GOP Peparing For Contested Convention

[Jim Lane]

43. Deadlines vary by state. Here's some further information.

There was a good discussion of this subject last week on Electoral-vote.com, with a link to a more detailed discussion by Larry Sabato.

The state deadlines, per the chart at the latter link, run from April 26 to September 9. Depending on the number of signatures required, the practical deadline could be considerably earlier, although of course Trump could pour money into paid signature-gatherers.

If Trump decides after the Republican convention in July that he's been shafted and so should run as an independent, he would have missed some important states, notably Texas (May 9 deadline). He could, however, still qualify in some states where his presence would make a difference. The obvious point is swing states, the deadlines for which are at the electoral-vote.com link. There are several with August deadlines where he could easily qualify. In addition, there are states that everyone is now counting as guaranteed red but where a big enough vote for Trump could give the Democratic nominee a shot at winning. For example, Arizona is one of those September 9 deadline states, and Romney beat Obama by only nine percentage points there. Give Trump 18% of the Arizona vote (the share Perot got nationwide in 1992) and the state could go blue.