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I have a hard time believing that he would drop out. Not much in it for him, and I assume that if he loses, he's gonna claim that the election was stolen again anyway to try and keep supporters interested.

If he does, though, what's the succession plan for a nominee? There has to be one, because people could get shot or have a heart attack or something. Do they just choose the second-place vote getter, Nikki Haley? There's no time to run a new primary. Does the party internally pick a new nominee?

googles

https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/12/politics/presidential-candidate-race-drop-what-matters/index.html

#What if a vacancy occurs after the primaries and before or during the convention?

If the leading candidate was to drop out of the campaign after most primaries or even during the convention, individual delegates would likely decide the party’s nominee on the convention floor.

That would shine a spotlight on the normally niche question of who those actual delegates are.

There would be a messy political battle in every state over who would get to be a delegate (if the vacancy happened before many of those people were chosen) and then who they would ultimately support. Even people who did not run primary campaigns could ultimately be considered.

You can assume, for instance, that Vice President Kamala Harris would be a top contender to be on the ballot if, for some reason, Biden left the race. At the same time, given Haley’s weakness in primaries, it seems unlikely that Republicans would coalesce around her if Trump was unable to run.

On the Democratic side, there would also be another group to consider: the “superdelegates,” a group of about 700 senior party leaders and elected officials who are automatically delegates to the convention based on their position. Under normal party rules, they can’t vote on the first ballot if they could swing the nomination, but they’re free to vote on subsequent ballots.

#What if a candidate left the race after the convention?

It would take a drastic event for a candidate to leave the race in the few months between a party’s nominating convention in the summer and the general election in November.

Democrats and Republicans have slightly different methods of dealing with this possibility. You can imagine the end result would probably be that the running mate stepped up to be on the general election ballot, but that is not necessarily guaranteed.

Democrats – The Democratic National Committee is empowered to fill a vacancy on the national ticket after the convention under party rules, after the party chair consults with Democratic governors and congressional leadership.

Republicans – If a vacancy occurs on the Republican side, the Republican National Committee can either reconvene the national convention or select a new candidate itself.

#Would the running mate automatically become the nominee?

An in-depth Congressional Research Service memo also notes that if an incumbent president becomes incapacitated after winning the party’s nomination, the 25th Amendment would elevate the vice president to the presidency, but party rules would determine who rises to become the party’s nominee.

Neither party, according to CRS, requires that the presidential candidate’s running mate be elevated to the top of the ticket, but that would obviously be the most likely scenario.

#Has a candidate ever left the race after the convention?

In modern times, per CRS, the Democrat running for vice president in 1972, Sen. Thomas Eagleton, was forced to step aside after the convention after it was discovered that he was treated for mental illness (1972 was a very different time! Today, thankfully, there is not nearly the stigma attached to mental health).

The DNC actually needed to convene a meeting to affirm Sargent Shriver as Democratic nominee George McGovern’s second-choice running mate.

So probably his running mate if after the convention and probably someone else the party chooses if prior.