GOP's primaries using bad math to assign delegates
By Ismar Volić / For The Conversation
Republicans around the country are picking a nominee to run for president. However, their process — designed and run by the party, not government officials — is a mess of flawed mathematics that can end up delivering a result that’s in conflict with the person most voters actually support.
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Splitting votes among many candidates: In 2016, former President Donald Trump became the Republican choice, having won 44.9 percent of the votes cast in primaries. That was nearly twice the share of votes won by the runner-up, Ted Cruz, who had 25.1 percent of the primary votes. But during primary season, polls suggested that in head-to-head primaries, Trump would have lost not only to Cruz, but also to third-place Republican finisher John Kasich and Marco Rubio, who placed fourth.
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An attempt at proportional representation: The Republican Party says its primaries are meant to encourage proportional assignment of delegates to candidates. So if a candidate wins, say, 40 percent of the votes, she should win as close to 40 percent of the delegates as possible.
This sounds reasonable, and it aligns with most people’s notion of fairness. For primaries taking place before March 15, the Republican Party mandates proportional allocation, but with lots of exceptions that can effectively turn the election into winner-take-all or winner-take-most. After March 15, the exceptions become the norm, pulling the outcome further from proportional representation.
https://www.heraldnet.com/opinion/comment-gops-primaries-using-bad-math-to-assign-delegates/
