballot at the national convention. If a candidate formally withdraws before the convention and has any at-large or automatic delegates, then those delegates would be released at the point of withdrawal.


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State allocation rules are archived here.


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¹ These delegate candidates will continue to appear on the ballot with the name of the candidate to whom they have committed list alongside. Voters know that they are voting for a Trump delegate candidate or a Cruz delegate candidate, etc.

² Look for the red check marks for an indication of the two and four delegate districts at that AP link.

³ It has helped in most past cycles that the race was decided by the time it got to Illinois or the winner of the primary went on to win the nomination.


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Recent Posts:
2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: FLORIDA

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2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: FLORIDA

This is part twenty-nine of a series of posts that will examine the Republican delegate allocation rules by state. The main goal of this exercise is to assess the rules for 2016 -- especially relative to 2012 -- in order to gauge the potential impact the changes to the rules along the winner-take-all/proportionality spectrum may have on the race for the Republican nomination. For this cycle the RNC recalibrated its rules, cutting the proportionality window in half (March 1-14), but tightening its definition of proportionality as well. While those alterations will trigger subtle changes in reaction at the state level, other rules changes -- particularly the new binding requirement placed on state parties -- will be more noticeable. 

FLORIDA

Election type: primary
Date: March 15 
Number of delegates: 99 [15 at-large, 81 congressional district, 3 automatic]
Allocation method: winner-take-all
Threshold to qualify for delegates: n/a
2012: winner-take-all primary

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Changes since 2012
The one change that has affected the delegate allocation in Florida the most for 2016 when compared to 2012 (or 2008 for that matter) is that the presidential primary is scheduled in a compliant position on the calendar. Unlike the last two cycles, the Florida presidential primary is in mid-March 2016 rather than in late January as was the case in 2008 and 2012. Those state-level decisions regarding the scheduling of the Florida contest five and nine years ago had consequences. On the Republican side, the January primary date carried with it a penalty cutting the size of the Florida delegation in half.

Florida was early then, but there was a price to pay for that action.

However, the one silver lining was always that, reduced delegation or not, Florida Republicans used a truly winner-take-all allocation of their delegates. Even at half strength in 2008 and 2012, the Florida Republican primary delivered and early at least a +50 in the delegate count to both John McCain and Mitt Romney. In each case, the winner's delegate haul coming out of Florida was basically the seed money for a delegate lead that neither McCain nor Romney ever relinquished.

Florida retains that winner-take-all allocation method in its party rules for the 2016 cycle, but the contest comes six weeks after Iowa rather than four as in 2008 and 2012. No, two extra weeks does not sound like a big difference. It is not. But -- and this oversimplifying things a bit -- it is the difference between Florida being the fourth nominating contest in 2012 and being tied for/in the 29th position in 2016.

Florida, then, is a much later delegate boost for candidates in 2016 than in the previous two cycles.


Delegate allocation (at-large, congressional district and automatic delegates)
This one is pretty simple; a nice departure from the varied rounding rules that have dominated the discussions of states within the early proportionality window in the Republican process. If a candidate wins the (statewide) Florida primary -- even if by just one vote -- then that candidate receives all 99 delegates from the Sunshine state.

There is no rounding and no split of the delegates. A candidate very simply leaves Florida with a little more than eight percent of the 1237 delegates necessary to clinch the 2016 Republican nomination.


Binding
The 99 delegates allocated to the winner of the March 15 presidential primary are bound to that candidate through the first three ballots at the Republican National Committee according the Republican Party of Florida rules. That is the longest hold on the delegates at the convention of any state to have held a nominating contest thus far in 2016.

The selection process for the delegates to fill those allocated slots is also of note. Within a week of the Florida primary candidates -- all of them and not just the winner -- are to have submitted to the state party a list of potential delegates and alternates. It is from those lists that the delegates are chosen at a meeting of the party called by the state party chair. Congressional caucuses comprised of the state committeemen and committeewomen and county party chairs from that district elect the three congressional district delegates while the remaining at-large delegates are elected by the Executive Board of the Republican Party of Florida.

That process does not guarantee that the winner will have its supporters filling all 99 slots. And the motivation of the party in that instance is not necessary to help or hurt the winner. Rather, the party is often motivated to insert party regulars (including elected officials)and/or those who donate time and money to the state party in those delegate slots as a reward for that service. But again, regardless of their background, those delegates are bound to the winner of the Florida primary for three ballots at the national convention.


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State allocation rules are archived here.


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Recent Posts:
2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: WASHINGTON, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

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2016 Republican Delegate Allocation: VIRGIN ISLANDS

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