Back in August, USA Today reported on a wee little problem Donald Trump would encounter if he decided to give up on his bid to win the Republican nomination and attempt to run as an independent or third-party candidate instead.
Ohio is one of several states that have “sore loser” rules prohibiting a candidate from appearing on the ballot as an independent or third-party candidate after they have previously declared themselves a candidate in another party.
Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted, a Republican, has concluded that since Trump has filed with the Federal Election Commission to pursue the Republican nomination and “voluntarily participated” in the Republican presidential debate in the state of Ohio, he has “chosen a party for this election cycle” and declared himself “as a Republican in the state of Ohio,” said Husted spokesman Joshua Eck.
Mark that down as the first major hurdle Trump would face in trying to mount a 50-state campaign for president as an independent.
Most states have sore loser laws, but almost all of those laws only apply to congressional elections or can be circumvented with smart election attorneys. In truth, Trump could get around most of these laws (including probably Ohio’s) by carefully choosing between filing as an independent or as the nominee of an actual or newly created third party. One thing Trump has is the money to hire the armies of attorneys and petition canvassers that he would need to get on all 51 (or very nearly all 51) ballots.
It would be a messy process, though. In Ohio, Trump is now precluded from using a petition drive to get on the ballot as an independent but could still appear as the nominee of a third party, whereas in Michigan he is precluded from appearing as a third party candidate but could still use a citizen petition drive to get on the ballot as an independent.
It sounds to me like Trump will need to devote a lot of attention and massive amounts of resources to making sure his team doesn’t screw up and wind up failing to get him on the ballot in any states. He’ll probably have to create his own third party because that would be much simpler than winning the nomination of a bunch of pre-existing third parties. But this third party would be useless to him in some states, and Michigan is pretty important state with a lot of electoral votes. All of this will have to be done with a careful eye to the various filing deadlines in each state. If he goes this route, it will be a HUUUGE undertaking, and he’ll have a chance to show us his self-professed managerial skills.
If he wants to do this all concurrently with a straightforward campaign for the Republican nomination, it’s going to cause no end of controversy and consternation. He’ll pay a price for his naked disloyalty to the GOP.
But he can do it.
If he really wants to and he has half the leadership skills he claims to possess, he can definitely pull this off.
What he can’t do is wait until he is somehow denied the nomination at the Cleveland convention to make up his mind. If he wants to hedge his bets and (perhaps more important to him) maintain the credible threat that he’ll bolt the party if he is treated unfairly, he’ll need to get on the ballot access stuff immediately.
And that means that we won’t have any surprises from him. Come convention time, everyone will know if he is in position to run a credible independent candidacy or not. If he hasn’t done this up-front legwork, he can still run as a spoiler by appearing on the ballot in some states, but he won’t have any chance of actually emerging with a majority of the Electoral College delegates.
At Salon, Paul Blest argues that Trump wouldn’t be denied the Republican nomination even if he showed up in Cleveland with a mere plurality of the votes because it would tear the party apart and Trump would just launch an independent bid. It’s a bit more complicated than that. The GOP is already torn apart, first of all, and secondly, Trump won’t necessarily be in position at that late point to credibly run an independent bid.
If Trump has any hope of winning the nomination on a second or third ballot at the convention, he’ll need his independent run to be ready to go and as serious as a heart attack. Otherwise, Trump is going to need to win that first ballot, and that means he’s going to need to win an outright majority of the delegates.
That seems unlikely, but we’ll just have to see, won’t we?
He would still have the threat of openly opposing the Republican nominee as selected unfairly and “against the will of the Republican voter”. It doesn’t carry much direct benefit, but honestly his chances of winning as a 3rd party candidate are incredibly slim anyway, and it would still probably guarantee a Republican loss. It might be more of a threat to the party as a whole, as renouncement would damage their downballot races while a 3rd party run would probably help.
that last point is a good one. Don’t know if they’ll game it out that way because they can’t control him anyway.
while a 3rd party run would probably help
or maybe not, since Trump’s negatives are very high. There are probably as many or more people wanting to vote against him than for him, and those votes most likely end up in the D column.
I have to say that I think all of the drama on the R side probably does bring about greater interest, but it also increases the chances that there will be a disappointed voting block after the convention. History shows that the fundies will still reliably pull the R lever regardless, so maybe Trump does end up the nominee and Cruz the VP? Although I could see Cruz on top of the ticket and Trump as the VP candidate as well- Trump as the VP candidate might be a compromise the establishment can live with (although they hate Cruz as well). God help us either way.
Given the size of The Donald’s ego, I can’t see him ever playing second fiddle to Cruz or any other nominee. He’s got to be the Boss, the biggest thing ever.
Sure, there is the ego thing. But do you think the guy really wants to govern? Was he seriously running for president to begin with or just trying to increase his exposure?
