Valley expert says brokered GOP convention unlikely
Mar 14, 2016, 8:00 AM
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks alongside a member of the Secret Service during a campaign stop at the Savannah Center, Sunday, March 13, 2016, in West Chester, Ohio. (AP Photo/John Minchillo)
(AP Photo/John Minchillo)
PHOENIX — There are some Republican Party leaders that are desperately hoping that Donald Trump won’t reach the 1,237 delegates needed to clinch the nomination. If he comes up short, it could force a brokered convention and KTAR political expert Mike O’Neil says that could be a nightmare for the party.
“If the convention is truly deadlocked and Trump has 45 percent of the votes and the rest are distributed, I don’t think they can go to Ted Cruz, John Kasich or Marco Rubio,” O’Neil said. “I think they have to go to somebody who hasn’t been beaten.”
So it’s unclear who the GOP would try to replace Trump with, but O’Neil says the Republican nominee in 2012, Mitt Romney, is unlikely to be the choice.
“We haven’t had a brokered convention since the television age started,” O’Neil added. “We would have reporters scattered all over the place with massive numbers of angry people, especially Trump supporters. I have no idea where we’d go with this. It would absolutely be uncharted territory.”
The last brokered convention for Republicans came in 1948 when they chose New York Governor Thomas Dewey after three ballots.
