Nate Silver: It’s Probably First Ballot Or Bust For Trump At The GOP Convention (538)

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Tom_Cody

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In spite of having a healthy lead in elected delegates, Trump and his operatives continue to get out-maneuvered state-by-state at the actual delegate selection level. I thought it would be useful to have a thread to keep track of this phenomenon as it happens. Nate Silver wrote a great primer on this subject a few days ago.

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features...-bust-for-donald-trump-at-the-gop-convention/
Nate Silver said:
At the prediction market Betfair on Friday morning, bettors put Donald Trump’s chances of winning the Republican presidential nomination at 56 percent. That’s down a fair bit — Trump had been hovering at about 70 percent after his win in Arizona (and loss in Utah) last week. Meanwhile, the likelihood of a contested convention according to bettors has considerably increased. There’s now a 63 percent chance1 that the convention in Cleveland will require multiple ballots, according to Betfair.

In other words, the markets are now betting on a contested convention. Not just a near-miss, where the nomination is resolved at some point between the last day of GOP primaries June 7 and the start of the convention July 18, but the thing that political journalists dream about: a full-blown contested convention where it takes multiple ballots to determine the Republican nominee.

Here’s the thing, though: Those markets don’t make a lot of sense. If you really think the chance of a multi-ballot convention is 63 percent, but also still have Trump with a 56 percent chance of winning the nomination, that implies there’s a fairly good chance that Trump will win if voting goes beyond the first ballot. That’s probably wrong. If Trump doesn’t win on the first ballot, he’s probably screwed.

The basic reason is simple. Most of the 2,472 delegates with a vote in Cleveland probably aren’t going to like Trump.
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Further explanation at the link.


Here is a list of some of the states where Trump has gotten out-maneuvered thus far. I till try to keep this updated:

Louisiana
Ted Cruz Gains in Louisiana After Loss There to Donald Trump
Trump threatens to sue over Louisiana delegate result

Georgia
Ted Cruz’s Stealth Delegate Hunt

Virginia
Cruz seen as having leg up in Virginia delegate battle

South Carolina
Meet South Carolina’s anti-Trump double agents

Arizona
Cruz snaring Trump's Arizona delegates

Colorado
Clean sweep for Cruz in early stages of Colorado delegate hunt

Tennessee
Donald Trump campaign: Tennessee GOP pushing delegates to Ted Cruz

North Dakota
Ted Cruz claims 18-delegate win after North Dakota GOP convention
Cruz's campaign took a 4-by-4 to the ND recommended delegate slate and rammed right through it with his own list.
 
This article is actually one of Friday's articles.

Their Monday podcast will probably be about this article, so try to update the OP with it when it goes up (this afternoon).
 
I don't want Trump to become the R nominee or any very weak GE candidate. I want the GOP to spend their money on the SCOTUS election and not local tickets because I want no more filibusters. Any candidate that will come out of the shitshow the convention will likely be is automatically weak.
 
Neoweee said:
This article is actually one of Friday's articles.

Their Monday podcast will probably be about this article, so try to update the OP with it when it goes up (this afternoon).
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Will do.

I understand that the article is a few days old, but I thought it was a good jumping off point for a thread on this topic.
 
Yeah, seems pretty clear to me. If he doesn't get the outright majority, he doesn't stand a chance.

I still think he's got a pretty good shot at hitting the majority, however.
 
I really dont like these articles. He's favored to win enough states from here on out to win the nomination easily. All these articles about a brokered convention are just written to get hits.
 
popcorn-blank.gif
 
I hate Trump but the idea of him getting the vast majority of delegates and not getting the nomination really pisses me off.

For better or worse he's the guy most republicans voted for to be their nominee. If the party essentially says "lol no", that should (and likely will) destroy the GOP for the foreseeable future. It'd be them confirming that your vote doesn't really matter, which a ton of people already believe to be the case
 
SlimySnake said:
I really dont like these articles. He's favored to win enough states from here on out to win the nomination easily. All these articles about a brokered convention are just written to get hits.
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Uh, not really. He's trending to fall short of 1237.
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/wisconsin-could-be-trouble-for-trump/

Harry Enten said:
If the rest of the states after Wisconsin went as our expert panel predicted, Trump would end up with, at best, 1,185 delegates after the last primaries on June 7. He could still get to 1,237 on the first ballot at the Republican National Convention by securing 52 additional delegates among the more than 100 currently unbound or uncommitted delegates, but it would be a steeper hill to climb than we originally thought.
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Personally, I think if he loses the nomination to Cruz. The republican vote will be even more fractured than ever and they'll lose even worse.
 
