GOP rules meeting on hold as Priebus huddles with insurgent delegates

CLEVELAND — A meeting to craft the rules that will govern the Republican National Convention was suspended Thursday for at least five hours as GOP leaders huddled with a handful of insurgent delegates at a private meeting. 

The Rules Committee meeting convened as scheduled at 8 a.m. but was abruptly disbanded after a delegate proposed a rule that would ban lobbyists from becoming Republican National Committee (RNC) members. 

{mosads}Reporters were told that a printer had jammed and needed to be fixed. 

RNC Chairman Reince Priebus then ducked into a conference room with Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) and a handful of delegates who pose a problem for the national party and Donald Trump’s presidential campaign. 

The meeting included Colorado delegate Kendal Unruh, who is leading the charge to unbind delegates so they can vote their “conscience” and revolt against Trump. 

Platform Committee member Jim Bopp, who has been one of the most vocal opponents to Unruh’s “Free the Delegates” movement, was also in attendance. 

So was former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, who plans to float several proposals aimed at weakening the RNC and the national party’s power structure. 

The disruption played out in the final hours before Trump’s expected announcement on his vice presidential pick. 

Trump’s top advisers held their own private meetings in nearby conference rooms in the cavernous Huntington Convention Center. Campaign manager Paul Manafort and adviser Jason Miller attracted hordes of reporters as they stalked the grounds, ignoring questions about Trump’s vice presidential pick.

The RNC and the Trump campaign want as little disruption as possible both at the Rules Committee meeting and on the convention floor on Monday. 

That means they’d likely hope to limit the number and scope of amendments put forth by Cuccinelli, a supporter of Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), who bowed out of the presidential race in early May. 

And they’d like to prevent Unruh from getting 28 signatures from her colleagues on the Rules Committee, which would ensure the Never Trump contingent gets a vote before the nearly 2,500 delegates on national television Monday when the convention kicks off. 

One delegate aligned with Cuccinelli told The Hill that the RNC and Trump campaign are applying pressure to the committee members not to cause trouble. 

The Rules Committee had planned two marathon sessions for Thursday and Friday. Committee members dropped a huge volume of amendments at the start of Thursday’s meeting, so the proceedings could drag late into the night on both days.