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IPFS News Link • Politics

Ryan's exit could mean GOP convention chaos

• www.politico.com

In a normal presidential election year, Speaker Paul Ryan would be the only choice to head the GOP convention this summer — just as the No. 1 House Republican has for decades before him.

But now that the Wisconsin Republican and presumptive nominee Donald Trump are at odds — and the speaker has offered to take himself out of the running for the honorary chairman post — the leadership of the convention is up in the air.

Even top officials at the Republican National Committee don't know who's going to be running the show, pointing instead to an obscure committee of more than 100 delegates that will ultimately decide.

Known as the Committee on Permanent Organization, the group of one man and one woman from each state is one of several rules panels handling the process for the convention in July. It's responsible for recommending someone to chair the proceedings in Cleveland, where the party will officially name the 2016 Republican nominee. But with their traditional choice of the highest-ranking House Republican not a lock for the post following the Trump-Ryan standoff, it's unclear who they'd go with.

Another member of Congress? A governor? A Trump supporter? Trump could weigh in himself, too — a request that may be influential, given his all-but-coronated status. And, of course, that also means that Ryan could say no thanks — and the committee could still end up naming him chairman anyway.

"The convention officers are elected through the adoption of the report of the Committee on Permanent Organization," RNC spokeswoman Lindsay Walters said.

If they choose anyone other than Ryan, they'd be breaking with decades of tradition. John Boehner oversaw the GOP nominations of Mitt Romney and John McCain. Dennis Hastert, the coronation of George W. Bush. Newt Gingrich had Bob Dole of Kansas, and before him Bob Michel ran the proceedings that selected Ronald Reagan to run for the White House.

But Ryan said Monday he'd step down as chairman of the Republican National Convention if Trump asks him to, a concession that came amid escalating tensions between the two men following the speaker's decision to withhold support from the presumptive nominee.

On Monday, Ryan was doing a round of local press to kick off the week and told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that he would step aside should the New York billionaire make that request.

"He's the nominee. I'll do whatever he wants with respect to the convention," Ryan said.

When asked over the weekend whether he would try to remove Ryan from his convention post, Trump left the possibility open but did not explicitly call for the speaker to vacate the position, whose holder essentially runs the main GOP event.


 


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