Democrats prepare a Trump battle plan for 2016 elections | Bangkok Post: opinion
HOUSTON —
Billionaire Donald Trump appears poised to take full control of the
Republican presidential race Tuesday evening as results come in from GOP
contests in 11 “Super Tuesday” states stretching from New England to
the Deep South to Alaska.
Recent surveys showed Trump leading in nearly all of the states. The biggest exception was Texas — the state with the most delegates at stake, and the home turf of another Republican candidate, Sen. Ted Cruz.
And exit polls in Virginia showed some glimmers of hope for Sen. Marco Rubio (Fla.), a rival who has attacked Trump furiously in recent days – and is counting on white-collar and suburban voters to challenge Trump’s blue-collar base. More than 6 in 10 Republican primary voters in Virginia are college graduates, according to preliminary exit poll data. That would be the highest total of any state that has voted so far. It would also be a welcome trend for Rubio, who has performed better among college graduates, while Trump’s strength has been among those without college degrees.
Preliminary
exit poll data also show that about 6 in 10 Virginia Republican voters
would be satisfied if Marco Rubio won the party’s nomination, compared
with just under half who would be satisfied with Donald Trump and about 4
in 10 who say the same of Cruz. That’s also a good sign for Rubio, but
it doesn’t seal the deal: Not all of those who would be “satisfied” with
Rubio will vote for him. Nationally, Rubio has consistently received
high numbers of favorable reviews from GOP voters – and still trailed
Trump.
In the Democratic race, former secretary of state Hillary Clinton seemed poised to dominate in many of the Super Tuesday states — including in the South, where she has relied on strong support from black voters. For her rival, Sen. Bernie Sanders, at least one victory seemed guaranteed: He was the overwhelming favorite in his home state of Vermont.
The first polls of the night will close at 7 p.m. Eastern time in Georgia, Vermont and Virginia.
Each party has a slightly different slate of contests Tuesday: In Colorado, Democrats are caucusing, but Republicans are not. In Alaska, Republicans are voting, but not Democrats.
In the other 10 states, both parties’ voters are choosing. It was unlikely that Super Tuesday would end either party’s race — but it could seriously reshape it, if Trump and Clinton are able to build huge new leads in the count of delegates to the parties’ conventions. That could make it harder for their rivals to convince donors, or voters, that they have a path to victory.
Faced with a massive day of voting across nearly a dozen states, candidates made their pitches to Americans on air and in photo ops at polling spots in areas poised to support them.
Many voters — including in Virginia, where voting began at 6 a.m. — were noticeably unenthusiastic about their choices on the presidential primary ballot, even as they felt obligated to turn out.
In Arlington, Va., one defense contractor, Nick Bryant, said Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) is the only one on the GOP ballot looking for the middle ground.
“Out of the options, he’s the better one, but I wish he had more experience,” said Bryant, 54. “If both parties dig in their heels and stick to their guns, how do we govern? I really like Kasich, I like his calm and even tone, his demeanor. But you have to get ratings now, and he hasn’t.”
In
suburban Richmond, where a tea party unknown named Dave Brat unseated
then-House Majority Leader Eric Cantor in a primary two years ago, some
voters were still in a throw-the-bums-out mood.
“The establishment had its turn and didn’t get the job done,” said Ben Alred, a 52-year-old middle school history teacher who cast his ballot for Trump at Maybeury Elementary School in Henrico County.
“My feeling is, we need someone who can make definitive decisions and has no ties to the infrastructure in Washington,” he said. “He’s definitely someone who’s not aligned with any party too deeply.”
Elsewhere in the country, voters confronted each other, an extension of the name-calling that has taken place among several of the candidates themselves.
At a polling place in Houston where Cruz cast his vote Tuesday, Francisco Valle, 74, held a sign depicting Trump with a Hitler-style mustache and his right hand raised; it read, “absolutely no Mexicans.” Valle also hung a sign with the letter T and word “Trump” in the shape of a swastika with “STOP” written beneath.
“I am here because I want to make awareness of a movement that is very dangerous to all the minorities, because Hitler started the same way,” said Valle, who is Mexican American. “He blamed the Jews for all the problems, and now Trump is blaming the Mexicans for the problems.”
At one point — before Cruz arrived — another voter, William Bruso, interrupted Valle when he answered questions for members of the Spanish-language media.
“Since most of us here speak English, can you repeat what you just said in English for everyone to understand, sir?” said Bruso, who was wearing a Cruz sticker and said he was half-Hispanic. “This is America, you know.”
