Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
Campaign Launched to Free the Delegates
A grassroots campaign has begun to unbind the delegates to the Republican National Convention so they can be free to nominate a candidate more worthy of the presidency than Donald Trump.
The “Free the Delegates” campaign was initiated by Kendal Unruh, a Cruz delegate from Colorado and a member of the convention rules committee. Unruh is a high school social studies teacher and a conservative Christian with the moral firmness of solid rock. Here she is, explaining her position in an interview on nationwide television.
The campaign began with the issuing of a delegates’ Declaration of Independence stating the case for unbinding the convention. It reads in part;
To our fellow Republicans: We, the undersigned, have decided to come forward “for such a time as this.”…
The rules of the Republican Party have been clear since its first convention in Philadelphia. Delegates can’t be forced to do something which violates their own conscience. Rule 38 clearly states “No delegate or alternate delegate shall be bound by any attempt of any state of Congressional district to impose the unit rule. A ‘unit rule’ prohibited by this section means a rule or law under which a delegation at the national convention casts its entire vote as a unit as determined by a majority vote of the delegation.”
The Constitution protects freedom of association. It is unconstitutional for state governments to violate the First Amendment by mandating the manner in which private citizens govern private institutions (see Cousins v. Wigoda). About the most un-Republican thing the party of Lincoln and Reagan can do is compelling its members to violate their own conscience. And that is particularly true since ours was a party founded by those who refused to violate their consciences as one-time members of the Whig Party. Beyond simply being illegal, such an act is a repudiation of everything it means to be a Republican.
For these reasons, we the undersigned, who have been duly elected as delegates of the Republican Party to represent the interest of our fellow Republicans, consider ourselves unbound and will vote accordingly at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland July 18-21….
We delegates are the closest representation of the base of our party. We are elected officials as well as everyday activists. And because we stand on principle before all else, we are the GOP’s lifeblood. It is time for actual Republicans to determine who our nominee will be once more. Much time, talent, and treasure has been volunteered in order to be delegates to the Republican Party and, in so doing, preserve the conservative platform for which it stands, ensure its integrity and strengthen its legacy. Now, more than ever, with American Exceptionalism teetering on the brink of history, the American people and our cherished Constitution both need the real Republican Party to please stand up. That is our charge to keep in Cleveland, and keep it we will.
On the evening of June 19, delegates attracted by the call held a telecom, and the campaign has now taken off nationwide, breaking press in the Washington Post shortly thereafter.
Trump supporters have responded to the initiative with rage, attacking Unruh and her collaborators with an avalanche of venomous abuse, as exemplified by clinically interesting pieces of hysteria like this.
I don’t think they are going to have much luck with such tactics. This lady is not for turning.
If you want to join the campaign to free the delegates, you can do so at on Facebook at Free the Delegates 2016 or via the internet website at www.freethedelegates.com.
Published in General
Seems that’s what most early Trump supporters have been rooting for.
Now it’s a problem?
No, the loss can be pinned squarely – and fairly – on Trump himself.
When he loses, for surely he will, much will be made of how Republicans failed to coalesce around Trump, much as it was (wrongly) said so of Romney.
Romney got 61 million votes or so – just one million shy of George W. Bush’s total in 2004. If Trump gets 55 million votes he’ll have done well by an admittedly low standard of “well.”
Whose fault will that be? The people who were waiting and looking for any sign that Trump would be an improvement over the available alternative but never saw one? Or is it the candidate’s fault for failing to signal that he was ready to pick up the mantle of fundamental seriousness?
Let me say this in praise of Trump: the Firing of Corey Lewandowski is a step in the right direction. One step on a long path of redemption between here and Cleveland in order to earn my (admittedly superfluous in Louisiana) vote.
Until such time I will actively work to undermine him and ensure that people understand that he does not represent me or my vision for the American Republic.
The honest men and women who stood in line and cast their votes for this candidate in overwhelming numbers are the GOP’s lifeblood. He won almost 4,000,000 more votes than Romney Turncoat did in 2012.
So that’s the fall back if Trump goes down? If Trump carries on his present idea of a “campaign” and loses, there is one person to blame–Trump.
As much as I’ve enjoyed reading this on numerous occasions, it really proves nothing. Each nominating process has its own unique set of circumstances. Or should we compare the non-Trump percentage of the vote to the non-Turncoat percentage of the vote?