Presidents in general have to work their asses off and make compromises with people they don’t like, and I doubt he wants to do that. I could see Trump blending the VP position into his empire- the reality show, the media self promotion, etc…
If he ended up a clear second place in elected delegates I think that he would have a much tougher time going the third party route because he would be seen as a sore loser by most people. I could really see the GOP nominee trying to retain those voters by putting a Trump in charge of immigration policy, building the wall or something equally offensive.
Yes, unlikely. But both sides might be desperate enough to do it. It’s a weird election.
He — like several other candidates — want to BE President. He’ll hire “people” to do the work. Whatever doesn’t get done, oh well. Worked for GWB.
I agree with both of you. He wants to win, but if he loses he is going to spin it in the best way possible for himself which may include saying he wanted to be Veep all along and start something along the lines of Spiny was suggesting.
Gary Johnson 2012. Withdrew as a GOP candidate on 28 December 2011, nominated by the Libertarian Party and had ballot access in all states except OK.
I could be wrong, but I don’t think Trump could get the Libertarian nomination.
I haven’t a clue — but star power opens a lot of doors that otherwise would be closed.
I hadn’t thought about Trump running as a candidate for a party that has already secured ballot access across the nation, but it’s intriguing. I think we can safely assume the Greens aren’t a match for him. For the Libertarians, there would be the trade-off of “on the one hand, we’d hit the 5% threshold everywhere perhaps helping us launch into bigger things in the figure, on the other hand only a few of his positions match the party platform.”
And I don’t know all of the other parties, but what about the Constitution Party? Ok, their view of what the Constitution includes all kinds of written-in-invisible-ink provisions that only Bible Federalists can see, and has notable gaps (like most of the amendments in the teens), but those beliefs aren’t well defined, and Trump stands for what they REALLY want, which involves white power above everything else.
Probably there are problems with this, but I see a possible match.
Not sure how it would work, but couldn’t some of the other parties also nominate Trump?
Definitely. It it’s goode enough for Virgil Goode, it’s goode enough for Trump.
I think that’s a fair assessment of Trump’s chances, but I’d like to quibble with one not-entirely-small point:
“One thing Trump has is the money to ….”
I see that a lot — that Trump has the money to do whatever he wants. He brags about it himself and others concede the point.
But I think money might be Trump’s Achilles’ heel.
There’s some dispute about how much he’s really worth, though most agree he’s a billionaire. But that doesn’t mean he has billions — or even hundreds of millions — to spend on an election campaign. A lot of his wealth is tied up in buildings and golf courses and in licensing rights. I’d be very surprised if he has sufficient liquid assets that he can use to self-fund a campaign through November. I believe the estimates for the last round was about $1 billion for the Obama reelection. That’s one helluva lot.
Where exactly is Trump going to get that kind of money? Is he going to sell off some of his own business holdings? No way.
Is he going to get the big donors and super PACS to finance the campaign for him? Maybe a little bit, but he’s the last candidate they want to get behind.
Does he have an army of small donors willing to fork over their hard-earned money to finance his vanity project? To a point — maybe even in the tens of millions — but far short of what’s probably needed to win.
So far Trump has spent less than $1 million on TV, and probably a few million on other campaign expenses. But the free publicity he’s generated to this point won’t carry him once the primary voting gets started, and even less after the conventions. Somebody will need to cut some big checks. Real money needs to be spent. That’s when the rubber meets the road.
When it comes to Trump’s money and how much he’ll spend on the campaign, I think he’s bluffing.
Agree. Perot spend approximately $50 million (1992 dollars) of his own money. Romney spent a similar amount (2008 dollars). Trump might go as high as that (2015 dollars), but he sure as hell isn’t going to self-fund a general election campaign. GOP donors will have a choice to either fork over the bucks or he’ll take the federal funds.
That’s something I’ve also wondered about. In my local Sunday “nooz” rag there is a letter to the editor from a Trump supporter crowing about how Trump can self-fund his election, and because of that, Trump will not be “influenced” by the various PTB.
Firstly, I also don’t see how Trump has a spare $billion sitting around to spend on this campaign. As indicated, his billions are probably mostly not liquid.
Secondly, even given that somehow Trump could totally self-fund his election, it’s utterly delusional to believe the fairy tale that Trump won’t be influenced by various PTB. He will. They all are. Yeah, Trump talks a good game and exhibits his bully persona to the max, but in the end, he’ll be “influenced.” They all are.
This coming from a CA voter, no less. Perhaps the writer is younger, but I can recall Ahhhnold Schwartenegger bragging about how he was so wealthy that he’d never ever ever be influenced… a point that MANY conservatives clung to when they voted for him. The very first thing that happened after Ahhnold was elected was that Bush & his cronies flew him to Tejas and made him forgive Enron for the massive Rip Off that Ken Lay perpetrated on CA citizens. Ahhnold had claimed during the election that he’d get that money back. Ha ha… the joke’s on you, CA citizens. We got bupkiss except for blowhard Ahhhnold who capitulated almost instantaneously.
Ahhnold’s a softie in comparison to Trump, but I don’t buy it that Trump will never be “influenced.” He will should he win. Count on it.
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