The Ted Cruz campaign may not be as dead as once believed. Although the candidate himself dropped out of contention after the Indiana primary, Cruz loyalists and pro-Cruz convention delegates are reportedly planning a committee coup, designed to protect the Republican Party platform from Trump’s influence.
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On Tuesday, Cruz suggested that the race for the Republican nomination remained a going concern, and did not rule out reconstituting his campaign. Picking a nominee “is not a choice that we as voters have to make today,” the senator told conservative radio host Glenn Beck, noting that there is still plenty of time before the Republican convention (in July) and the general election (in November).
“We need to watch and see what the candidates say and do,” Cruz said, adding that he wouldn’t rule out reviving his campaign if “there’s a path to victory.”
Although Cruz has dismantled his national campaign, he’s maintained a presence in North and South Carolina, where the state parties will choose 56 RNC delegates this week. High level Cruz staffers are also, according to Heat Street sources, calling delegates in Texas, looking for confirmation of their support for Ted Cruz and ensuring that they plan to attend the RNC.
The Cruz “zombie campaign” as POLITICO termed it, is alive and well — and vocal — and intent on maximizing Cruz’s impact on the convention, even if it is just to preserve Cruz’s efforts for 2020. Cruz is looking to shape his legacy, and preserving the conservative aspects of the Republican platform could provide him leverage over other future presidential candidates.
According to the New York Times, pro-Cruz forces, led by Ken Cuccinelli, the former Attorney General of Virginia (and former Cruz “delegate wrangler”), are marshaling sympathetic delegates in states Cruz has already won, in an effort to stack the RNC’s Platform and Rules Committees with conservatives who would resist Trump-led, liberalizing changes to the platform, and who could overturn the notorious “Rule 40b” that keeps upstart candidates off the RNC ballot.
This could be why Trump is publicly warning Paul Ryan that his RNC chairmanship is in jeopardy: the chances of a delegate-led mutiny are quite real, and without a Trump ally at the convention helm, a groundswell rebellion could be tougher to quash.
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On Sunday, Cuccinelli sent an email to Cruz delegates that read, “[I]t is imperative that we fill the Rules and Platform Committees with strong conservative voices like yours…That means you need to come to the national convention and support others in coming, too!” But he was only following Cruz’s western operation head, Rob Uithoven’s, lead. “It’s still important that we have a conservative convention … I think we would be doing Ted Cruz a disservice if we gave up that fight,” Uithoven wrote to supporters last week.
Cruz allies confirm that they’re looking, specifically, to counteract Trump’s influence on the party platform, ensuring that the GOP remains “conservative” even if Trump has expressed a desire to liberalize certain aspects, such as the GOP’s hard line on abortion, its support for free trade, its support for low taxes and its opposition to Obamacare. These are all Trump policy positions that much of the #NeverTrump coalition contend underlies their opposition to Trump’s nomination. RNC Chair Reince Priebus tried to settle fears over the platform Monday morning, to no avail.
Cruz’s delegates to the Rules Committee — which includes powerhouse Sen. Mike Lee, who endorsed the his Senate colleague — could overturn Rule 40b, the rule that requires potential nominees to have won a majority in at least eight states, placed in the rulebook in 2012 so that Ron Paul’s delegates would be shut out of the convention process. If there’s any hope of Cruz returning as a convention “White Knight,” Rule 40b must go.
Cruz’s payroll runs out around May 15th, so much of this work will have to be done in the next several days.
Marco Rubio also remains a wild card in the delegate space. He still commands around 50 delegates and, having won two states, will have at least four allies on the Rules Committee. It may not be enough to make a difference, but sources tell Heat Street that Rubio’s delegates are exploring every option they have to make an impact on the RNC process.
RNC chairman Reince Priebus has called on the GOP to unify around Trump, the “presumptive nominee.”
Many Republicans, including a number of prominent donors, have taken the message to heart and are throwing their backing behind Trump.
But some, most notably Paul Ryan, have been hesitant to embrace a candidate whose commitment to conservative principles appears tenuous, at best. The Weekly Standard’s Bill Kristol reportedly met with 2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney in Washington, D.C., last week to discuss the possibility of a third-party run, although former Romney aide Dan Senor was quick to pour cold water on the idea.
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