Nevada GOP may use poll to endorse Trump, not caucus

The Nevada Republican Party is planning to use a poll of its central committee members to nominate President Donald Trump for a second term, rather than the usual caucus process, according to a draft resolution.

The party will still conduct its precinct caucuses in February, but only to elect delegates to the various county conventions. Those delegates will elect representatives to attend the state convention, where delegates will be nominated to travel to the party’s national convention in Charlotte, North Carolina, in August 2020.

The resolution — to be considered at the state Republican central committee meeting Sept. 7 — will allow the party to pledge the state’s convention delegates to Trump, who faces no serious opposition in the GOP at this point. (Former Massachusetts Gov. William Weld has declared he will run against Trump, but no other major figure has officially declared a run.)

Central committee members are expected to take a vote to officially endorse Trump’s re-election at the Sept. 7 meeting, assuming the resolution is adopted.

“The Nevada Republican Party is firmly behind President Donald J. Trump’s re-election campaign,” said Nevada Republican Party Chairman Michael McDonald in a statement.

“He has delivered on every promise he has made to Nevadans, and that is why at our next central committee meeting on September 7, we will be voting to endorse the president and allocate all our delegates to his campaign at the national convention in Charlotte next year. We are all in and are excited to get to work on sending President Trump back to the White House for four more years!”

The resolution says if the central committee decides a statewide poll of all registered Republican voters isn’t needed to determine whether to support Trump, an Alternative Presidential Preference Poll may be taken of central committee members only.

The process “may only be used when there is an incumbent Republican president who has legally filed for re-election as of the date of the decision by the (Nevada Republican Central Committee) Executive Committee as to which poll will be used.”

The resolution means that even if Weld or any other Republican wages a campaign against Trump in 2020, Nevada’s delegates will have already been pledged to vote for the president.

The Central Committee will meet in Winnemucca. Also on the agenda for the meeting is McDonald’s re-election as state party chairman. He’s already the longest-serving chairman in state party history, and he has forged a personal friendship with Trump.

Contact Debra J. Saunders at dsaunders@reviewjournal.com or 202-662-7391. Follow @DebraJSaunders on Twitter.

An earlier version of this story incorrectly reported the Nevada Republican Party would not hold its regular caucuses.