The grassroots supporters of the Republican Party were pushed aside at the 2012 Republican National Convention (RNC). Anticipating a Romney Presidency, Romney campaign attorney Ben Ginsberg put forth and lobbied for a permanent change, in the way RNC delegates were chosen, to guarantee that a (expected) President Romney wouldn’t face a primary challenge in 2016. It was controversial. Convention Chairman John Boehner read off of a script, called the rules change election by the script (rather than through the proper democratic process), and was booed by more than half the RNC delegates.
Prior to the rules change, each state party decided how to select or elect its delegates. In California, Presidential candidates select three delegates for each Congressional District; if the candidate wins that Congressional District, his or her selected delegates go to the national convention. Not bound, it is assumed that the candidate-selected delegates will almost always vote for their candidate at the convention.
There are a few problems with the “California model”. First, because of intense candidate pressure, the RNC delegates are obliged (by patronage) to put the candidate over the party. Should a situation arise where no candidate has the required number of delegates to secure the nomination, RNC delegates have to reconsider their votes to award the nomination to a candidate who can (a) win and (b) best represent the Republican ideals. Second, the unbound delegates serve as the “last defense” against a bad candidate. Eight months is a long time in Presidential primary campaigns. Candidates can (and sometimes do) say or do things which make early primary voters doubt their wintertime support.
Other state parties have presidential preference primaries but leave delegate selection to the grass roots volunteers. The volunteers painstakingly caucus at the precinct level and select a delegate. Those precinct delegates meet at the county level, caucus, and elect delegates to the state convention. Then those county delegates caucus (at a state convention) and elect the eventual state delegates to the RNC. While this small R republican approach seems to subvert the “will of the people”, delegates tend to be the most involved and active party members. They can gauge the mistakes candidates might have made, since the early primaries and, in extreme cases, make necessary changes.
While I might want to change the CRP delegate selection process (I do), I will be unable to lobby for that change, at our state convention, if the Romney rules change is allowed to stand. The Romney rules change requires the RNC to adopt the “California model” for all state parties, thereby creating a top-down convention, which is more like a press conference, than a meeting of committed and interested volunteers.
This was, of course, a beltway establishment GOP move to exclude the “conservative right” (made up of evangelical Christians, tea party activists, gun rights activists, and Liberty Republicans) from having influence on the nomination process. It exists to lock in the power the Republican political consultants have…and it won’t work. The political consultant class is DC-centric with little connection to the heartland. Oftentimes, the consultant class and heartland activists agree on the best candidates and somtimes they don’t. What differentiates the consultant class for the volunteers is motivation: volunteers are motivated on advancing principles in the political process while consultants are motivated by money.
There is nothing wrong with money; I’m a capitalist. But the consultants too often see the “payday” associated with a well-packaged candidate as success rather than the election of one. In 2012, the consultant class backed a candidate, to run as a critic of the most unpopular federal legislation in my lifetime, who’s crowning achievement served as the model for that unpopular federal legislation. That doesn’t offer much of a contrast to the voters and the conservatives in the GOP knew that. The consultant class thought an “anti-Obama” campaign would win, chose the biggest fundraiser, and ran him. The activists knew that the American people vote FOR rather than AGAINST Presidents and were suspicious all along.
Does that mean that a Santorum, Paul, Gingrich (or in the case of a brokered convention, Palin) might have beaten Obama? I don’t know but I do know that Mitt Romney couldn’t win the Presidency, even though I supported the Republican nominee.
Romney never had the grass roots support to wage a big-tent, engage with independents and disaffected Democrats campaign. How could he? He (and his attorney) spat on every one of the conservative activists at the 2012 RNC.
In my next installment, I’ll lay out the “inside baseball” of the RNC Rules Committee meeting, scheduled for April 10-13 in Los Angeles, and make a recommendation for activists to restore the power to the grass roots.