They better lock Biden in a cyrogenic chamber or something until the Election. Because if both candidates get sick and die there is no telling who might win the Presidency.
Who is the Republican nominee if Trump dies before the election?
Who is the Republican nominee if Trump dies before the election?
Should the president be incapacitated or even die, the US constitution has a plan for covering his responsibilities. Vice-president Mike Pence, followed by House speaker Nancy Pelosi, are in his line of succession, and would take his place either until he recovered or until the end of his mandate.
But what happens with the election? Does an incapacitated (or worse) Trump stay on the ballot?
He very likely does.
The
Republican party’s rules to replace a presidential candidate on the ballot—because of illness, death, or withdrawal—outline two options. The first is to have the 168 members of the Republican National Convention (RNC) select another candidate by a simple majority vote. The second is to reconvene the actual convention, with the 2550 delegates who named Trump the nominee, and pick an alternative to put on the ballot.
However, it’s too late for that. The vote will have to happen between
10 and 20 days after RNC members (or convention delegates) are convened, which would mean the decision wouldn’t be reached till about two weeks from Nov. 3.
People have already been voting for weeks around the country (and the world), and since the election likely
won’t be postponed, those votes would have to be counted. Ballot access deadlines have
passed in all states, so it’s simply too late to
change the ballot.
This doesn’t make Pence the default candidate either: While he would replace Trump till the end of the presidency, he is not the automatic substitute nominee.
So, who decides then, if not the Republican party? The electoral college does.
Most states have some kind of regulation as to how members of the electoral college should vote. In those states, what they would be allowed to do would depend on whether there are explicit provisions about voting for a replacement presidential candidate.
In the states where such rules don’t exist, the state elector can simply make their choice.