SlimySnake said:
I really dont like these articles. He's favored to win enough states from here on out to win the nomination easily. All these articles about a brokered convention are just written to get hits.
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You think? He seems to have hit a bit of a wall with some of his gaffes lately, but I haven't seen it reflected yet in his poll numbers. I do think he'll be the eventual nominee. Screwing him out of the nomination with procedural bullshit will taint the GOP for life, and they'll lose millions of voters permanently.
 
Amory said:
I hate Trump but the idea of him getting the vast majority of delegates and not getting the nomination really pisses me off.

For better or worse he's the guy most republicans voted for to be their nominee. If the party essentially says "lol no", that should (and likely will) destroy the GOP for the foreseeable future. It'd be them confirming that your vote doesn't really matter, which a ton of people already believe to be the case
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Yep. If this same situation happened with Bernie getting a majority of the vote but a contested convention would elect Hillary instead, the entire country would go apeshit.

Just because a bunch of people think Trump is an idiot and should not run the country (me included) doesn't mean you can just disregard the will of primary voters like that.

That is most likely why the betting sites still have him up to win even though they predict it will go to multiple ballots at the convention. In the end they have to pick Trump even if they don't want to.
 
The Trump base contains a significant number of voters who otherwise wouldn't be energized in November- and many who will sit it out in protest and a few who are so cataclysmically stupid that they will accidentally vote for their own interests (Hillary) out of spite.

Ironically the brokered convention may create a nightmare for downticket.
 
Amory said:
I hate Trump but the idea of him getting the vast majority of delegates and not getting the nomination really pisses me off.

For better or worse he's the guy most republicans voted for to be their nominee. If the party essentially says "lol no", that should (and likely will) destroy the GOP for the foreseeable future. It'd be them confirming that your vote doesn't really matter, which a ton of people already believe to be the case
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The entire point here is that 1237 represents 50% +1. A simple majority.

He's winning a plurality, not a majority (let alone a "vast majority", lol).

The logic behind this rule system is that a candidate is judged to have not unified the party if they can't win a simple majority. And at that point it is up to the elected delegates to choose the best candidate.

You are certainly welcome to disagree with that argument though.
 
TheOctodad said:
Personally, I think if he loses the nomination to Cruz. The republican vote will be even more fractured than ever and they'll lose even worse.
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Cruz certainly holds substantially less appeal to anti-establishment types and any independents who may be Trump supporters. Cruz is the exact kind of person that, at best, only gets the votes of people who were always going to vote R anyway, and you aren't going to win an election with that.
 
Trump will likely fall 50-200 delegates short. It's possible he could win enough unallocated delegates to win but I doubt it. I think the last few weeks has destroyed his campaign. The rally riots, his advocacy of violence, and the abortion nonsense probably ensured that GOP power brokers who were once flirting with the idea of Trump not being that bad have flipped back to viewing him as a giant disaster.

Cruz is running the smartest non-incumbent campaign since Obama's 2008 run. His people are exploiting every rule and have seemingly been preparing for a brokered convention for months. If this goes to a second or third ballot I think he'll take the nomination.
 
So Trump loses and runs as an independent, wrecking what little chance Cruz had at a win and fucking things up downticket for the whole party, right?
 
Amory said:
I hate Trump but the idea of him getting the vast majority of delegates and not getting the nomination really pisses me off.

For better or worse he's the guy most republicans voted for to be their nominee. If the party essentially says "lol no", that should (and likely will) destroy the GOP for the foreseeable future. It'd be them confirming that your vote doesn't really matter, which a ton of people already believe to be the case
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Yea, going against who the people voted using a system people don't fully understand would be a disaster. Even if Trump doesn't run third party, it would leave a huge group of his supporters feeling cheated, and they'll just stay home.
 
Can you imagine three-way general election debates with Trump, Cruz, and Clinton?

