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HuffPo: "How Paul Ryan Will Pick the Next President" (with a GOP Spoiler Candidate)

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jgwhiteus

Member
Saw this being shared on FB; while the probability of this is rather low and it reads like a conspiracy theory, I thought it was an interesting discussion of how a three-party race could possibly play out, and it did bring up electoral rules under the 12th Amendment with which I'm pretty unfamiliar. The biggest check against this happening is that the third party candidate has to actually steal electoral votes, and most states award electoral votes on a winner-takes-all basis.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/adam-nicholas-phillips/doomsday-savior-how-paul-ryan_b_9474788.html
It’s hidden there in plain sight, even if it hasn’t happened since the election of 1825: The people will not pick the next president, Congress will...

Because there will be a third party candidate — and their name will likely be Mitt with a Kasich or a Rubio on the same ticket
.
Michael Bloomberg practically left a breadcrumb for this theory in plain sight when he declared that he would not be running for President this cycle. While pundits focused on why the math wouldn’t work out for Bloomberg against Trump or Hillary Clinton, the former mayor of New York City buried this interesting analysis in his op-ed this week.

"In a three-way race, it’s unlikely any candidate would win a majority of electoral votes, and then the power to choose the president would be taken out of the hands of the American people and thrown to Congress. The fact is, even if I were to receive the most popular votes and the most electoral votes, victory would be highly unlikely, because most members of Congress would vote for their party’s nominee. Party loyalists in Congress — not the American people or the Electoral College — would determine the next president."
Here’s how it will happen:

Donald Trump is going to win the Republican nomination out right. The establishment won’t be able to stop him. He will get 50 percent. So there will be no brokered convention. There will be no Mitt Romney savior moment in Cleveland.

When Trump secures the nomination out right this summer, the establishment goes ballistic: Terrified at the prospect of losing their party with Donald Trump as president.

Suddenly they realize, “holy shit, what if we could stop Donald Trump and keep Hillary Clinton out of the White House?”

So they run a moderate establishment Republican as a third-party candidate — 100 percent as a spoiler candidate. Worst case scenario oh, they prevent Donald Trump from winning the White House. Best case scenario they pull enough votes away from Hillary Clinton to prevent her from securing the necessary majority of 270 electoral votes.

Then the election goes to a House of Representatives ballot presided over Speaker Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney’s former running mate in 2012.
If neither candidate gets 270 electoral college votes, Congress picks the president. And he will be called President Mitt, the one who is laying the groundwork for this doomsday electoral scenario.

It’s right there, hidden in plain sight in the 12th Amendment of the US Constitution:

The person having the greatest Number of votes for President, shall be the President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed; and if no person have such majority, then from the persons having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the list of those voted for as President, the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President. But in choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by states, the representation from each state having one vote; a quorum for this purpose shall consist of a member or members from two-thirds of the states, and a majority of all the states shall be necessary to a choice.

And Congress can pick whomever they damn well please.
If you remember, in the 1992 election, Bill Clinton was unable to secure a simple majority of the popular vote, with Ross Perot serving as a third party spoiler — not only taking votes away from the Republican incumbent George H.W. Bush, but pinching off the odd moderate vote from the Democrats as well.

But Ross Perot was never able to win a state, thus, he was never awarded any electoral college votes.

In this cycle, however, a third party spoiler candidate could in fact carry a handful of states.
Bloomberg recognized it and realized the grave implications of that type of candidacy — taking the highest elected office in the free world out of the hands of the people and into the hands of a Tea Party-influenced, yet establishment-Republican Congress.

If you are an establishment Republican right now, this is actually an even better outcome than a brokered convention: Because you have even greater control over, not only the conservative nominee, but the ability to handpick the next president.
 
I don't see it. For their premise to work this theoretical third party Mitt ticket would have to steal electoral votes away from Blue states. Can't see that happening with republicans being so divided.
 
All of their options suck, so it wouldn't surprise me if they choose an option that sucks for them. I don't see why Mitt would run just to lose, though.
 
