Bad News from Little Beirut: A Rovian Analysis of the Remaining Republican Primary

Results of the 2016 Republican Primary in the northeast, after April 19 New York primary. Trump (red) won every county in the Empire State except Manhattan) which he narrowly lost to Kasich. At the other end of the ferry line, he had his best showing in the entire state, winning the borough of Staten Island with 82% of the vote (My curiosity led me to find out that he carried a certain to-remain-unnamed district in the middle of the South Shore, between New Dorp and Great Kills, with almost 87%). This is probably something that gave great pause to the New York-based press,  a signal that the revolution was at their very doorstep across the harbor.

Current bound Trump delegates after winning in New York: 845 (by some reckonings)

Total number of bound delegates available on Tuesday in the "Northeast Primary": 118 (would be 172, but only 17 of the 71 delegates in Pennsylvania are bound to the winner).

Minimum number Trump will probably win, given the latest polls and trends: +110

Minimum number of bound delegates he will have a week from now: 955

Number of delegates available on June 7 in California and New Jersey: +223

Number he needs to get by convention: 1237

Number he needs to have, going into June 7, for a sweep in Calif. and New Jersey to seal the nomination for him: 1237 - 223 = 1014

Number of delegates he still needs to get, from some other state or source along the way: 1014-955=59

Number available in Indiana on May 3: 57.

The delegate slate in Indiana will be entirely Establishment Cruz supporters, but they will evidently be forced to vote for the winner of the state (likely Trump) at least on the first ballot.

Number of delegates Trump would still need to get, provided he wins Indiana: 2

The week after Indiana, on May 10, comes West Virginia (36 delegates) and Nebraska (34 delegates), Cruz is actually leading in Nebraska at this point. The Cornhusker State may be his last shot at a win.

Trump would dominate the West Virginia vote, were it held in direct fashion, but the situation in the Mountain State Republican primary is whack. Folks there apparently vote for the delegate individually by name, and the affiliation of the delegate is not necessary even known. So who knows who they will vote for. The upshot is that May 10, as far as bound delegates go, may well be a shutout for Trump. It has to be, actually, or else Trump will effectively put it away at the end of the evening on the 10th.

But if he does indeed get shut out on May 10, he may have wait another week to all-but seal the nomination, when he has the chance pick a few more bound delegates.

This should be a piece of cake because the next state, which has 28 delegates, is not winner take all. Instead it divides it bound delegates in proportion to the vote, in a very fair democratic fashion, even for the Republicans.

It's the only state this late in the calendar in the Republican primary that divides it delegates so fairly that way A candidate need win only about four percent of the vote to get his first delegate, and so on from there.

Of course, this state that votes on May 17 that divides its delegates this way is Oregon.

Oregon is the opposite of winner-take-all. The way the Oregon primary works, even if Trump were to lose the vote to Cruz and/or Kasich, so long as he didn't completely tank, and were able to pull in at least 10%, it is probable the Beaver State would wind up giving him enough bound delegates to put him within the "red zone" going into June 7, where a sweep in California and New Jersey (and even disregarding the other states voting on that day), would put him over the top.

That's providing that unbound delegates from Pennsylvania or West Virginia haven't already done so by this point, or that he hasn't won Nebraska, in which case it will have been over after May 10.

After Oregon, his opponents would have to win everything left: Washington (44 delegates on April 24), as well as the other June 7 states of South Dakota (where he is leading), Montana (where he is leading), and New Mexico (where Cruz is leading, but which is not winner take all). They would have to somehow find a week to poach delegates from Trump in California, where Trump leads in every Congressional district in the state (each one of which is winner-take-all for three delegates).

But it would not be over. From there until the convention, even the slightest defection of delegates from any other candidate would start putting Trump in landslide territory going into the last round. At that point, and all the way to the convention, it would be up to his opponents to furiously hold the line on their own guys. It would be brutal and hopeless, to prevent the leakage from their ranks. Trump would be in the catbird seat, doing the schmooze with the delegates, knowing that he would need to convince only a tiny number of them in order to win on the first ballot. He would have six weeks to do nothing else but this. His opponents know this and can see it coming. They don't see any way to prevent it.

Moreover, everything written above is pretty much the worst case scenario for Trump.

That's why even the master is jumping ship.

Always win---even if you have to change sides. Just never be on the losing side.

But the old man is too old to change. No doubt he will go down, yelling at the television, whenever that "horrible man" comes on. It will not help that Oregon, a state that he probably has little love for, may be the ones that effectively seals the deal. 

No matter how it plays out, Trump will go into June 7 still needing California and New Jersey to put him over the top. Thus the California primary is guaranteed to be contested, unless Cruz and Kasich have thrown in the towel by then (which is quite possible). The only question will be whether a victory in California barely puts him over the top, or puts him over the top in a big landslide going into the convention.