WASHINGTON — Four years ago this week, with four months left before he would formally accept the Republican nomination, Mitt Romney named a longtime confidant to spearhead the effort to find a suitable vice president.
Ted Cruz’s campaign has quietly started the search. But for Cruz, Donald Trump and John Kasich, the task is not as easy as it was for past contenders.
Republicans are likely headed into the first national convention in decades where a party’s presidential nominee will not already be settled. Usually, a candidate, like Romney, has long clinched victory and chosen whom he wants to join him on the ticket. Not this time.
Three months before delegates arrive in Cleveland, only Trump is close enough to win without a floor fight. Even he faces long odds and won’t know for sure until the final primaries on June 7.
The uncertainty leaves the contenders with a tough, two-pronged task: Win the convention fight and simultaneously prepare for the fall, by identifying and investigating a running mate.
Trump has tossed out possible choices. Cruz has quietly shifted some campaign resources to the task. But they’re losing precious time. And scholars, campaign veterans and operatives who’ve overseen vetting for previous nominees warn that haste in such matters can yield catastrophe.
“It’s one of the complicating factors of having a protracted nomination,” said the Texas senator’s chief strategist, Jason Johnson. “We quickly approach the point where if we’re not thinking about those things, we’re neglecting our obligation to be prepared to be the nominee and beat Hillary (Clinton).”
He emphasized that Cruz is anything but “negligent,” though he declined to describe the process or identify a point person. “Ultimately the goal is to beat Hillary, and in order to beat Hillary you have to have a running mate,” Johnson said. “Those things are being considered.”
The clock is ticking. And carelessness entails enormous risk.
Consider the case of Missouri Sen. Thomas Eagleton, Democrat George McGovern’s running mate for 18 days in 1972. He withdrew after disclosures that he had been hospitalized repeatedly for depression and had undergone electroshock treatment.
Since then, nominees in both parties have taken pains to avoid such surprises. Yet breakdowns still happen.
Aides to Sen. John McCain came to regret his choice of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin in 2008, made in haste after pushback forced him to give up on his first choice, Democratic Sen. Joe Lieberman. It wasn’t long before she went rogue.
Romney’s early announcement of a methodical process four years later was a way to reassure the party he’d make no such unforced error.
Trump, Cruz and Kasich face a vastly different environment. Romney had the race wrapped up at this point. They don’t. That makes it premature to launch a full-blown vetting process, and hard to get full cooperation.
“You can’t go to people and say, ‘Would you turn over your tax returns and your medical records? Tell me your deepest, darkest secrets but I’m still second in the delegates,’” said Joel Goldstein, a St. Louis University law professor who has written several books on the vice presidency. “They have a problem because it’s dragging on.”
There’s also a chance the candidate will lose control of the process. The delegates themselves must sign off on the vice presidential nominee, and the No. 2 spot could be part of a deal to build a coalition to resolve a deadlock.
Such compromises were common decades ago but are unfamiliar terrain to modern-day nominees, who’ve had the luxury of picking their own running mate based on who can help them win, and govern.
Bill Clinton’s choice of Al Gore meant a ticket with two young Southerners, a contrast to a more traditional approach of balancing geography and ideology. George W. Bush, a neophyte on foreign policy, turned to Dick Cheney, a former White House chief of staff and Pentagon chief who, as it happened, had been overseeing the selection and vetting process.
But this year in the GOP, winning in the fall takes a back seat to locking down 1,237 delegates.
A candidate who can put Trump or Cruz over the top on a second or third ballot could start looking mighty attractive.
To mitigate the chaos and avert a last-minute scramble, conservative commentator Hugh Hewitt proposed two weeks ago that the national GOP offer to vet up to five potential running mates for each campaign. He nominated Beth Myers — a Karl Rove protege who led the vetting for Romney — to act as the Republican National Committee’s agent.
In 2012, Myers completed her work by early July, though Romney waited until Aug. 11, two weeks before the convention, to roll out his pick: Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, now speaker of the House.
For this year’s GOP survivors, the considerations are apparent enough.
Trump is weak on Washington and national security experience, though he’s also alienated women and ethnic groups; he needs an insider. Cruz is an evangelical Christian and very conservative. A conventional move might be to find a governor who’s less of an ideologue to broaden the appeal.
It’s a safe bet they won’t pick each other. Trump derides his rival as “Lyin’ Ted,” and Cruz has accused the businessman of spreading lies about extramarital affairs to a supermarket tabloid.
“We’re in the process now of looking at a number of different options,” Cruz said Wednesday night at a CNN town hall, pressed on whether he’d consider picking Sen. Marco Rubio.
Publicly, Trump has been playful in tossing out possibilities.
In recent days, he’s name-checked Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, a Cruz backer, and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, one of his own supporters. He’s even floated Rubio, whom he ruled out as lacking credibility for losing his home state of Florida, big time.
Trump is keen to pick a Washington insider to offset his own shortcomings — “somebody that can walk into the Senate and who’s been friendly with these guys for 25 years … and can get things done,” as he told The Washington Post last week.
That formulation rules out Cruz, a freshman who — as Trump endlessly reminds voters — has few allies in the Senate.
But if the mogul is running background checks or even compiling a short list, it’s under the radar.
GOP strategist Ryan Williams, a Romney campaign aide, sees no signs that the candidates are putting serious effort into the selection process yet.
“How could they be? They’re fighting for their life,” he said.
And that’s causing heartburn for GOP insiders.
“If we have a shotgun marriage at the convention, it causes the ticket to be disorganized and divided,” Williams said. “Look no further than McCain in 2008.” The senator finished his selection just before Republicans gathered in Minnesota that year.
Trump’s penchant for offending means his running mate will be a first responder, having to answer for the latest firestorm. Williams doubts the party’s leading lights will be willing to raise their hands for him.
“Cruz has rubbed some people the wrong way in Washington but … Trump is viewed as a toxic disaster who could be a career-killer for any politician who wants to hitch their wagon to his clown show,” Williams said. “That is a dark blemish on your resume that you cannot wash off.”
Veterans of vetting exercises past say there’s still enough time to do it right. The Internet makes it easier for a skilled team to assess strengths and weaknesses and find dirt on those who’ve run for office.
Roderick DeArment, a retired Washington attorney who led the process for GOP nominee Bob Dole in 1996, said it would be “presumptuous” for Cruz or Trump to publicly begin vetting, given how far they are from claiming the nomination.
Dole chose Jack Kemp, a popular congressman and former housing secretary. To sort through the options, DeArment used a detailed questionnaire to smoke out vulnerabilities. He brought in trusted accountants to scrub tax returns.
“What’s the worst people could say about you?” he liked to ask.
Given this year’s unusual constraints, DeArment’s counsel would be to focus on governors or senators who’ve been through bruising elections. They’re far less likely to have skeletons than, say, a CEO who’s never run that gantlet.
The betting markets, in fact, view Kasich as the overwhelming favorite, though he vehemently denies any interest.
But with a safe bet like the Ohio governor, said DeArment, “I wouldn’t worry so much. He’s been through the drill already. Presumably people who’ve thrown rocks have already thrown rocks.”
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