Not seeing how running two Republican candidates would cause Hillary to lose votes. If anything I would think a 3 candidate race would make it even easier for her to win.
 
If they put up a third candidate, they're even dumber than I thought. It will make a Democratic victory even more sure than it already is.
 

Rentahamster

Rodent Whores
Best case scenario they pull enough votes away from Hillary Clinton to prevent her from securing the necessary majority of 270 electoral votes.

Yeah I doubt that. Has this strategy ever worked before in history? The only thing I remember is Perot "spoiling" it for Bush, and Nader "spoiling" it for Gore.
 
Republicans need to run Bernie Sanders as a 3rd party Independent candidate with John Kasich as his running mate. They win Vermont and Ohio maybe 2 other states and chaos ensues.
 
This only happens if Romney and Bernie both run third party. If its Romney, Trump, and Hillary then Hillary will win easily as Romney and Trump will just divide the conservative vote.
 

massoluk

Banned
Uh... That didn't work at all for Theodore Roosevelt, and he's by far the most popular third party ever.

This is impossible with Winner-take-all system.
 

Dishwalla

Banned
Repubs need to take responsibility for the beast that is Donald Trump, let him be their nominee, and deal with it. They are the reason he's as big as he is, so suffer from the consequences. Because they are going to end up losing anyway.
 

Joni

Member
They would split the Republican vote, which is already the minority, and yet somehow win the elections?

That seems... really risky. Do the establishment hate Trump that much more than Clinton?
They'd probably prefer to vote Clinton if it was the Trump-Clinton choice. She is more predictable, which is a good thing. They are getting a normal democrat, that would continue the Obama line. That offers them four to eight years of stability which they can attack in the same fashion.
 

Fuchsdh

Member
A very interesting article, thanks for sharing. As indicated by others and yourself, I agree it's a pretty low chance of success, though it would certainly be a bold move. Running a spoiler candidate would likely just anger the Trump supporters even more and would still siphon more votes from Trump in all likelihood than it would disrupt Clinton's support. I think the issue is that it's much more about people voting for/against Trump than switching party allegiance.
 

Makonero

Member
Republicans need to run Bernie Sanders as a 3rd party Independent candidate with John Kasich as his running mate. They win Vermont and Ohio maybe 2 other states and chaos ensues.

I can imagine Republicans trying to get Bernie to run third party hahahaha
 
If the Republicans created and passed an amendment to allow a President to hold three terms, and they put Obama up as their nominee, then yeah, I could see the vote getting split and Hilldawg not getting enough electoral votes.

Besides that, I can't think of any scenarios where Hilldawg loses (lol going to prison lol notwithstanding) in a three-way race.
 
Why would Democratic voters pick Romney over Hillary? Wouldn't that be required to make this work?

This is more about attracting establishment Republican voters than Democrats. A number of them have threatened to support Clinton over Trump. This gives them someone to vote for and hopefully leeches some support from both Trump and Clinton if Romney is successfully portrayed as a "centrist" candidate.

I mean, that's what they're hoping, anyway. It won't work.
 

Griss

Member
How does the third person running affect Hillary's ability to get votes in any way? It would be that guy vs Trump for the scraps.

Not only that, but it would show the republican primary voters just how much their party thinks of them, and confirm what they all already believe - that the establishment wants nothing to do with them and hates their guts. It would be the end of the party as a believable political institution.
 

Downhome

Member
Fine, lets do this.

Let Clinton run as the democratic nominee, let Trump run as the republican nominee, let the idiots on the right choose Mitt Romney, and then convince Bernie Sanders to run on the left as well. While we are at it we may as well have a full blown battle royal for November.
 

Balphon

Member
A moderate republican presidential candidate who could steal large numbers of Democratic votes is about as likely to actually exist as unicorns.
 
If it all went down like the article suggests, it would be the 2010 midterm elections giving the Democrats one final kick in the butt.
 
The only thing that absolutely guarantees a win for Hillary is Republicans trying to insert a spoiler GOP candidate. Please do it, Republicans. Your ilk is the only thing worse than the fascist, racist and incompetent Trump. Even your own base knows it.
Fine, lets do this.

