What if Donald Trump Drops Out?

With Donald Trump's campaign reeling from revelations that he spoke vulgarly of women - even boasting of being able to grab them by their genitals and get away with it - the question echoing around the internet is can he be replaced on the ballot?

While several top Republicans have called on Trump to step aside and let the party pick a replacement - something he said he absolutely will not do - experts say that while there is a mechanism to put someone else on the ballot, the logistics involved would make it near impossible to pull off.

And, even if they did, would it make a difference on Election Day?

"Technically, it's possible," says long-time New York political consultant Joseph Mercurio. "Functionally, it's not really possible."

The rules of the Republican National Committee have a procedure to replace candidates - it's called Rule 9. It reads:

"The Republican National Committee is hereby authorized and empowered to fill any and all vacancies which may occur by reason of death, declination, or otherwise of the Republican candidate for President of the United States or the Republican candidate for Vice President of the United States, as nominated by the national convention, or the Republican National Committee may reconvene the national convention for the purpose of filling any such vacancies."

The important thing is it only allows them to replace a candidate who dies or drops out.

"Even if Trump does drop out, what are they doing to do?" Mercurio asks. "Who would want to replace him and risk hurting their chances four years down the road?"

Mercurio also points out there are several very large road blocks to getting a new candidate on the ballot.

"Early voting has already started," he says. "What do you do with those ballots? What if someone voted and then died? And then there's the military ballots, which have already gone out. It's too late.

"Do you disenfranchise the military vote?"

Jim Moore, professor of politics and government and Director of Pacific University's Tom McCall Center for Policy Innovation, said that even if the party were able to choose another candidate, there is the question of how - if, at all, you are able to get them on the ballot.

"It's not a national question," says Moore. "There are 51 states including the District of Columbia. And then, in many states, you have different rules county to county. And there are some 7,000 counties across the country."

Mercurio says the process of trying to get a new candidate on ballots would be "a massive nightmare."

And even if all that happens, there is then the question of legal challenges. Those could cover topics ranging from the legality of changes to ballots to groups claiming they were disenfranchised.

"The Supreme Court is divided right now," says Moore. "They are already saying no to cases because there are only eight justices. They are in no position to tackle this."

Mercurio points out that while there have been cases of candidates dropping out and being replaced late in the game - Paul Wellstone in Minnesota, Mel Carnahan in Missouri - they have all been in local or statewide races.

"There has only been one precedent for this on the national level and that was when Thomas Eagleton was dropped in 1972," Mercurio says.

And that didn't end so well for the man who was on the top of the ticket at the time - George McGovern.

So, if Trump stays on the ticket - where does that leave the Republicans?

"There are a couple of options," says Mercurio. "I can see Kellyanne Conway (Trump's campaign manager) trying very hard to spend the next 31 days working very hard to keep him on message while the party does everything it can to have the House.

"There is already a flood of candidates backing away and I'm sure there is a lot of talk about saving what can be saved."