What happens to Ted Cruz's delegates?
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Ted Cruz exited the race for the Republican nomination following his loss to Donald Trump in the Indiana primary election yesterday. At the time of his announcement, he had roughly 546 delegates bound by state party rules to support him at the Republican National Convention in July. Now that he’s suspended his campaign, what happens to all of those delegates?
Because state Republican parties are responsible for crafting their own rules on what their delegates can and can’t do at the national convention, the fate of Cruz's delegates varies from state-to-state.
In some states, they will automatically become unbound or reallocated. The Michigan, Nevada, and Louisiana Republican parties, for example, have clauses in their bylaws that “release” delegates bound to a candidate who “suspends” his or her campaign.
In other states, the situation could become more complicated, depending on what the Cruz campaign decides to do. Few state parties’ bylaws include the word “suspend.” Instead, a majority of states have clauses that release delegates when a candidate “withdraws” or “drops out” from the race.
Historically, state parties have viewed “withdraw” and “drop out” as synonymous with “suspend” and have allowed delegates bound to withdrawn candidates to become unbound or to be reallocated to other candidates. Marco Rubio, who suspended his campaign on March 15, 2016, challenged this tradition when he wrote to 21 state and territorial parties in late March requesting that his delegates remain bound to him on the first ballot. Several state parties, such as the Alaska GOP, were willing to honor this request.[1] It is possible that Cruz could try to utilize this same strategy in an effort to block Trump from winning the nomination on the first ballot. Without any movement from the Cruz campaign, however, it is most likely that these state parties will follow tradition and unbind or reallocate Cruz’s delegates.
There are also states like Mississippi, Colorado, and Alabama that do not release delegates when a candidate leaves the race but instead require the candidate to submit a signed letter releasing his or her delegates or to make a formal announcement to that effect.[2]
Two outliers are Virginia and Iowa, where Cruz won eight delegates each. Virginia GOP bylaws say nothing about what happens when a candidate drops out or suspends his or her campaign—though Virginia delegates are only bound on the first ballot at the convention. Iowa GOP bylaws state that delegates are to remain bound to the candidate to whom they were allocated “regardless of whether any such candidate has withdrawn from the race or otherwise does not have his or her name placed in nomination at the Republican National Convention.”
Almost half of Cruz’s delegates come from five states. Here are what their state party bylaws say about what happens when a candidate drops out:
- Colorado (30 delegates): Colorado GOP bylaws stipulate that the delegate is bound to the candidate to whom they pledged their support on their intent-to-run form through the first round of voting at the national convention. Prior to the second round of voting, delegates may only support a different candidate from the one to whom they pledged their support if that candidate releases them "through public declaration or written notification" or if the candidate's name is not placed on the nominating ballot.
- North Carolina (27 delegates): Unclear. The rules and regulations that Ballotpedia could find for North Carolina do not stipulate anything specific about what happens when a candidate leaves the race.
- Texas (104 delegates): Texas GOP bylaws stipulate that if a candidate “withdraws or dies” between the primary election (March 1) and the state convention (May 12-14), the delegates allocated to that candidate will be elected as uncommitted delegates. “Withdraw” is defined by the Texas GOP as “the candidate filing a signed and acknowledged request to that effect with the Secretary of the SREC [State Republican Executive Committee].”
- Utah (40 delegates): Utah GOP bylaws stipulate that if a candidate who was allocated delegates at the Utah Republican caucuses “is not a candidate at the national convention according to the rules of that convention,” then his or her delegates will be reallocated and bound to the remaining candidates.
- Wisconsin (36 delegates): Wisconsin GOP bylaws stipulate that delegates are bound until the candidate releases them or fails to receive at least one-third of the total votes cast on a ballot at the convention.
See also
- Republican delegate rules by state, 2016
- Republican National Convention, 2016
- Ted Cruz presidential campaign, 2016
Footnotes
- ↑ NBC News, "Rubio Makes Unprecedented Bid to Keep Delegates for Contested Convention," March 30, 2016
- ↑ In Alabama, delegates also have the option to release themselves if two-thirds of the delegates pledged to a particular candidate vote in favor.
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