While I have nothing but respect for many of the conservatives in the #NeverTrump movement – and while I completely understand their strong opposition to Donald Trump’s nomination – the #NeverTrump movement threatens to destroy the Republican Party for generations to come. Work underway to unbind delegates at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland continues to move forward with a great deal of enthusiastic optimism. Advocates of this strategy are extremely short-sighted and are unconsciously laying the groundwork for the outright ruination of the Republican Party.
Before explaining why denying Donald Trump the nomination at this point is so remarkably dangerous, I feel that I must demonstrate that I do, in fact, understand the objections to my position. First, I understand that “The Party”, not the voters, chooses the Republican Nominee. Second, I understand that before every convention the rules committee has had the prerogative of preserving old rules and establishing new ones. I understand that Donald Trump is not yet the nominee and that he has no implicit right to the nomination – and that the delegates we elected to represent us in Cleveland have the final say.
Despite these truths, the vast majority of Americans have been taught that the United States is a Democracy and that their votes who represents them from the Oval Office. Republicans, Democrats, and Independents who voted for Donald Trump in caucuses and primaries across the United States will never (and I mean never) vote Republican again if delegates in Cleveland “steal” or “deny” Trump the nomination. The average voter will no longer feel as though there is any incentive to participate in Republican Party elections. Unlike Democrats, who have participated in show votes for years, choosing instead to allow their establishment to select their nominees, Republicans actually want their votes to count.
If you think the hatred the progressive populists in Virginia feel for Ken Cuccinelli is extreme, just wait and see the level of vitriol and contempt they’ll hold against Senator Ted Cruz if Trump is denied the nomination. Cruz could lose his next reelection for Senate and he would have absolutely no chance at winning a White House bid in 2020. In fact, our attempts at unbinding the delegates have probably already done irreparable damage to Ted Cruz’s political future.
Furious at the lies and deceptions wielded by the Trump campaign against Senator Cruz, many Cruz supporters preceded to burn our political villages to the ground. Folks from the other factions will never forgive us for this. I was as angry as anyone, but I could not justify destroying our future fighting a battle we already lost. I understand principles and I even understand fighting to the bitter end; but what I do not understand is deliberately destroying the Republican Party’s future and undermining thousands of Republican candidates running for local, state, and congressional offices.
Today, the only way to move forward is to let this debacle play out. If Trump loses, we can run a conservative candidate against Hillary in 2020 (though, probably not Cruz at this point, unfortunately). If Trump wins and does a poor job as President, then we can primary him with a conservative in 2020 (this would probably be the best opportunity for Senator Cruz). If Trump wins and does an excellent job, then we really have our work cut out for us as more and more populists will attempt to rise to power on Trumps coattails.
To those representing us on the Rules Committee in Cleveland, I beg you, do not do this. To the delegates representing us in Cleveland, if this comes up for a vote, do not vote to unbind the delegates. The Republican Party is worth preserving and burning the entire thing to the ground out of frustration and spite will be something we will all come to regret in the years to come. Changing the rules and exciting the fury of millions of Republican voters in the eleventh hour would have catastrophic consequences for generations.
Please… reconsider. I agree that Trumps’ nomination is extremely disappointing, but not nearly as disappointing as one hundred years of Democrat Rule. Take warning and proceed with the utmost caution. If you cannot vote for Donald Trump, I understand. That’s fine. Unbinding delegates at the last minute, however – well, the undermines all future elections. If we want to get conservatives elected in the future, we need voters to continue to have faith in the electoral system. Take that away and voters will stay home.
61 comments
It was never spite. It was the belief that Trump’s nomination represents an existential threat to the Republic and that there is no 2020. It was the belief that Trump elects Hillary because GOP primary voters are a small part of the general electorate – which overwhelmingly hates Trump because of his nasty lunatic behavior and because of what we shall surely find out about him in the weeks to come.
Hillary will very likely get elected based on what comes out about Trump after the convention. That means she will get a huge block of new illegal immigrant voters (soon to be known as new citizens) that will guarantee the century of Dem rule and maybe the end of the country.
Even if Trump wins, he will be a liberal dictator in the mold of Obama, and the GOPe will fall in line because they’re already pretty much the Uniparty anyway.
It was all about country, not party, and not Cruz either, who probably did not want this or he would not have suspended in the first place. Everyone in FTD knew it was a huge risk and only the probable death of liberty propelled them to attempt it.
Stay home and give “Rinse” Priebus and the RNC what they have fought for a third humiliating defeat. After 36 years as a loyal straight ticket Republican I could care less what happens to the Party. #NeverTrump & #RinsePriebusOut
I will wait till the last possible moment to fully make up my mind but I am certain that even in every GOPer votes for Trump in Nov. he will still lose. Since Va is probably already gone I have an easy choice to vote my conscience.
