Question, what would it take to force a debate between Trump and a challenger?
You can’t.
And I agree with Walsh, but I expect them to cancel primaries anyway.
Dunno about forcing, but Trump seems to be eminently coaxable into doing things, either by carrot (buttering him up to do it) or stick (calling him a chicken, loser, etc. if he doesn’t do it). Tell him Obama would never debate Joe Walsh, and Trump will leap to do it. 
A thought… If some state Republican parties do cancel their primaries, could that challenge their status with respect to ballot access, state funding of primary elections, and so on?
Tell Trump it will get the highest ratings of the year
Hadn’t thought of that angle. Good idea! Although probably only workable in blue or purple states.
It’s state by state laws but generally no.
Canceling primaries is something that both parties have done when there is not a significant challenge to an incumbent. In 2012 New York, Virginia, Connecticut, and Delaware did not hold either Democratic primaries or caucuses.
In 2008 the DNC initially choose to ignore the results in Florida and Michigan by penalizing them all of their delegates for choosing scheduling that violated rules. That significantly suppressed the votes held before the compromise that seated half the delegates. Clinton won both states but her legal challenges failed. Caucuses themselves are problematic if having a primary is required. They suppress the vote and the vote is typically just about selecting representation to party convention processes that actually choose delegates. It’s a fine needle to have a law that allows that but invalidates just selecting delegates directly in state conventions.
As much as some have made the possibility of some states canceling GOP primaries out as something unprecedented or necessarily nefarious it’s not. There’s generally nothing requiring a primary as the means a party uses to select a candidate. Both parties rules allow state parties some leeway to do exactly that. There’s precedent for doing that. Ballot access laws are typically based on previous general election results not the procedure a party uses to select their nominee.
Sanford is in. Be interesting when the Trump party unironically makes a big deal about his extramarital affair.
Well, it was an affair with a foreigner. Sanford’s mistress was taking jobs away from hard-working American golddiggers. Trump would never stoop so low as to have an affair with an illegal immigrant!
Mark Sanford from SC is going against trump as well…
He lost his election due to trump backing another republican (who was weak) and caused her to lose by wanting to offshore drill our coast. Now we’re one of two blue districts in SC.
Oddly enough hes one of the few republicans who actually has a shred of integrity.
Just to be sure I’m understanding this – when you say some states may not have a Republican primary, you mean they will have a Republican primary, but not include the Office of POTUS on the ballot, right? Because surely these states have other races, such as US House, for which the GOP wants a primary.
If a state decides not to include the race for POTUS on its ballot, isn’t that likely to reduce the number of voters? What impact might that have on the other races?
Of course they do; they’re used to being involved in the process, and drawing national attention to Iowa in a way that never happens outside election years.
And Trump would never stoop so low as to have an affair with a man----as I believe Donald’s tweet was intended to imply (falsely) that Sanford had done:
My emphasis. I’m not seeing this interpretation in the first few sources I look at—but it seems to me that that’s what Trump was hoping for.
I think it is more likely that Trump was trying to spell “flamenco” and had an autocorrect fail.
Oh, I agree that some part of his brain was trying to come up with “flamenco.” But even if he tried to type it and got ‘flaming’ instead, why not ‘girlfriend’ instead of ‘friend’?
I could be wrong that Donnie was trying to imply homosexuality, but it also seems possible that that’s what he’s come up with to make his own affairs “okay” but Sanford’s “icky.”
Time will tell, I guess.
Although the basis for Melania‘s immigration and naturalization seems a bit flimsy.
Oh yeah, true.
Yes, and don’t call me Shirley.
It also means that the stated rationalization for cancellation, cost savings, is bullshit.
They’re all going to have Dem primaries; it costs almost nothing additional to provide a Republican ballot as well.