ANALYSIS:
Ted Cruz’s loss in the Arizona primary Tuesday puts mathematics squarely on the side of Donald Trump in the race to capture the Republican presidential nomination, an ongoing state-by-state delegate allocation analysis by The Washington Times indicates.
“Mr. Trump’s win in Arizona means Mr. Cruz must win 90 percent of the remaining delegates after March 22 to get to 1,237. The chance of this happening is equivalent to winning the Powerball lottery,” said former Republican National Committee Treasurer Randy Pullen, who was also the state party chairman in Arizona.
Randy Evans, a Standing Rules Committee member of the Republican National Committee, said projections put Mr. Trump about 75 to 100 delegates short of a majority after the final primaries and caucuses in June.
“Remember after March 31, only one-third of the delegates will be left to award because two-thirds will have been picked in state party contests,” Mr. Evans said. “With each passing primary, the challenge becomes increasingly insurmountable, absent a total meltdown throwing the convention wide open. Right now, that appears unlikely.”
Some veteran election observers flatly predict that Mr. Trump is on a march to get the 1,237-delegate majority, and even those who disagree conclude he is on track for a total so close to a majority that he is, for all practical purposes, assured of a first-ballot win.
Even a brokered convention rests on an assumption that may not pan out — that delegates pledged to Sen. Marco Rubio and others who have suspended their campaigns will not vote for Mr. Trump now that they are free agents.
Mr. Pullen said that based on his analysis, “after New York on April 19, Cruz will be mathematically eliminated, except for the unbound delegates and delegates of candidates who have suspended their campaigns.”
“So, naturally, Cruz is shifting his focus to recruiting unbound and suspended delegates. I have spoken to several unbound delegates who have already been contacted by one or more of the campaigns soliciting their commitment.”
Media speculation has raged over unbound delegates and delegates allocated to candidates who have suspended their campaigns, and how all this works out at a convention. But here is what may be the most important factor for the four days in July in Cleveland:
“In some states, the delegates awarded to suspended candidacies may not cast a vote, while in others they will be free to vote or steered to a particular candidate by party leadership in the delegation,” Mr. Pullen said.
Instead, a number of state delegation leaders will suggest to the unbound delegates in their states that they back Mr. Trump to give him a first-ballot win and avoid a political bloodbath on the convention floor.
“Delegates awarded to suspended candidacies will find themselves in no-man’s land, because their candidate will not be nominated,” Mr. Pullen said. “Therefore, they will not be able to vote for him or her.”
Though state rules and laws vary, in general “you are bound to the candidate who won the vote in your district or caucus,” Mr. Pullen said.
In this scenario, Mr. Trump gets to 1,237 on his own, “and then conservative elites try to peel off delegates to get him under 1,237.”
The state offering the biggest delegate haul by far is not likely to award all 172 to one candidate, making it what ballot allocation analyst Jim Ellis calls “the total wild card.”
“California is very difficult to forecast,” Mr. Ellis said, because of its 53 congressional districts, each with three delegates to be awarded to the candidate who wins the most votes in each district. In effect, the state has 54 separate Republican primaries June 7 — 53 congressional districts and one for the five unbound delegates.
“I give Trump the lion’s share only because I can’t see Cruz or Kasich carrying those districts,” Mr. Ellis said.
• Ralph Z. Hallow can be reached at rhallow@gmail.com.
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