True. I will wait to the last minute to decide on Johnson, not voting, skipping POTUS or writing someone in.
The problem with the #NeverTrumpMovement was that if they had succeeded they had no alternative for Trump. The end result would have been chaos which would have with certainty handed the presidency to Hillary Clinton, an obvious criminal who used her office for personal gain.
Personally, I preferred Cruz. But he didn’t win and I am over that. Trump has got to be the guy and we better hope that some assassination squad doesn’t take him out.
There were multiple excellent Governors. This is a false narrative based on shallow thinking. Lincoln, Garfield, Harding and Ike had no chance of being the nominee, but delegates voting their consciences rejected the presumptive nominee and selected winners and great Presidents. Only once before in ’76 were delegates bound and Reagan lost to Ford. History is repeating itself 40 years later.
Who do we thank for binding our delegates this year? I suspect Romney since he controlled the rules 4 years ago.
“Rinse” Priebus Loser Extraordinaire.
Hey, if there was enough chaos I might have been able to ride into the nomination as a Joan of Arc figure. There is nothing false about saying that chaos would take place and that such chaos favors Hillary.
trump’s nomination favors Hillary more than chaos would have.
Just shows how brilliant the unmitigated “will of the people” (spread out over months and not necessarily current) has been to reject some really great ones.
“Will of the people” has always been a red herring. We have a number of ‘Peoples’ Republics’ to prove it.
Excellent article Mr. Tucker, except for a couple of comments. (ie. “The debacle that is Trump:” I don’t consider the Trump nomination a debacle, unless you consider his emergence as the winner a byproduct of the slimy republican elites, who capitulated to almost everything the Marxist in Chief has proposed, a debacle.)
I voted for Cruz in the primary. However, if there is a betrayal of the people’s choice, I for one will be done with the Republican Party.
What about the majority who didn’t want Trump? The 63% of Republicans who voted for someone other than Trump? I don’t suppose our choices matter.
Out of 17 candidates, he received more votes than anyone, and amassed the delegates needed for the nomination. I thought that’s how the system worked.
Way too many candidates.
“The fact that we have a convention in addition to a primary has to mean something,” (Senator Mike Lee) said. “Any time you have … a set of primaries and then a convention, I think whoever is going to be the nominee needs to win both.
“I don’t view this as a ‘Never Trump’ effort. That isn’t the point. The point is there are delegates who have yet to be won over. He needs to win them over,” Lee said.
Nope. trump will never win over a majority of Americans. Conservatives know it even if “Rinse” Priebus and company reject reality.
Last night, on the O’Reilley Factor, there was an opportunity to listen to Trump and Clinton on what to do about the Islamic terror. Trump was clear. It is necessary to get Congress to declare war. Hillary was a mumbling mess of bureaucratic platitudes that in the end wasn’t even “sound and fury signifying nothing”.
I remind all that a congressional declaration of war commits the country to do whatever it takes to eliminate an enemy. No more half measures or police actions – and certainly no more of obama’s unwillingness to name “Islamic terrorism” as the problem.
I also suggest those who read this check out the news stories regarding what happened at the Bataclan massacre. If you think Nice is bad, the Bataclan story will sicken anyone with a sense of humanity. Drudge is featuring it today.
Hillary’s speech was really awful, using every cliche possible with no plan at all to deal with ISIS.
But it reflected exactly how uncomfortable she is with national security. I found myself utterly confused and disinterested by the last few sentences she said.
Trump gets criticized because he doesn’t lay out a detailed plan. Well, you don’t tell the enemy what you are going to do other than declare war on him. Hillary was “we need better intelligence cooperation” – why, we won’t use it anyway if she is president.
It is worse than a crying shame that she is likely to be POTUS when if we’d had almost anybody but Trump we’d be trouncing her.
I’m nobody within the party. I either vote in November, or not. I’m old enough to remember that our country was established as a republic and understand what that means. That the GOP won’t stand firm on that matter and leave delegates the freedom to hash out the party’s choice is disgusting to me. Support for either party’s candidate is flat and unenthusiastic, but none of that matters. We should support the erroneous belief that the United States is a democracy and give a weak majority of primary voters what they wanted, nebbermind many or most of them were arguably not Republicans.
What is the Republican Party today other than a slightly less progressive arm of the Democrat Party? Pfffft.
I agree, however , just to note, some of my conservative friends have become almost militant on this issue, so I have quietly just quit communicating.
