Ted Cruz continues to prove his is the most organized campaign in the Republican field. The Texas senator is maximizing the delegates he can count on at this summer’s Republican National Convention by exploiting both the party’s rules and the failure of his chief rival, Donald Trump, to capitalize on his own primary wins. The latest example comes from North Dakota, where the state’s GOP convention held this weekend selected its slate of 25 delegates to the convention in Cleveland.
The Washington Post‘s Dave Weigel reports:
Weigel adds that just 1 of the 25 elected delegates can be considered an “obvious” Trump supporter, while several others considered friendly to Trump were defeated by Cruz supporters. That’s bad enough for Trump, but what’s worse is that the Trump supporter with the highest profile in the state didn’t even bother putting his name forward to be a delegate.
That would be North Dakota’s lone congressman Kevin Cramer, whose endorsement the Trump campaign trumpeted on Saturday. As the state’s at-large House member, Cramer ought to have had an easy time getting a slot on the slate of 6 delegates put forth by the state GOP; the Republican governor and attorney general are among those who were elected delegates. But Cramer, who would have been a reliable pro-Trump vote at the convention, didn’t even try, telling Weigel he wanted “someone else to have the chance.”
Cruz’s banner weekend in North Dakota is the latest in a pattern of the Texan showing organizational strength in a presidential primary that could be decided in Cleveland this July.
In Louisiana, where Trump narrowly edged out Cruz in the primary, Cruz’s campaign has worked to grab the five delegates awarded to former candidate Marco Rubio as well as five other officially unpledged delegates. Securing most of those 10 would give him a delegate advantage in Louisiana. Cruz is working to do something similar in Tennessee, where Trump has won the majority of elected delegates but an additional 14 put up by the state party are likely friendly to Cruz (or at least hostile to Trump).
And in Arizona, David Drucker of the Washington Examiner reports Cruz is recruiting delegates to fill that state’s slate to the convention. Trump won Arizona and all 58 of its delegates, but those delegates are only bound to the GOP frontrunner through the first ballot. If the nomination is contested in Cleveland, Cruz is counting on defections from these friendly delegates.
The Cruz machinations have raised concerns within Trump’s campaign, with Trump hiring veteran GOP delegate pro Paul Manafort in recent days and even threatening to sue the Republican National Committee. The New York reality TV star met with RNC leadership last week and reportedly chastised his own staff for failing to be prepared for a contested fight over delegates.
