[EL] Interesting National Popular Vote effect on GOP delegates to national conventions

[Sean Parnell]

This morning I stumbled across an interesting little factoid regarding the
National Popular Vote and its impact on the number of delegates each state
sends to the Republican National Convention. I suspect everyone on the list
understands that under NPV, a state's electoral votes wouldn't necessarily
be cast for the candidate receiving the most votes in a given state, and
most are also probably aware that under the way the RNC awards delegates,
states get "bonus" delegates for things like having a Republican governor or
having a majority in either or both of the state's legislative chambers. And
of course a state also gets bonus delegates if the party's nominee wins the
state.

 

Here's the rub, though - the way the Republican rules are written, the bonus
delegates go to states whose electoral votes go to the party's nominee (you
can read the rule here:
https://s3.amazonaws.com/prod-static-ngop-pbl/docs/Rules_of_the_Republican+P
arty_FINAL_S14090314.pdf, it's Rule 14 (5) ). Obviously, even if a state
votes for the Republican, but its electoral votes go to the Democrat under
NVP, they don't get the bonus delegates.

 

RNC rules can be changed, of course, but apparently not easily. Meaning
that, in all likelihood, a Republican state legislator in a reliably* "red"
state voting for NPV would be voting to reduce his or her state's delegation
to the national convention in the event the national vote was determined to
have gone for the Democrat. For example, if South Carolina were to be a
member of the compact, and the Democrat was determined to be the NPV winner
while the Republican candidate won the state, if I've done my math correctly
there delegation would be cut from 50 to 41, using 2016 numbers, while
Tennessee would go from 58 to 43.

 

Best,

 

Sean Parnell

President, Impact Policy Management LLC

Alexandria, Virginia

571-289-1374

sean at impactpolicymanagement.com

 

*In a year when polls suggest Clinton could beat Trump in Utah, it's
probably worth re-considering the entire notion of whether states are really
reliable for one party or the other, but that's for another time.

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