And in some states, Democrats decided to vote for Rubio as a way of embarrassing Trump.
Tom Paquin, a resident of Cambridge, Mass., said in an email that his decision to back the Florida senator “might be the only Republican vote in this part of town.”
“Given Trump’s support in my state among the Neanderthals in western Massachusetts, I doubt it’ll make much of a difference,” Paquin added. “But I’m hopeful enough common-sense conservatives will rally behind the establishment choice, as vague a choice as it is with such a diluted field.”
Meanwhile, a handful of candidates gave interviews with morning anchors in an effort to sway undecided voters. In a telephone interview with the Fox News Channel, Trump called on Rubio to drop out of the race.
Calling him “Little Marco Rubio” — a phrase he has taken up, along with “Lying Ted Cruz” — he said of the Florida senator: “I think he has to get out. You know, he hasn’t won anything, and Ted Cruz very rightly points out, you know, Marco has not won.”
In a separate phone interview,George Stephanopoulos of ABC’s “Good Morning America” asked the GOP front-runner whether he categorically rejects the support of all white supremacists, a controversy that erupted over the weekend when Trump did not immediately disavow former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke during a CNN interview.
“Of course I am. Of course I am,” he responded. “I mean, there’s nobody that has done so much for equality as I have. You take a look at Palm Beach, Florida, I built the Mar-a-Lago Club, totally open to everybody. A club that, frankly, set a new standard — a new standard in clubs and a new standard in Palm Beach — and I’ve got great credit for it. That is totally open to everybody.”
Trump also suggested that he is expanding the GOP’s base of support by appealing to Democrats and independents, even though some say he is alienating some traditional Republican backers.
“We have tremendous numbers of people coming in, and the Republican Party is growing larger,” he said. If it fails to do that, he added, “it’s not going to win.”
While voting results could give Trump a critical boost over his closest rivals, a well-funded super PAC is ramping up its effort to discredit the New York businessman with a new television advertisement that portrays him as a predatory huckster who scammed working- and middle-class Americans.
The 60-second ad, which will begin airing Wednesday on stations across the country at a cost of more than $1 million, centers on Trump University, the billionaire mogul’s for-profit enterprise that promised to teach students the tricks of the real estate trade and is now defunct and the subject of a fraud suit.
The attack echoes themes that Rubio, who is trying to unite the GOP’s anti-Trump forces under his own banner, has advanced as he has addressed swelling crowds in suburban areas.
Cruz, who has been partly overshadowed by Rubio in recent days, arrived with his wife and two daughters at a polling place at a Houston community center Tuesday morning. Speaking to reporters before voting, he told reporters that the overall delegate count Wednesday will send a clear signal as to who can halt the billionaire’s rise.
“Tomorrow morning, what is likely to happen is Donald Trump is likely to have a whole bunch of delegates. We’re likely to have a whole bunch of delegates, and I think there will be a big, big dropoff for the rest of the field,” he said. “I believe it would be an enormous mistake to nominate Donald Trump, so I speak to unity for Republicans.”
But if the polls and roaring crowds that greeted Trump in Virginia and Georgia on Monday were any indication, he is steamrolling toward a triumphant showing Tuesday. Republican primaries or caucuses will take place in 11 states — seven across the South, as well as in Alaska, Minnesota, Massachusetts and Vermont — and the only one Trump is not expected to win is Texas, where Cruz appears to be the favorite.
Retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson, who remains a long shot for the GOP nomination, said Tuesday on Fox News Channel’s “Fox and Friends” that he plans to remain in the race, because his supporters are expressing their beliefs through his candidacy.
“And I think they have a right to be heard,” he said. “At some point, the people will wake up. The question is, when will that happen?”
Super Tuesday Republican primaries: Trump appears to be consolidating lead
Quoted
“Obviously, he's done very well. He could be on the path. Maybe somebody else could intervene and rise above that.”
Hillary
Clinton, acknowledging on Tuesday that businessman Donald Trump appears
to be headed toward the Republican presidential nomination.
The upcoming voting schedule
March 1
It's
Super Tuesday: Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Georgia, Massachusetts,
Minnesota, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas Vermont and Virginia hold
primaries or caucuses for both parties.
March 5
Both parties vote in Kansas and Louisiana. Maine and Kentucky hold GOP caucuses; Nebraska holds a Democratic caucus.