Trump will probably just go nuclear on Cruz out of spite.

Imagine how blue the electoral map will look.
 
balladofwindfishes said:
Yea, going against who the people voted using a system people don't fully understand would be a disaster. Even if Trump doesn't run third party, it would leave a huge group of his supporters feeling cheated, and they'll just stay home.
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Even though I know it won't happen, I am really curious to see what would happen if he explicitly tells his supporters to vote democrat to "teach the party that stole the nomination a lesson."
 
I saw something like this on Vox a while ago. It's so complicated that I just couldn't be bothered to read it all but I am really looking forward to it.
 
Amory said:
I hate Trump but the idea of him getting the vast majority of delegates and not getting the nomination really pisses me off.

For better or worse he's the guy most republicans voted for to be their nominee. If the party essentially says "lol no", that should (and likely will) destroy the GOP for the foreseeable future. It'd be them confirming that your vote doesn't really matter, which a ton of people already believe to be the case
Click to expand...

If he gets the vast majority of delegates this wont be an issue. It is only an issue if he gets a plurality and not a majority.
 
The moment he hits anything below 1237, there's literally no way they won't stonewall the man at the convention and hamstring him with every technicality they can find. Trump can say his voters will riot all he wants, but it's a losing game for the GOP if they don't put something else out to save the rest of the party on the down ballot.
 
studyguy said:
The moment he hits anything below 1237, there's literally no way they won't stonewall the man at the convention and hamstring him with every technicality they can find. Trump can say his voters will riot all he wants, but it's a losing game for the GOP if they don't put something else out to save the rest of the party on the down ballot.
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Their "Plan B" is Cruz, so they're doomed either way. He's not popular at all, not even in his own party and is basically unelectable.
 
The question is do they care more about not giving trump the nom knowing that it will guarantee the dem wins(most likely Clinton) or do they rally support to try and put their best shot at blocking the dem
 
I've been bullish on Trump's chances for a while now, but more and more I'm buying into the idea that he's looking for a way out. Having the nomination "stolen" from him is the cleanest way for him to not have to actually get blown out in the Fall, but still be able to call himself a winner and say "I would have won if I hadn't been screwed over" til the end of his days. His negatives are so overwhelming that even he, behind closed doors, has to know that it will take an act of God for him to actually sit in the Oval Office. I'm expecting him to not fight too hard at the convention and end up not making too many waves during the general. This is all just guesses on my part, though, and I'm sure I'll be surprised.
 
Tom_Cody said:
The entire point here is that 1237 represents 50% +1. A simple majority.

He's winning a plurality, not a majority (let alone a "vast majority", lol).

The logic behind this rule system is that a candidate is judged to have not unified the party if they can't win a simple majority. And at that point it is up to the elected delegates to choose the best candidate.

You are certainly welcome to disagree with that argument though.
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mcfrank said:
If he gets the vast majority of delegates this wont be an issue. It is only an issue if he gets a plurality and not a majority.
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You're right, majority was the wrong word.

I should've said "way more delegates than the other candidates"
 
Well Cruz is gonna get demolished by the democratic nominee anyway so...

I guess it all comes down to the world realizing Trump needs to be stopped
 
To be honest, the delegate system is total nonsense. Trump wins but doesn't get as many delegates makes no sense.

He is a racist but the system inherently undemocratic.
 
Zyae said:
The question is do they care more about not giving trump the nom knowing that it will guarantee the dem wins(most likely Clinton) or do they rally support to try and put their best shot at blocking the dem
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If they are being honest with themselves they know that there is no option they can put forward with a decent chance of winning the presidency. That's not really what it's about for them at this point; it's all about mitigating the damage to the party as a whole and saving as many congress seats as they can. Any non-Trump will help with that somewhat, but the irony is that Cruz is the worst of those options.
 
