Caucus, primary or convention, how Republicans actually pick a nominee

Picture three rooms, all on the same evening, all choosing a Republican nominee.

In the first, there is a quiet line at an elementary school. A man in a work jacket takes a paper ballot, steps into a booth, marks a name, and is home before the casserole is cold. In the second, there is a school gym in winter. Folding chairs, a dozen neighbours standing up to give speeches for their candidates, coffee in paper cups, and a show of hands or a handwritten ballot passed down the row. In the third, a convention hall full of delegates with credentials around their necks. Roll calls. Points of order. Somebody in a blazer is explaining to the chair that the motion is out of order.

Same party. Same office, possibly. Three completely different ways of choosing, and I'll tell you something that campaign professionals know and ordinary voters often do not: the method changes who wins. Not always. Not by a mile. But enough that a smart candidate studies the rules before he studies the polls, and a smart volunteer picks which effort to join based on how the nominee will be chosen.

First, define the terms

Let me put on my debater's hat. There are five main systems, and each has variations. I will use plain names.

1. Primary election. The party's voters choose a nominee in an election run by the state, with state-printed ballots, at ordinary polling places, over a day (plus early or mail voting where the state allows it). Most Republican nominations for Congress, governor and the legislature in most states are decided this way.
2. Runoff. A second election between the top two finishers, held when no one wins a required share in the first. Several Southern states, including Texas, Georgia and Alabama, use runoffs.
3. Caucus. A meeting, run by the party and not by the state, where participants gather at a set time and place, hear speeches and then vote. Iowa Republicans have been the best-known example, with a vote in the room at each precinct.
4. Convention. A meeting of delegates, chosen earlier at lower-level meetings or by voters, who vote for the nominee. Some states use conventions for particular offices, and conventions, along with primaries, are how most nominating happens for presidential candidates at the national level.
5. Hybrids. Many states mix: a convention that picks a nominee unless a challenger collects enough support to force a primary, or a convention route and a signature route running side by side.

The table

Read each row as a tendency, not a law. Now let me go through the systems one by one and say which candidate each one tends to favour.

Primaries: open, closed and in between

The difference between the three kinds is who is allowed to pick the Republican ballot.

In a closed primary, only voters registered as Republicans can vote in the Republican contest. Florida and Pennsylvania are examples. If you are registered as something else, you cannot take part, and you must change your registration before the state's deadline if you want to.

In a semi-closed primary, registered Republicans vote in the Republican primary, and unaffiliated voters may choose a party's ballot on the day. New Hampshire is a familiar example, and Oklahoma Republicans have also allowed unaffiliated voters to take part. This is the system the Supreme Court had in view in Clingman v. Beaver (2005), when it upheld Oklahoma's rule limiting the Libertarian Party's primary to its own members and unaffiliated voters, rather than opening it to every registered voter.

In an open primary, voters do not register by party at all, or may pick a party's ballot in the booth regardless of registration. Michigan and Wisconsin are examples. The Republican Party itself usually does not get to say who can vote, because the state sets the rules. That is a fight for another day, but the Supreme Court has said that a party has a First Amendment right to associate with whom it chooses, and in Tashjian v. Republican Party of Connecticut (1986) it held that Connecticut could not stop the Republican Party from opening its primary to independents. In California Democratic Party v. Jones (2000) it struck down California's blanket primary because it forced parties to associate with voters who were not members.

There is also the top-two system, used in Washington and California, which is not a party primary at all. All candidates run on one ballot, and the top two vote-getters advance to November regardless of party. Washington's version was upheld in Washington State Grange v. Washington State Republican Party (2008). In a top-two system the party does not choose a nominee in the sense this post means. A party can endorse, but the label on the ballot is a candidate's own preference.

Who wins in a primary? The candidate with name recognition, money and a message that a large, relatively diffuse electorate will accept. In a closed primary the electorate is the base. In an open one it reaches further. A primary rewards the campaign that can buy mail, broadcast time and digital reach, and the candidate who has been on television for years. It also rewards the candidate who can win a plurality in a crowded field. With six candidates, the winner might be the one with a third of the vote, not a majority.

Runoffs: the second round

A runoff exists to make sure a nominee has a majority. Texas requires one when no candidate in a party primary gets more than half. Georgia does as well, with a majority of at least 50 percent plus one needed to avoid it. Alabama likewise. The rule varies, so check your state.

Here is a quick hypothetical to show how it works. Say five Republicans run for one office and the first-round results are 34, 28, 17, 13 and 8 percent. That adds up to 100, since 34 plus 28 is 62, plus 17 is 79, plus 13 is 92, plus 8 is 100. The leader has a third of the vote and not a majority, so the top two go to the runoff. The 38 percent who voted for the other three, 17 plus 13 plus 8, now decide it, if they return. That is the main thing a runoff rewards: the candidate who can win over the supporters of the losers, and the campaign that can keep its own voters coming back for a second election, often with lower turnout.

Runoffs help candidates who are widely acceptable and sometimes hurt candidates who excite a passionate minority but are hard for others to accept. They also cost more, and they ask voters to come back. If you are a volunteer, a runoff means another round of door-knocking and phone calls in a short window. See Can I vote in the Republican primary? Your registration questions answered for how runoffs fit into the voter's questions.

