The fireworks leading up to this summer's Republican convention in Cleveland promise months of popcorn-worthy fun, and that's not even considering what Donald Trump's campaign might cook up. There's a clash now within the leadership of the RNC that has the chairman of the Rules Committee accusing the rest of the party leadership of a "major breach of trust" in fighting a move to change the rules governing the convention, new rules that would make it harder for party insiders to draft a new nominee in the case of a deadlock.
The proposal in question would switch the rule book governing the convention from the rules of the U.S. House of Representatives, which have been used at Republican national conventions for decades, to Robert's Rules of Order, which is common in civic and organizational meetings.
"It became apparent to me during the discussions with Reince and others at the RNC that there might be an underlying political result that adherence to the House Rules achieved, and that Roberts made more difficult," Ash wrote in the email, which was first reported by The Associated Press. "Reopening the nominations for President during the balloting to permit a more acceptable candidate to be nominated other than Donald Trump or Ted Cruz."
Meanwhile, Trump wants to make sure that the convention is a proper showcase for his own brand of megalomania and has some "showbiz." He says the 2012 convention was "the single most boring convention I've ever seen," and blasted the RNC for not having "the people who know how to put showbiz into a convention." But hey, who needs showbiz when you can have a brawl?
That's what Trump is promising, saying that if he manages to amass 1,237 delegates required to win the nomination by the time of the convention, he just might replace the leadership with his people. And he's trying everything to get those delegates. His new campaign strategist, Paul Manafort, said that the campaign is going to protest the delegate allotments from Colorado and Missouri. The other candidate is cheating, he says: "The Cruz campaign, even in the closed systems like Colorado, like Missouri, they're not playing by their own rules."
All of which means that a lack of excitement at the convention in Cleveland is probably the last thing Priebus is worrying about.