Calamari41 said:
I've been bullish on Trump's chances for a while now, but more and more I'm buying into the idea that he's looking for a way out. Having the nomination "stolen" from him is the cleanest way for him to not have to actually get blown out in the Fall, but still be able to call himself a winner and say "I would have won if I hadn't been screwed over" til the end of his days. His negatives are so overwhelming that even he, behind closed doors, has to know that it will take an act of God for him to actually sit in the Oval Office. I'm expecting him to not fight too hard at the convention and end up not making too many waves during the general. This is all just guesses on my part, though, and I'm sure I'll be surprised.
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I still don't think he ever wanted to be president. The guy has a pretty sweet life and seems to enjoy what he does. This always seemed like a way to increase his brand and serve his own ego. I don't think he expected people to actually come out in droves to vote for him
 
Robot Pants said:
Well Cruz is gonna get demolished by the democratic nominee anyway so...

I guess it all comes down to the world realizing Trump needs to be stopped
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It's either going to be Trump on the first ballot, or someone like Paul Ryan on the 4th+. If Ted Cruz manages to ground game his way to snatching enough delegates on the floor to put him over the top, then it will actually be pretty impressive and might speak well of his chances in the general.
 
pgtl_10 said:
To be honest, the delegate system is total nonsense. Trump wins but doesn't get as many delegates makes no sense.

He is a racist but the system inherently undemocratic.
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I don't think running with the plurality from the start is more democratic than complicated fallback calculations and additional balloting.
 
Calamari41 said:
I've been bullish on Trump's chances for a while now, but more and more I'm buying into the idea that he's looking for a way out. Having the nomination "stolen" from him is the cleanest way for him to not have to actually get blown out in the Fall, but still be able to call himself a winner and say "I would have won if I hadn't been screwed over" til the end of his days. His negatives are so overwhelming that even he, behind closed doors, has to know that it will take an act of God for him to actually sit in the Oval Office. I'm expecting him to not fight too hard at the convention and end up not making too many waves during the general. This is all just guesses on my part, though, and I'm sure I'll be surprised.
Click to expand...

I think you have spectacularly misjudged Trump's character...

You think he's going back to his hotel room after these big speeches with stadium sell-out crowds, slumping into an easy chair and saying "Geez, if only there were some way I could bow out gracefully"?

I think it's more likely that he's surrounded by people who tell him that he's the next messiah, and that he himself believes that wholeheartedly. What's more, he's had victory after victory to reaffirm that belief, and is certainly the only one that could mathematically win the nom before the Convention at this point.
 
QuicheFontaine said:
I think you have spectacularly misjudged Trump's character...

You think he's going back to his hotel room after these big speeches with stadium sell-out crowds, slumping into an easy chair and saying "Geez, if only there were some way I could bow out gracefully"?

I think it's more likely that he's surrounded by people who tell him that he's the next messiah, and that he himself believes that wholeheartedly. What's more, he's had victory after victory to reaffirm that belief, and is certainly the only one that could mathematically win the nom before the Convention at this point.
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I do believe he's smarter than most people in a place like NeoGAF OT believe he is, so yes, I do think it's possible that he goes back to his hotel room and sees the poll numbers and understands them. The last month or so has been brutal to his numbers. Time will tell, of course, and I am fully willing to say that I could be completely wrong. These are just my thoughts which, if you go through my post history on the topic, have evolved as events have happened to change them.

It's kind of analogous to the bankruptcies that people love to cite. They show that he's willing to jettison a bad investment if it comes down to it, and in a way that is most beneficial to him. If he understands that he won't be president, the best way to jettison this investment is to have it stolen from him rather than go down in history alongside McGovern and Mondale.
 
QuicheFontaine said:
I think you have spectacularly misjudged Trump's character...

You think he's going back to his hotel room after these big speeches with stadium sell-out crowds, slumping into an easy chair and saying "Geez, if only there were some way I could bow out gracefully"?
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Not in the way you mean, no.

But I do think in a completely self-serving sense, he'd rather reap all of the brand benefits from being a high-profile presidential candidate and not have to actually...you know....be the president.

I'm sure he's absolutely sure he could do a spectacular job, I don't think he wants to.
 
pgtl_10 said:
To be honest, the delegate system is total nonsense. Trump wins but doesn't get as many delegates makes no sense.

He is a racist but the system inherently undemocratic.
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it's a lot more democratic than it used to be

remember these are just internal selections within political parties

they don't have to do any of it

but you're right that it's going to feel really damn wrong for people to go out and vote and then have that not mean a whole lot

the Republican party is going to be... interesting this election lol
 
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