RUSH: It has been a while since we took a phone call, and people have been waiting patiently. Monroe, Louisiana. Mary, thank you for calling. It’s great to have you on the program. Hello.

CALLER: Hi, Rush. It’s such a great honor to talk to you. Thank you for taking my call.

RUSH: Yes. You bet.

CALLER: I just wanted to run something by you and get your thoughts. If Hillary gets the nomination and Bernie chooses to run third-party, I think there’s a good chance that none of the three will actually reach the 270 electoral votes. So, if and only if Bernie decides to run third party, should Cruz also decide to run as a third or I guess fourth party so that it would then go to the House of Representatives for the deciding vote, and Cruz actually would legitimately be considered a candidate.

RUSH: Here’s a problem with that, though. Any third-party candidate is gonna have to get on ballots by the end of next week. I mean, the signing deadline and the deadline for signatures, petition, whatever the hell you have to do in all 50 states, it’s upon us. You couldn’t decide, I don’t think, to go third party in August. Now, I say that. I could be wrong about it, but I don’t think it works that way. I don’t think you can just announce, because you have to go through a whole lot of procedures to get your name on the ballot. Otherwise anybody can run any time they wanted.

So there’s some thresholds that have to pass. Bill Kristol is trying to find somebody to do that very thing now, trying to find anybody to run against Trump as a third party hoping to throw the race to the House of Representatives. Now, here’s one thing, Mary. The House of Representatives can pick anybody. They don’t have to pick from the existing candidates.

If you’ve got three people running for president and none of them get to 270, the House can — the Republicans would pick the next president, because whoever holds the majority in the House — I mean, the Democrats would try to blow the joint up, but it’s the Republicans that have the majority, and if they were unified on a candidate, that’s who would be the next president. And as far as I know — oh, wait, somebody’s telling me that 12th Amendment says that the House can only pick between the top three vote-getters in the general election. That I was unaware of. So that would be a noneffective way for Cruz to throw his hat back in the ring. I think.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: The deadline to be on the ballot as a presidential candidate third party in Texas is already past. If you can’t get on the ballot in Texas as a third party, especially if you’re Ted Cruz, then what’s the point? It’s a nonstarter. The 12th Amendment essentially says that the House must pick between the top three vote-getters in the general election.

It says: “The person having the greatest number of votes for president, shall be the president, if such number be a majority of the whole number of electors appointed; and if no person have such majority,” 270, “then from the persons having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the list of those voted for as president, the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the president.”

So if nobody gets 270, the House chooses but can only choose from the top three vote-getters. Republicans run the House, so it stands to reason that they would select Trump, it stands to reason. But, believe me, this is one of the strategies, I guarantee you, that they’re planning for in the House leadership that they could get. That’s why Bill Kristol’s doing what he’s doing. Don’t think that’s an off-the-wall effort that’s not attached to anything.

Remember, some of these people are on record saying they would rather vote for Hillary than Trump. Some of these Republicans. We have spent time talking about that on this program the past months. A bunch of Republicans have been quoted as saying so, elected Republicans, House, Senate members and so forth, and others.

So, hey, look, this is gonna be exciting all the way through, folks, for a host of reasons. I’m actually thinking of taking a couple days off of my eight weeks of vacation coming up and just do seven weeks and two days. I’m just kidding.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: We got a Peggy Noonan sound bite here before we go to the break from CBS This Morning. Gayle King, the BFF of The Oprah, was talking to Noonan about Trump’s campaign. And Gayle King said, “What are your Republican homeys –” (laughing) “Hey, Peggy, what are your Republican homeys saying about Trump behind closed doors?” Tell us the truth. Tell us, tell us what your homeys really think of Trump that they’re not saying publicly?

NOONAN: Some people are just trying to wrap their heads around what is still, for them, a surprise. It’s a funny thing about people in politics. They ought to be the ultimate realists, and yet there were a lot of people in Washington Republican politics who thought, “Trump won’t happen because that’s not the kind of thing that happens; therefore it won’t happen.” And they managed to be surprised last week when he just cleaned it all up. Republican leaders in Washington ought to be thinking, “Jeez, for ten years we’ve been doing white papers on how to bring people in. This guy just brought people in. Do we like that or not?” Normally you like the guy who makes the tent bigger.

RUSH: My point exactly. The Republican Party has been running around thinking this is exactly what we need to do to win. Trump’s been doing it, and they don’t like it. That’s understandable; they didn’t do it. But it just proves that what they say they want and need to win is not really what they are interested in. They want to be the ones in control of it. Trump making it happen…? Anyway, her point is that behind closed doors, Republicans still can’t believe it. They’re in a state of shock, state of panic, and still expecting Trump to implode, still thinking that he’s gonna step in it at some point, folks. Mark my words.