Donald Trump’s race toward 1,237 delegates — the number he would need to win a first-ballot election for the Republican presidential nomination — is prompting some observers to look more closely at the process by which delegates are awarded. Blake Neff of the Daily Caller suggests those who look too closely might end up with more questions than answers.
While many people are aware of winner-take-all and proportional delegate states, the way Republicans allocate delegates has many bizarre quirks that have largely escaped notice, which could have major consequences in a close election season that could end with a contested convention. …
… 1. The GOP’s rules heavily reward small Republican-controlled states.
Much like the Electoral College itself, the Republican primary process allocates delegates by states, but not in proportion to population. The largest state, California, has 172 delegates, but every state also has a minimum of 16 delegates, meaning the largest state only has about 10 times the delegates of the smallest state, even though California is over 40 times the size of several small states like Wyoming, Vermont and Delaware. …
… 2. Electoral votes matter, but in an odd way.
In addition to rewarding states that have Republican officeholders, the Republican National Committee also rewards states that voted Republican in the most recent presidential election. But once again, the reward is calculated in an odd way that heavily favors smaller states.
Instead of giving states a delegate boost equal to their electoral vote total, states that voted Republican in 2012 are rewarded a bonus delegate count based on the following formula: 4.5 + (0.6 x [2012 electoral vote total]). …
… 3. Tiny U.S. territories are ridiculously overrepresented.
While U.S. territories can’t vote in national elections, the Republican and Democratic parties both give them delegates for nominating presidential candidates. Sen. Marco Rubio’s biggest delegate win, in fact, came from picking up all 23 of Puerto Rico’s delegates.
But Puerto Rico isn’t the only U.S. territory. The Republican Party also gives nine delegates each to Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands, American Samoa, and the Northern Mariana Islands.
