Over at Political Animal, Martin Longman has attempted to game out how the Republican Party might go about denying Donald Drumpf its nomination in the event of a brokered convention. Longman points out that the GOP would likely have a difficult time finding a candidate who can credibly replace Drumpf (who is expected to have a plurality of delegates, if perhaps not the majority necessary to actually secure the nomination) and also bring together the warring groups within the party itself.
More specifically, Longman argues that the GOP is not riven this year by competing factions. That is, there are no candidates whose appeal is distinctly regional in nature or who are being pushed by blocks of voters with particular but inherently divergent goals. As a result, there is a lot less trading of interests that could be done by the party leaders at the convention such that a mutually agreeable candidate could be found who might appease (most of) the various candidates’ supporters. (Drumpf’s supporters, of course, have begun swearing their loyalty to Drumpf personally at his campaign rallies; these people are not likely to accept anybody but Il Douche.)
But one thing Longman concluded jumped out at me, and suddenly a solution to the GOP’s problem presented itself.
Here’s what Longman wrote:
What I think this all means is that perceived electability will be the biggest consideration. That’s what John Kasich is banking on, and he’d probably have the poll numbers to back up his case for himself.
But Kasich would have to jump through more hoops than just having the best argument that he can win the general election. He’ll almost definitely need to have Rule 40(b) changed so that he can stand for the nomination despite not having won the majority of the delegates in eight states. And he’ll have to get Cruz and Rubio to back him, which will require that he agree, most likely, to put one of them on the ticket and the other in a position of considerable power.
And just like that, I can imagine at least one (potential) solution to the GOP’s brokered convention party.
Kasich gets the GOP nomination for president, running with Rubio as his V-P. The Republicans could credibly present Kasich as the stalwart, tried-and-true conservative most likely to win the general election, a “moderate” who won’t alienate voters, and a guy with real experience in both business and governing who could get things done.
Marco gets to be on the ticket so as to present something of a unified party, but the big dig against Rubio these days is that he seems too young and out of his depth to really be presidential material. However, the vice-presidency is usually a fairly low-stakes position that Rubio credibly could occupy, and might even prepare him for a future run in 2024 if Kasich were to win this year. Moreover, the deal conceivably would appeal to Rubio because (i) it presents at least the possibility of continuing his political career in the near-term, and (ii) even if the Kasich-Rubio ticket were to lose in November, Rubio would better be able to argue in 2020 that it’s now “his turn” to snag the Republican nomination.
But then (sing the Republican nuns) how to you solve a problem like Teddy? Simple: Kasich promises him Scalia’s seat on the Supreme Court. That’s a win/win/win for nearly everybody in the Republican Party.
Putting Cruz on the Supreme Court would give him a lifetime gig in one of the most hallowed institutions in American politics. More importantly (from Cruz’s perspective) it gives him decades in which to read into the nation’s founding document all the Christianist blather that he insists is the Constitution’s animating purpose. The selection could easily be sold to the American public; Cruz is, after all, a former Supreme Court clerk. And while I’m pretty sure that, like Taft, Cruz would prefer to be president and then a Supreme Court justice, I still think he’d jump at the chance to spend the rest of his life imposing his imprimatur on our nation’s fundamental law.
Moreover, the GOP establishment should have every reason to go for this solution. The party leaders could claim to have saved the party from the guy Charlie Pierce refers to as “the vulgar talking yam” – hell! this really would weld an actual #NotTrump coalition out of the remaining not-Drumpf candidates. And, more importantly, all the Republican Senators would finally have gotten the detestable Ted Cruz out of their club and away from them.
Of course, Kasich wouldn’t be able to just come right out and say publicly that Cruz had been promised Scalia’s seat. But I’m sure a little loose talk about how Kasich thinks Ted Cruz is a fine constitutional scholar and certainly somebody “that we’ll be looking at closely when it comes time to fill the Court opening,” would get the job done. The important thing for the GOP is that Cruz’s supporters understand the deal that has been made and that they therefore can vote for Kasich in good conscience.
And what about all the voters that really want to vote for Drumpf? Well, they’re going to be pretty pissed off, but if the Republican leadership is serious about preventing Drumpf from getting the nomination then there’s not much to be done about that. Drumpf’s voters are going to be pissed off no matter how the GOP works this out at the convention. And that pissed-offedness is very, very likely to keep the Republicans from having much of a chance in November.
But forget about the party’s interests; think about the personal interests of the three not-Drumpfs remaining in the race:
Kasich secures the nomination. Given the current delegate count, that is by far the best Kasich can hope to accomplish in this race.
Rubio, as noted, gets to save face and hope to challenge the Democrats four years later.
Cruz gets his name floated for a Supreme Court nomination, cements his position as the leader of the Teavangelicals, and (unlike Rubio), gets to keep his sweet, sweet gig in the Senate.
Of course, all of this is rampant, idle speculation, but man this year’s Republican primary is one helluva entertaining trainwreck that the rest of us get to watch.