Let Clinton run as the democratic nominee, let Trump run as the republican nominee, let the idiots on the right choose Mitt Romney, and then convince Bernie Sanders to run on the left as well. While we are at it we may as well have a full blown battle royal for November.
An amount of candidates only viable for alternative vote using countries in a FPTP two party dominated country? Let the fireworks fly!
 

studyguy

Member
I need to see how small a minority of a vote the GOP third party candidate gets. Low enough is just rubbing salt in the wound in terms of how far their party has gotten away from them.
 
Fine, lets do this.

Let Clinton run as the democratic nominee, let Trump run as the republican nominee, let the idiots on the right choose Mitt Romney, and then convince Bernie Sanders to run on the left as well. While we are at it we may as well have a full blown battle royal for November.

Then they really would get to choose the next candidate, because nobody will get enough EVs to win.

Bernie needs to stay out of the GE. He will.
 

M.Bluth

Member
The person who described this election as America's last season and the writers just throwing everything at the wall really got it right.
 

xorx

Banned
They'd probably prefer to vote Clinton if it was the Trump-Clinton choice. She is more predictable, which is a good thing. They are getting a normal democrat, that would continue the Obama line. That offers them four to eight years of stability which they can attack in the same fashion.

Makes sense. I guess having a person they dislike to rally against is really their best option.
 

Salamando

Member
Technically they'd only need the third candidate to win a few key states. Instead of focusing on a national campaign, they focus their efforts on those states, it could work?
 

Brandson

Member
The Republicans would need to find a candidate to run who could win at least one, probably more, states over Clinton and Trump. It's not inconceivable that Cruz could be that person, but he must know that Congress would not select him to be President in such a scenario, so I don't know why he would agree to do it. They could ask Sanders, but he would definitely refuse. Kasich might go for it, but he probably can't beat both Clinton and Trump at the same time anywhere. I wouldn't put it past the current Republican party to try anyway though.
 

Brakke

Banned
Yeah I doubt that. Has this strategy ever worked before in history? The only thing I remember is Perot "spoiling" it for Bush, and Nader "spoiling" it for Gore.

Even that doesn't help us too much. Ross Perot is the most successful third party candidate of all time and he didn't win a single electoral college vote. The crackpot theory in the OP proposes this spoiler candidate actually wins states, and enough to bring Hillary below majority. I think it would be totally unprecedented?
 
Even if this will work, the Republicans will think "let's put the guy in charge who got the least votes and that will totally not come back and bite us later on and piss off about 90% of the nation"?
 
This is more about attracting establishment Republican voters than Democrats. A number of them have threatened to support Clinton over Trump. This gives them someone to vote for and hopefully leeches some support from both Trump and Clinton if Romney is successfully portrayed as a "centrist" candidate.

I mean, that's what they're hoping, anyway. It won't work.

But the map is winnable for Clinton even if she doesn't have defection votes from pissed off establishment Republicans. And people kind of already spoke about Romney in 2012.
 

tim.mbp

Member
Based on the 2012 election, I think a 3rd party candidate would have to take away Florida, Ohio, Virginia, and New Hampshire from the Democratic side. That would have given Obama 268.
 

Kurdel

Banned
I don't see the Republican establishment fearing an out of control Trump presidency, so I don't see this plan going anywhere.
 
Amazing that people get paid to write this shit.

Right? This is the height of silliness.

I mean, this is something they might actually do but the chance of it working out as described here is basically zero.

But the map is winnable for Clinton even if she doesn't have defection votes from pissed off establishment Republicans. And people kind of already spoke about Romney in 2012.

Yeah, I mean, she doesn't even really need those votes which is one of the reasons the strategy's logic is defective.
 

Goro Majima

Kitty Genovese Member
You'd need another strong candidate from the left not the right for this to happen. Basically Bernie running third party.
 

Mengy

wishes it were bannable to say mean things about Marvel
Wow, I could actually see this scenario playing out.
 
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