We knew exactly who we were voting for and why. This party needs a good shaking up by someone who isn’t afraid to tell it like it is instead of being afraid of its own shadow as has been the custom for the last few years. The so called conservative religious right ruined our brand long before Trump came along. And by the way, in this country we leave it up to the individual to register his/her party. Who are you to decide what a Republican is or isn’t? Aren’t we the big tent party?
Who did you blame for Romney’s loss in 2012?
Good luck with President Hillary Clinton.
The American people.
Barack Obama got 65 million votes in 2012 – GWB on his best day got just 62.
Obama had deep popularity with the young, minorities, urban whites and even suburbanites. In my estimation, Romney was a fine and even an acceptable candidate to a large segment of the electorate. It’s just that Obama was a) already President and had the advantages which incumbency brings, b) skilled at driving first-time and young voters into voting for him, and c) improved the built-in advantages that Democrats tend to have in the Electoral college because a disproportionate number of the largest states are heavily Democrat.
We’re going to get that whether I support him or not.
That could have been avoided if we hadn’t nominated the man.
And that’s exactly what the #NeverTrump people want. I also suspect some serious George Soros money behind this movement. The dems are very, very good at dividing and conquering.
I’m waiting for my check. Where do I sign up so I can at least monetize my principled stand?
The candidate always bears the responsibility. Romney’s “get out the vote” apparatus was reportedly a nightmare. Did he design it? No. Is he ultimately responsible? Yes.
And the more the candidate makes himself/herself the focus of the campaign and forgoes necessary methodology, the more responsibility he/she bears. That, IMO, is what we’re looking at here.
He was also a weak candidate. I happen to know two life-long Republicans who did not vote for him because of that. I did vote for him as I have voted for the nominee of the Republican party for every election in the last 50 years. Since he’s become such a turncoat, I would seriously love to take that vote back.
Oh, they’re much more subtle than that. I wouldn’t be at all surprised to find out major dem checks being written right now for the Free the Delegates movement right alongside you #NeverTrump people. Hillary must be loving this.
The numbers disagree with you. If he was a weak candidate you might have expected him to significantly underperform President Bush. If Romney was weak, what was McCain? Somnambulent? Incontinent?
It’s not that Romney was a weak candidate, it’s that Obama was a much stronger candidate. On raw vote totals, Romney was the second best candidate Republicans have ever run.
Wrong. Apparently to some nevertrumpers absence of outright condemnation equals support. Then Levin openly left Trump several months ago, but you don’t listen to him so how would you know?
If I send him my address, can I expect a check?
We will agree to disagree. As was noted above, he received 60+ million votes against a sitting president with the most sophisticated campaign apparatus in history. He kicked Obama from here to Bora Bora in the first debate, but failed to capitalize on it. That’s on him.
As to the issue of him being a turncoat, I’d prefer to think that he has the right to say what he thinks, and certainly when the primary campaign was ongoing.
Something something …. nothing, nothing.
Hillary loved it when Trump became a serious threat to win the nomination. This is all just mop-up.
The Clintons are smart – but not omniscient. They knew they were going to have a tough road to election if basically any candidate but Trump emerged from the Republican field based upon the polling. The one candidate who could conceivably lay an egg? It was always known to be Trump.
With this in mind I could just as easily blame the Trump people for losing us a winnable election, couldn’t I? I’ve been anti-Trump since the day of his announcement, so I’m no johnny-come-lately to this party.
Yes. I voted for him too as well as his seriously undereducated running mate.
But the GOP needed a good shake up. So now it’s a problem the party isn’t unified enough to beat Hillary?
It’s weird how when you shake things up they tend to become less solid.*
*except for non-Newtonian fluids. I don’t expect anybody to convincingly make the case that Trump is to the Republican party what Corn Starch is to fluid mechanics.
He only left him when it became evident that Trump was gonna actually win…. Before that he was happy to use Trump to whip the establishment over the head. Obviously Levin never read Frankenstein in his youth….
You guys convinced me.
If they go forward the chaos will be indescribable. If they don’t go forward the chaos will be indescribable. H..m.m.m.m.m. I seem to be repeating myself. There’s a part of me that says, aw, why not, let’s see what happens. I can guess, however, that all the delegates will not vote their consciences and will fall in line and vote for Trump. Boy, do I sound cynical.
Its so convenient to assume the worst motivations for your opponent isn’t? Its almost like one is making a straw man to destroy….
Yeah, who gives a rats behind what the voters actually did in all those primaries. Bunch of nobodies anyway. Who needs em.
Me too.