March 6
It's the Maine Democratic Caucus and the Puerto Rico Republican primary.
Upcoming debates
March 3: GOP debate
on Fox News, in Detroit, Mich.
March 6: Democratic debate
on CNN, in Flint, Mich.
March 9: Democratic debate
on Univision, with The Washington Post in Miami, Fla.
Campaign 2016
✕
The
Fix's Aaron Blake sets up the stakes for Republican and Democratic
presidential candidates on Super Tuesday. (Peter Stevenson/The
Washington Post)
Recent surveys showed Trump leading in nearly all of the states. The biggest exception was Texas — the state with the most delegates at stake, and the home turf of another Republican candidate, Sen. Ted Cruz.
And exit polls in Virginia showed some glimmers of hope for Sen. Marco Rubio (Fla.), a rival who has attacked Trump furiously in recent days – and is counting on white-collar and suburban voters to challenge Trump’s blue-collar base. More than 6 in 10 Republican primary voters in Virginia are college graduates, according to preliminary exit poll data. That would be the highest total of any state that has voted so far. It would also be a welcome trend for Rubio, who has performed better among college graduates, while Trump’s strength has been among those without college degrees.
Campaign 2016 Email Updates
Get the best analysis of the presidential race.
In the Democratic race, former secretary of state Hillary Clinton seemed poised to dominate in many of the Super Tuesday states — including in the South, where she has relied on strong support from black voters. For her rival, Sen. Bernie Sanders, at least one victory seemed guaranteed: He was the overwhelming favorite in his home state of Vermont.
The first polls of the night will close at 7 p.m. Eastern time in Georgia, Vermont and Virginia.
Each party has a slightly different slate of contests Tuesday: In Colorado, Democrats are caucusing, but Republicans are not. In Alaska, Republicans are voting, but not Democrats.
In the other 10 states, both parties’ voters are choosing. It was unlikely that Super Tuesday would end either party’s race — but it could seriously reshape it, if Trump and Clinton are able to build huge new leads in the count of delegates to the parties’ conventions. That could make it harder for their rivals to convince donors, or voters, that they have a path to victory.
Faced with a massive day of voting across nearly a dozen states, candidates made their pitches to Americans on air and in photo ops at polling spots in areas poised to support them.
Many voters — including in Virginia, where voting began at 6 a.m. — were noticeably unenthusiastic about their choices on the presidential primary ballot, even as they felt obligated to turn out.
In Arlington, Va., one defense contractor, Nick Bryant, said Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) is the only one on the GOP ballot looking for the middle ground.
“Out of the options, he’s the better one, but I wish he had more experience,” said Bryant, 54. “If both parties dig in their heels and stick to their guns, how do we govern? I really like Kasich, I like his calm and even tone, his demeanor. But you have to get ratings now, and he hasn’t.”
“The establishment had its turn and didn’t get the job done,” said Ben Alred, a 52-year-old middle school history teacher who cast his ballot for Trump at Maybeury Elementary School in Henrico County.
“My feeling is, we need someone who can make definitive decisions and has no ties to the infrastructure in Washington,” he said. “He’s definitely someone who’s not aligned with any party too deeply.”
Elsewhere in the country, voters confronted each other, an extension of the name-calling that has taken place among several of the candidates themselves.
At a polling place in Houston where Cruz cast his vote Tuesday, Francisco Valle, 74, held a sign depicting Trump with a Hitler-style mustache and his right hand raised; it read, “absolutely no Mexicans.” Valle also hung a sign with the letter T and word “Trump” in the shape of a swastika with “STOP” written beneath.
“I am here because I want to make awareness of a movement that is very dangerous to all the minorities, because Hitler started the same way,” said Valle, who is Mexican American. “He blamed the Jews for all the problems, and now Trump is blaming the Mexicans for the problems.”
At one point — before Cruz arrived — another voter, William Bruso, interrupted Valle when he answered questions for members of the Spanish-language media.
“Since most of us here speak English, can you repeat what you just said in English for everyone to understand, sir?” said Bruso, who was wearing a Cruz sticker and said he was half-Hispanic. “This is America, you know.”
And in some states, Democrats decided to vote for Rubio as a way of embarrassing Trump.
Tom Paquin, a resident of Cambridge, Mass., said in an email that his decision to back the Florida senator “might be the only Republican vote in this part of town.”