Caucuses: the gym on a winter night

The caucus is the most demanding system on the voter. You must show up at a set time. You must stay. In an Iowa Republican caucus the typical sequence is that participants gather in the precinct, supporters of each candidate may speak, and then attendees cast a ballot, which is counted and reported. It is a party meeting, run by the party, not an election run by the state.

The strengths are real. A caucus rewards organization. A candidate who has found and committed supporters in every precinct, who has a captain in each room and who can get a few dozen people to turn out on a cold night has a decisive advantage over a candidate who is merely well known. It rewards retail politics, because the voters have met the candidates, often several times, and they come ready to speak. It rewards intensity, since a person who will spend two hours in a gym is a person who cares. And it makes the parties' activists the electorate.

The weaknesses are equally real. A caucus excludes anyone who works the evening shift, anyone who cannot get childcare, anyone who is homebound and anyone who has to travel for work. It produces low turnout, which means a small group decides. And it can produce a nominee who is the favourite of the activists but who is not the favourite of the whole party.

If you are a volunteer and you live in a caucus state, this is the place where a few hours of your time are worth more than money. A neighbour who brings three friends moves the count.

Conventions: delegates decide

A convention is a meeting of delegates. The delegates are chosen earlier, in precinct and county meetings or by a vote of the party's members, and then the delegates vote on the nominee. At the national level the convention is how a presidential nominee is formally chosen, and the delegates are bound or unbound according to rules explored in how delegates are chosen and what they really do at a national convention.

At the state level, conventions are used for particular offices in particular states:

• Utah has a convention route and a signature-gathering route to the primary ballot, and candidates may use either or both.
• Colorado parties hold assemblies where candidates seek support to be placed on the ballot, and candidates may alternatively gather petition signatures.
• Connecticut holds party conventions that endorse candidates, and a challenger who gets a set share of the convention vote can force a primary.
• Virginia lets each party decide its own nominating method for many offices. In 2013 the Virginia Republican Party used a convention to choose its nominee for governor, and in 2021 it used a ranked-choice process run by the party, sometimes called an unassembled convention, to choose its statewide nominees.

Who does the convention reward? The activists. The person who has spent a decade showing up at county meetings, who has been elected a delegate again and again and who knows the other delegates by first name. A convention rewards the candidate who has been working the party apparatus, and it can pick a nominee who is a better fit for the party's grassroots than for the general electorate. It is a system that punishes a candidate who has money but no relationships, and that rewards a candidate with friends. That is a feature to its defenders and a bug to its critics, and both are partly right.

The 1976 Republican convention, in Kansas City, is the best modern example of a nomination that was actually decided by delegates in the hall. See The 1976 Kansas City Convention and the Last Real Fight Over the Nomination for the story.

The history of how we got here

Republicans did not always use primaries. For much of the party's early history, nominees were chosen at conventions, often in a hall where state bosses negotiated delegate votes. The primary system spread in the early twentieth century as a reform and has been the dominant method ever since. For a history of that transition, see How Republicans Pick Nominees from Party Bosses to Primaries and Caucuses, and for the story of how the 2016 field narrowed, see The 2016 Republican Primary and How a Field of Seventeen Became One.

The case for each, and the case against

The fairest way to compare is to give each system its best defender.

For the primary: it brings the most voters in, it protects the secret ballot, it treats the working shift worker and the retiree alike and it is run by a neutral state office, not by party insiders. Against: it favours money and name recognition, and plurality wins in crowded fields can nominate someone most of the party did not choose.

For the runoff: it ensures a majority and punishes candidates who cannot widen their support. Against: it costs more, it lowers turnout and it can hand an advantage to the candidate who finished first in the first round even though a majority voted against him.

For the caucus: it creates a conversation. Neighbours hear each other and persuade each other, and it rewards a candidate who works hard. Against: it excludes working people and produces a small, unrepresentative electorate.

For the convention: it empowers the party's most committed members and keeps the nominating decision in the hands of the people who will do the work. Against: it can be dominated by insiders and it can nominate a candidate the wider party would not have chosen.

Which is best? I'd argue there is no single answer. A party that cares about reaching ordinary voters will favour primaries. A party that cares about building an organization will keep some role for conventions. The wise approach for a volunteer is to learn the system that governs your own contest and to organize for it.

What a volunteer should do with all this

1. Find out your state's rules for your office. The secretary of state's site and the state party's rules explain the method.
2. Match the effort to the system. In a primary, put your time into voter contact and turnout. In a caucus or convention, put it into recruiting delegates and attendees.
3. Learn the dates. Registration deadlines and caucus times are the places where good voters are lost.
4. Think about the runoff before the first round. If your state has one, ask your candidate how he will win the second round.
5. Do not complain about the process on Tuesday if you skipped the meeting in January. The party's choices are made by those who attend.

The bottom line

• Every method chooses nominees. They do not choose the same ones: primaries tend to reward money and name recognition, caucuses reward organization and intensity, conventions reward activists and relationships, and runoffs reward coalition builders.
• Your first job is to learn which method decides your race, in your state, for your office. The secretary of state's website and your state party's rules will tell you.
• Put your time where the system is weakest for the candidate you support: voters in a primary, neighbours in a caucus, delegates at a convention.
• If your state has a runoff, plan for round two from the first day, and do not assume the leader wins.
• Whatever the system, the rule is the same: the party's nominees are chosen by the people who show up. Read how the rest of the field works in Why every Republican owes the primary election a vote, every time.