Yawn. #NeverTrump was overwhelmingly wiped out in the Rules Committee last night. Overrated, hyperbolic, drama queens… that is #NeverTrump’s legacy. Or as Ann Coulter said: “Generals without armies.”
The impact of #NeverTrump can’t be known until November. The idea is to never vote for Trump. We’ll find out in November how many republican voters refuse to vote for the Orange One.
It all depends on whether Hillary’s Marxism overcomes Trump’s fascist load of crazy. Hard choice. Poison or hanging.
Good point. I chose neither.
Mr Tucker like most Cruz supporters like to portray Cruz as the victim of Donald Trump’s alleged lies and deceptions without acknowledging that Cruz and his campaign used dirty,filthy tactics against not only Trump but Dr Carson and Marco Rubio.
Yes you are correct Cuccinelli is done as far as his career. Cruz not so sure. Both men are narsarcists and are in denial that the majority of Republican voters have rejected their dirty tactics.
Get off the Cruz thing. Objections to Trump are because of Trump and who he is. Those objections have nothing to do with Cruz.
Thank you.
They used to mock us as Jeb supporters, then Rubio and finally Cruz. He’s just the last man standing against their orange messiah. They can’t handle that intelligent and sensible people reject trump.
It’s a cult, the modern day know nothings. You will never dissuade the Trumpsters. They will follow him right off a cliff.
You do realize that intelligent and sensible people embraced Trump, don’t you? The current GOP establishment has been a disaster and the GOP base reacted against furthering the disaster. I liked Cruz, Carson and Fiorina but am quite comfortable with Trump as the economy and national security are in unbelievable danger.
Political correctness has become a deadly and disastrous game, and Trump to his credit called it out. Just yesterday, Newt nailed sharia law and its Islamic adherents – something that would not have happen without Trump. Islam’s insistance on a caliphate and sharia law are anti-constitutional and anti-western civilization positions. If you believe in them, get the hell out of America and Europe.
“Rinse” Priebus and the establishment saved trump this week. You forget trump was one of the first to criticize the Draw Mohammed event in Texas.
Many intelligent people have been seduced into cults. Trump has employed numerous cult techniques, though certainly not all. He has not forced anyone to watch him but he has certainly lured them in.
I have to chuckle at a Trump supporter calling Cuccinelli and Cruz narcissists.
You are the one who is lying here, whether you realize it or not. Even Trump now says Cruz is not a “liar.”
It is more than wild to talk about Cruz and Cuccinelli being ‘narcissists’ when we have the spectre of NPD Trump staring at us.
Shouldn’t this article be titled “GOP Take Warning”? The GOP is tasked with selecting candidates around whom Republicans can develop a consensus. Because of many factors — including the number of candidates — they are about to select a candidate who has consensus only among a minority, over the objections of a large group — possibly the majority.
The latter group is taking every legal step to make possible the selection of a candidate who can earn consensus among a majority of Republicans.
And now, regardless of the outcome , a significant number of Republicans will rightfully see a candidate to whom they object, and a party that was unfaithful to them.
Republican Party officials, who ignored calls for party reform after losses in the last two presidential elections, are responsible for this mess.
… https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/45c679695b630b32d8ebdda595860e42e96a09a0d8adaa890e83b90db3f3985a.jpg
For weeks you have been saying that the majority of Republicans oppose Trump. I understand that you may personally not vote for Trump, but I don’t think you can argue that the majority of the party is still opposed to Trump, if they ever were. The last Rasmussen poll had the majority of all Americans saying they will vote for him; not just Republicans… all likely voters nationwide!
It’s time to stop pretending that the majority of Republicans do not support Trump.
You might want to re-read my comment above. Allow me to paste it here: “they are about to select a candidate who has consensus only among a minority, over the objections of a large group — possibly the majority.” I don’t see me being declarative about a majority there. I did imply a plurality will be on record opposing Trump, and I maintain that assertion. Also, my claims of support have been based on primary votes and several other polls, so I don’t see my claims being unrealistic.
Adding to that, I took your suggestion and looked at the latest Rasmussen report, dated yesterday. The title reads “White House Watch: Trump 44%, Clinton 37%.” While it indicates Trump has a 6% lead on Clinton, it says 44% of Americans would vote for Trump. I’m a retired Marine, and we Marines aren’t renouned for our math skills. But last time I checked, 44% does not constitute a majority
This is a common mistake of Trump supporters. They keep calling a plurality a majority.
Yes, I should have said plurality rather than majority in regards to the poll. The neverTrump crowd that has misused primary results to imply a majority oppose Trump. Just because Trump got a plurality of the votes does not mean a majority opposed him. By that logic, Republican voters opposed all 17 candidates and don’t want any of them. Nonsense. Trump has a very good chance of winning as the recent polls indicate. I know you were terribly concerned about the polls when Trump was behind, and now that he has gained in the polls you want to find reasons they aren’t valid.
