Donald Trump won't likely need the full 1,237 delegates to clinch the GOP presidential nomination this summer, but if he gets fewer than 1,000 then there will be a contested convention, a member of the Republican National Convention's Rules Committee said Wednesday.
"What I do expect is this: If Donald Trump exceeds 1,100 votes, he will become the nominee, even though he may not have the 1,237," Randy Evans, a Georgia Republican who also chairs the Republican National Lawyers' Association, told
MSNBC's "Morning Joe" program.
"If he gets less than 1,000 delegates, then I think we're looking at a contested convention that could go on for many, many days," Evans continued.
"And then in the middle there is that gray area between 1,000 and 1100 and that's where the unbound delegates or the delegates that have been released by other candidates come into play to see if there are enough of those to get either Cruz or Trump over the finish line."
And the worst-case scenario, said Evans, is if the delegates get to the end of the four-day convention and there is still not a candidate with 1,237 delegates.
"Under the current rules, basically, what will happen is we will have nominations," said Evans. "Currently, you have to have the majority of eight states demonstrate their support for you to get your name put in nomination. And then after your name is in nomination, they start the call of the roll."
Further, he said, there is "no provision to add a Paul Ryan, to add a Jeb Bush, to add another candidate" through the current rules.
"Rule 40e you don't hear about, it says at the end of the roll call the secretary will tally the numbers," Evans said. "If no one receives 1,237, you start calling the roll again. And it will be the same candidates that were nominated before."
And as for now, the only candidates who qualify for the process are Trump and Ted Cruz, said Evans, because they are the only ones who have won at least eight states.
And while Trump is complaining about campaign rules for both Louisiana and Colorado that made him lose to Cruz, Evans said that those elections proved that Trump is "a neophyte" when it comes to Republican Party rules.
"It's almost like a baseball game when you get to the seventh inning and start complaining because 'what do you mean there's four balls, but three strikes? There should be four balls but four strikes.'"
And as for the convention rules, they can't be changed solely by the Rules Committee, said Evans, but have to be approved on the convention floor.
"What happened last time was that Gov. [Mitt] Romney came in with voting control of the convention and they decided they didn't want any other name in nomination," so the Rules Committee raised the threshold so you had to have the support or demonstrate the support of eight states. They knew that only Gov. Romney was the one that could meet that threshold."