As we head into the last week of February, we are also reaching the end of the authorized early primaries.  Under the respective rules of the two parties, there is a preliminary window in which only some states were authorized to hold early primaries/caucuses.  For the Republicans, the “regular” primary window opens on March 1.  For Democrats, the “regular” primary window opens on the first Tuesday in March (March 5).

For this last week, we have three primaries on the book.  First up, today, is the South Carolina Republican primary.  South Carolina law allows the parties to choose the date of their own primary, and the two parties have tended to choose different dates (but usually a Saturday).  And so we had the Democratic primary several weeks back which was won by President Joe Biden.  Now, it’s the Republican primary.  While there are seven candidates on the ballot, two of them are not known nationally, and three of the nationally-known candidates have dropped out.  In other words, while five of the candidates may get some votes, there are only two with any chance of winning delegates — former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley and a candidate who ineligible to be president, Donald Trump.  South Carolina Republicans use a “winner-take-most” system for allocating delegates.  In other words, each congressional district has three delegates and whomever wins that district gets all three delegates.  Likewise, there are twenty-nine at-large delegates, and whomever wins the state gets all twenty-nine delegates.  Especially with only two serious candidates in the races, whomever wins statewide will have won at least one congressional district (and probably will have won more than one).  Thus, the winner of the primary is guaranteed to take at least 32 of the 50 delegates (which is why this type of system is referred to as winner-take-most).  Despite the fact that Nikki Haley used to be the governor of South Carolina, the traditional Republican Party in South Carolina is dead and has been replaced by the Trump Party.  While anybody who did not vote in the Democratic Primary could theoretically vote in the Republican Primary, there probably will not be enough independents and Democrats voting to save the Republican Party from itself.  Polls show Donald Trump leading by a wide enough margin that he should win all fifty delegates, and the only question is whether Nikki Haley can make it close enough to steal a district or two.

On Tuesday, we will primaries for both parties in Michigan.  President Joe Biden should win the state easily.  Neither Representative Dean Phillips nor Marianne Williamson is a serious contender to reach the fifteen percent to win delegates.  The real contender to take delegates away from President Biden is “uncommitted.”  Representative Rashida Tlaib has been encouraging voters to vote for uncommitted in protest of President Biden’s middle of the road stance on Israel’s response to Hamas’s invasion of Israel.  While the pro-Palestinian progressive wing of the Democratic Party has a problem with Israel trying to remove Hamas from the Gaza Strip, if President Biden were to do what they want him to do, it would guarantee Donald Trump’s victory in November.  If uncommitted stays below 15% (state-wide or in any individual district), President Biden will win all of the delegates (state-wide or in that district).  The largest districts have seven delegates; so it is unlikely that uncommitted will get more than one delegate in any individual district.  The one exception to that might be Representative Tlaib’s district.  And the issue in that district will be whether uncommitted can get to the 21% necessary to win a second delegate.  If uncommitted does not win any delegates in that district, we could see a primary challenge to Representative Tlaib emerge.  State-wide, there are twenty-five at-large delegates and fifteen party-leader delegates.  As such, if uncommitted were to get to fifteen percent state-wide, uncommitted would get, at least, four at-large and two party-leader delegates.   But the expectation is that President Biden will win almost all of the 117 delegates at stake on Tuesday.

Given that the Michigan Republican primary is in violation of the Republican rules, the Michigan Republicans are resurrecting the Texas two step.  As long-time readers may recall, for a long period, Texas Democrats had their own unique method of allocating delegates.  One set of delegates would be elected using the results of the primary.  At the same time, a second step of delegates would be allocated via a caucus-convention system.

Technically, to comply with the Republican rules, the Michigan Republican Primary is nonbinding.  However, the expectation is that the Republican state convention will use the results of the primary to allocate the at-large delegates.  As in South Carolina, there are only two candidates with any chance to get enough votes to win delegates — Nikki Haley and Donald Trump.  There are 16 delegates at issue.  Assuming that both Haley and Trump get to the 12.5% to qualify for delegates, each delegate represents about 6.33% of the vote.  If there are any unallocated delegates, those delegates will go to the state-wide winner (probably Donald Trump).

A week from today (March 2), the Republicans will hold a state convention (which since it is after March 1 complies with the Republican Party rules).  Aside from allocating the at-large delegates, the convention will hold district caucuses.  Each caucus gets to allocate three delegates.  In any district in which a candidate gets 50% of the votes, that candidate gets all three delegates.  If there are enough delegates supporting “other” candidates to keep the winner below fifty percent, the winner (probably Donald Trump) will get two delegates and the second place candidate (probably Nikki Haley) will get one delegate.  The reality is that Donald Trump will get a large majority of the fifty-five delegates at stake.

The next week is going to be a tragic week for this country.  The Republican Party has a chance to put loyalty to country and the traditional values underlying American Democracy ahead of blind loyalty to a demagogue.  They will not do so.  And so we continue our march toward the biggest election since the election of 1860.  The results could determine if the U.S. remains a global leader of constitutional democracy or if we slide into autocracy.