The point is the same as I said earlier. It is time to stop pretending that the majority of Republicans do not support Trump. There isn’t going to be another candidate. By this time next week you will have to decide between the only two people in the world that have a chance to be president. Time to choose.
The republican primary was very much a referendum on Trump, so I think a vote for someone else was a vote against Trump in a way that it wasn’t for the other candidates. But all that is water over the dam now. It looks like Trump will be the republican nominee through the process set up by the republican party. So he’s going to be their candidate, no matter how many republicans didn’t want him.
As for the polls, as I said before, I don’t really pay much attention to them. Trump is behind in all of them save one, which historically favors republicans. But I look at the betting markets, not the polls. They’re more predictive. Trump has come up in those, too. They now have Hillary’s odds at about 75%, Trump’s at about 20%, and “other” at about 5%. You say “there is not going to be another candidate,” but there already are other candidates, and Better for America is working to give us yet another candidate. So we don’t have to accept your false dichotomy of Trump or Hillary. I reject both. I presently plan to support the Better for America candidate, if they get on the ballot in Virginia. If that doesn’t work out, then I’ll vote for Gary Johnson. We’ll see what happens in November. I know from the predictive betting markets that there’s a 95% chance my candidate will lose. There’s a 75% chance your candidate will lose. So I guess your candidate is doing better than mine, if that’s some comfort to you.
That’s hilarious. Good luck with that…
Not expecting much luck under a likely four more years of a hard left executive.
I don’t think trump has much chance of winning. So just stuck with his corrupt crony Hillary.
Even more Hillaryous think trump can win. I wish him and all trumpicans bad luck in November.
Give “Rinse” Priebus the finger and stay home.
Lead by Trump supporters and the establishment made sure via the Rules Committee that Priebus will continue in power and continue to appoint his minions on the RNC.
Neither. No one has to vote for either Democrat. There is Gary Johnson, other small Parties, skipping voting for POTUS or staying home. That’s the beauty of freedom do what you choose.
Plurality: the number of votes cast for a candidate who receives more than any other but does not receive an absolute majority.
Votes for Trump: 13,300,472
Votes for Cruz, Kasich, or Rubio : 15,284,153
Source: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/republican_vote_count.html
Perhaps they should have done a recent poll after Indiana. Then we’d know – for now it’s all conjecture.
Oh, wait – there have been polls showing a slight majority want to nominate someone else. 52%
One could say the convention itself id a referendum on who a majority of Republicans could support. After all, the delegates were elected.
Touché
Rasmussen is a consistently wrong outlier.
It did appear that way, but I didn’t have to go that far. @FrankUnderwoodSr claimed Rasmussen’s data showed majority support for Trump, when that was not true.
I think you’re right and wrong. First, I would caution you against relying on Rasmussen. I clung to that poll the last two election cycles because it was the only poll consistently showing that the republicans could beat Obama. Guess what? Rasmussen was wrong, and all the other polls were right. Rasmussen’s bias is well-documented. We all like polls that tell us what we want to believe, but Rasmussen has disappointed me for the last time. Second, I don’t believe Trump’s support has ever gone above 50%, even in Rasmussen’s poll. This is a weird cycle where both major candidates are mired well below 50%. It’s true that Hillary has dropped below Trump in Rasmussen’s poll, but I think that’s been due to Hillary supporters moving to Johnson, Stein, or undecided. Trump keeps hovering about 40%. Having said all of that, I think you’re clearly right that a majority of republicans will vote for Trump. A majority didn’t support him in the primaries, but enough are coming around now that he’ll easily get a majority of republicans. The problem for Trump is that the fact that we’re even having this discussion spells his doom. I believe better than 90% of the republicans who voted selected Romney in 2012, and he lost. Trump can’t with within similar support, and he’s nowhere near that. Plus he keeps doing things to continue to alienate conservative republicans. Pence will help, but not enough.
Rasmussen has a weak C- rating.
The highly rated Marist poll, unlike the decades wrong Rasmussen poll, has Hillary winning by double digits. Of course in hundreds of boring polls Hillary beats trump, but thankfully for desperate trumpicans there have been a dozen outliers feeding their delusional fantasies.
Majority = >50%. No poll has shown that for Trump. There were polls that showed 52% to 53% of actual Republicans wanted the convention to nominate someone else.
Well said Michael! Thank you! And now we have those same Republican party officials, under the same party rules, for the next 4 years.