RUSH: Everybody’s speculating about the GOP convention in Cleveland in July. “What’s gonna happen? Is it gonna be open? Is it gonna be brokered? Is it gonna be contested? If it is, who’s gonna rule the roost? Will the donors rule the roost? Who is gonna end up being nominated? Will the establishment choose somebody that has not even run?” All these questions are being asked. But there’s other stuff going on that nobody is even talking about, except for now. I’ve mentioned to you in the past that it appears The Politico is the place where establishment Republicans go to leak news that they want out there.

I mean, every newsmaker does it. I mean, every office, every president, every issue organization. They all have a process for leaking things. It’s a way of obtaining coverage either for yourself or opposition research on an opponent or something. But my point is that the GOP establishment has chosen Politico as their go-to place for such leaks. And here is a story about the party platform. See, nobody’s talking about it, ’cause everybody’s still focused on who’s gonna be the nominee. Nobody’s talking about the party platform except the people working on it.

And they are busy little beavers, and they’re working under cover of darkness, and they’re hiding behind the cloak of invisibility brought on by the coverage of the horse race. The Politico says, “Republicans, already girding for their most tumultuous convention in decades, now have another fight brewing: a divisive battle over gay marriage on the partyÂ’s official national platform.” You want to talk about throwing a wrench into your own campaign? So here are a bunch of guys on the platform committee, and they’re being led by the donors.

The donors are demanding that the Republican platform (as I cut to the chase here) essentially accommodate, if not accept, same-sex marriage. Obviously, “It’s an issue that drives intense passion, and one that splits the mainstream and evangelical wings of the GOP. With the convention less than four months away, both sides are mobilizing in anticipation of a bitter clash over whether the party should embrace” this. Now, look, platforms are only relevant for the period of time they’re written and maybe during the convention; then they’re thrown away.

However, just like Trump’s answer on abortion, what happened to this platform is gonna be news for the rest of the year, whether it’s accepted, whether it’s voted on. And even if it is, it’s forgotten. Once the nominee is chosen, his agenda becomes the platform. But the donors are attempting to get it. “Some of the party’s biggest financiers … have been helping to bankroll the American Unity Fund, a group that has launched a well-organized, behind-the-scenes effort to lobby convention delegates who will draw up the platform. It is asking them to adopt language that would accommodate,” if not promote, “same sex marriage,” in the party platform.

And they hope to have this done in time to basically force this on the nominee, whoever it is.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: I tell you what, folks, this story in The Politico about the platform committee writers being heavily influenced by the donors to accommodate same-sex marriage, if I’m not mistaken — in the party platform — if I’m not mistaken, the Republican Party platform in 2012 — and look, I know after the convention it’s pretty meaningless except to be used as a bludgeon by the Drive-By Media if there’s anything in it they think is advantageous to Democrats. But in terms of affecting the next administration, it doesn’t mean much; it never has.

But it seems to me that in 2012 the Republican platform had a clause opposing same-sex marriage. From the platform, 2012: “We reaffirm our support for a constitutional amendment defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman.” That was in the party platform in 2012. So opposition to gay marriage, back then, Lindsey Graham and Jeb Bush were pushing to have that plank removed, among others. Back in 2012 many in the establishment didn’t want that plank in the platform. They wanted accommodation for same-sex marriage.

And as you think about how the establishment is attempting to manipulate this convention to get a nominee they want, somebody not currently running, it will give you an idea of what they want this party to be once they finish running a convention with results they have engineered. And it would not look anything like what the Republican Party has appeared to be during this campaign. Safe to say, I’ll betcha within the bowels of the GOP establishment this campaign, everybody in it is embarrassing them — the donors — or troubling them, maybe not embarrassing some of them. But it is an illustration of just how quickly things can change culturally. Four years and we’re gonna do a 180 on this.