“Given Trump’s support in my state among the Neanderthals in western Massachusetts, I doubt it’ll make much of a difference,” Paquin added. “But I’m hopeful enough common-sense conservatives will rally behind the establishment choice, as vague a choice as it is with such a diluted field.”
Meanwhile, a handful of candidates gave interviews with morning anchors in an effort to sway undecided voters. In a telephone interview with the Fox News Channel, Trump called on Rubio to drop out of the race.
Calling him “Little Marco Rubio” — a phrase he has taken up, along with “Lying Ted Cruz” — he said of the Florida senator: “I think he has to get out. You know, he hasn’t won anything, and Ted Cruz very rightly points out, you know, Marco has not won.”
In a separate phone interview,George Stephanopoulos of ABC’s “Good Morning America” asked the GOP front-runner whether he categorically rejects the support of all white supremacists, a controversy that erupted over the weekend when Trump did not immediately disavow former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke during a CNN interview.
“Of course I am. Of course I am,” he responded. “I mean, there’s nobody that has done so much for equality as I have. You take a look at Palm Beach, Florida, I built the Mar-a-Lago Club, totally open to everybody. A club that, frankly, set a new standard — a new standard in clubs and a new standard in Palm Beach — and I’ve got great credit for it. That is totally open to everybody.”
Trump also suggested that he is expanding the GOP’s base of support by appealing to Democrats and independents, even though some say he is alienating some traditional Republican backers.
“We have tremendous numbers of people coming in, and the Republican Party is growing larger,” he said. If it fails to do that, he added, “it’s not going to win.”
While voting results could give Trump a critical boost over his closest rivals, a well-funded super PAC is ramping up its effort to discredit the New York businessman with a new television advertisement that portrays him as a predatory huckster who scammed working- and middle-class Americans.
The 60-second ad, which will begin airing Wednesday on stations across the country at a cost of more than $1 million, centers on Trump University, the billionaire mogul’s for-profit enterprise that promised to teach students the tricks of the real estate trade and is now defunct and the subject of a fraud suit.
The attack echoes themes that Rubio, who is trying to unite the GOP’s anti-Trump forces under his own banner, has advanced as he has addressed swelling crowds in suburban areas.
Cruz, who has been partly overshadowed by Rubio in recent days, arrived with his wife and two daughters at a polling place at a Houston community center Tuesday morning. Speaking to reporters before voting, he told reporters that the overall delegate count Wednesday will send a clear signal as to who can halt the billionaire’s rise.
“Tomorrow morning, what is likely to happen is Donald Trump is likely to have a whole bunch of delegates. We’re likely to have a whole bunch of delegates, and I think there will be a big, big dropoff for the rest of the field,” he said. “I believe it would be an enormous mistake to nominate Donald Trump, so I speak to unity for Republicans.”
But if the polls and roaring crowds that greeted Trump in Virginia and Georgia on Monday were any indication, he is steamrolling toward a triumphant showing Tuesday. Republican primaries or caucuses will take place in 11 states — seven across the South, as well as in Alaska, Minnesota, Massachusetts and Vermont — and the only one Trump is not expected to win is Texas, where Cruz appears to be the favorite.
Retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson, who remains a long shot for the GOP nomination, said Tuesday on Fox News Channel’s “Fox and Friends” that he plans to remain in the race, because his supporters are expressing their beliefs through his candidacy.
“And I think they have a right to be heard,” he said. “At some point, the people will wake up. The question is, when will that happen?”
Wagner
reported from Burlington, Vt.; Eilperin from Washington. Katie Zezima
in Houston; Patricia Sullivan in Arlington, Va.; Laura Vozzella in
Richmond, Va.; Abby Phillip in Minneapolis, Minn.; Anne Gearan and Paul
Kane in Washington; Robert Costa in Atlanta; Jose A. DelReal in
Nashville; Fenit Nirappil in Norfolk, Va.; Ed O’Keefe in Alcoa, Tenn.;
and David Weigel in Castleton, Vt., contributed to this report.
Philip Rucker is a national political correspondent for The Washington Post, where he has reported since 2005.
Juliet
Eilperin is The Washington Post's White House bureau chief, covering
domestic and foreign policy as well as the culture of 1600 Pennsylvania
Avenue. She is the author of two books—one on sharks, and another on
Congress, not to be confused with each other—and has worked for the Post
since 1998.
David
A. Fahrenthold covers Congress for the Washington Post. He has been at
the Post since 2000, and previously covered (in order) the D.C. police,
New England, and the environment.