In the unlikely event he wins utah and the election is close enough that the electoral college gets deadlocked I can easily see the house voting for him over Trump
No chance in hell because that assumes that the GOP is actually principled. There is NO way that House GOP members will risk arousing the ire of their base back home and potentially lose their primaries by virtue of voting for an independent candidate who received fewer votes than Trump and making him POTUS.
As Vosem notes here, in the unlikely event of an electoral college deadlock, there are enough anti-Trump Republicans in the House that there would almost certainly be a deadlock. Neither Trump nor any other candidate would be able to win a majority of House delegations. So if the GOP controls the Senate, then the House deadlocks, the Senate elects Pence as VP, and we get President Pence. OTOH, if the Dems control the Senate, then the House Republicans have a strong incentive to reach a compromise, in order to avoid President Kaine.
But wouldn't the lame duck Senate make the choice, so either way Pence wins?
