Donald Trump’s central complaint about how Republicans choose a presidential nominee isn’t that Colorado picked the wrong method of selecting delegates. It’s that the requirement that a candidate get a majority of delegates to win the nomination is too onerous, and that a plurality should suffice. When his op-ed in today’s Wall Street Journal says he intends to win the nomination through votes, not nefarious insider maneuverings, that’s what is meant: He is very likely going to win the most votes, though not a majority, and he thinks that should entitle him to the nomination.
Many Trump critics have noted that the process is already “rigged” in favor of Trump: He has won a higher percentage of bound delegates than of votes. Of course the system was not designed to benefit Trump specifically. It was, however, designed to help frontrunners.
Neither feature of the process—that it helps frontrunners, and that it does not guarantee weak frontrunners the nomination—strikes me as problematic. The party should be encouraged to consolidate behind a candidate; but if a majority of the party holds back from supporting a candidate, even with that encouragement, the process should not give him the nomination.
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