Donald Trump, Ted Cruz play nicer during town hall on eve on Wisconsin primary
Forget the mudslinging. On the eve of the Wisconsin primary, it was damage-control time for rival Republicans Donald Trump and Ted Cruz.
The GOP front-runners seemed more engaged in message clean-up during town hall chats on Fox News on Monday after one of the roughest weeks of the campaign.
Trump brought his wife, Melania, by his side. Cruz, notably soft-spoken, brought in popular Gov. Scott Walker.
Some highlights:
It’s settled -- there will be another Democratic presidential debate
After a prolonged negotiation, the Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders campaigns have agreed to a new Democratic debate before the New York’s April 19 primary.
The Sanders campaign said it rescheduled an April 14 rally to make time for the debate, and took a shot at Clinton when announcing the agreement.
“We hope the debate will be worth the inconvenience for thousands of New Yorkers who were planning to attend our rally on Thursday but will have to change their schedules to accommodate Secretary Clinton’s jam-packed, high-dollar, coast-to-coast schedule of fundraisers all over the country,” said spokesman Michael Briggs.
The initial statement from the Clinton campaign was more succinct.
Bernie Sanders supporters gather in Milwaukee
Hundreds of voters are waiting for the Vermont senator to speak on the night before Wisconsin’s primary, including this volunteer who brought a homemade sign that plays off Hillary Clinton’s slogan, “I’m with her.”
Clinton camp tries to paint the Democratic race as increasingly out of Sanders’ reach
Hillary Clinton’s campaign sees some myths that need busting in the Democratic primary race.
In a state-of-the-race memo released on the eve of Tuesday’s Wisconsin primary, campaign manager Robby Mook paints a picture of a nomination battle that is all but wrapped up rather than still in doubt. Among his data-driven arguments:
- Clinton has earned 58% of the popular vote so far in the Democratic primaries and caucuses, 2.5 million more than rival Bernie Sanders.
- While Sanders routinely argues that a big turnout favors him, Mook says that Clinton has won 17 of the 21 states where more than 7% of eligible voters turned out.
- And then there is the delegate math: Clinton has a lead of 230 in pledged delegates. “With each passing week, it’s becoming increasingly unlikely that Sen. Sanders will be able to catch up,” Mook wrote, arguing that Sanders would need to win 60% of the vote in New York, Pennsylvania, California and New Jersey to do so.
The memo appears to be a prebuttal to Wisconsin, where Sanders has a narrow lead in surveys of primary voters, according to the Real Clear Politics average of public polling.
But the case for Sanders isn’t as hopeless as Mook would like his readers to believe.
One advantage Sanders has that goes unmentioned by Mook: He raised about $15 million more than Clinton in March. Her $29.5-million haul left her with $29 million in the bank heading into April.
In a separate statement, Mook said the campaign has made “smart investments” and surpassed its first-quarter fundraising goal, while also seeing a “surge in grass-roots support” -- March 31 was its best online fundraising day of the campaign. By underscoring Clinton’s small-donor totals, Mook is taking direct aim at Sanders, whose fundraising from individual donors has become a campaign-trail refrain.
Clinton appears to have ceded Wisconsin to her rival, and chose to campaign in New York on Monday and Tuesday in anticipation of the Empire State’s April 19 primary.
This conservative town could be a bellwether of how Trump’s message translates in California
Betty Robison got so riled up debating with her son over Donald Trump and immigration that her voice drowned out the barks of her two Chihuahuas.
“I don’t like Mexicans. I don’t like them,” the 58-year-old said in the frontyard of her apartment, which is littered with empty soda bottles and hamburger buns still in their plastic bags. “To me, if you can’t speak English, why be here? Go back to where you come from.”
“That’s the point of coming to America,” said Sean Kearns, 31. “Just because of the color of your skin doesn’t mean you’re not welcome here.”
“Well, you watch [Trump] get everyone the hell out of here,” retorted Robison, who wore a Dia de Los Muertos shirt. “What gives them the right to come to the United States and take over everything they see?”
Oildale — the conservative hometown of country legend Merle Haggard that is north of Bakersfield — might be as close as California gets to Trump Country. The region has remained loyally Republican while California as a whole has become more Democratic.
On a big day for minimum-wage laws, Hillary Clinton, not Bernie Sanders, grabs the spotlight
With the stroke of a pen, Andrew Cuomo got a beat on Jerry Brown. And with the flash of the cameras shortly after, Hillary Clinton sought to steal a bit of Bernie Sanders’ spotlight.
Cuomo, New York’s governor, signed into law the first statewide $15-an-hour minimum wage in the nation Monday, beating Brown doing the same in California by an hour or so. And Clinton, New York’s former senator, who is banking on a big victory in its primary in two weeks, was a conspicuous presence in celebrating the state enacting what has long been a policy goal for progressives.
“It’s a result of what is best about New York and what is best about America. And I know that it’s going to sweep our country,” Clinton said.
The moment was a microcosm of Clinton’s primary campaign: singing in harmony with the Democratic progressive base while she seeks the party’s nomination, but not quite the same tune in the way that Sanders does.
Donald Trump says the U.S. would be fine without NATO. Obama brings in the head of NATO to show he disagrees.
President Obama offered a calm rebuke of Republican Donald Trump’s foreign policy views on Monday, referring to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization as a “cornerstone” of U.S. security as he marked the 67th anniversary of the alliance.
Speaking with reporters in the Oval Office, Obama also praised the organization for “staying focused” on Islamic State as part of its commitment to the security of Europe and the world.
The remarks followed a meeting with NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg that was announced only after the bombings in Brussels two weeks ago. And they come as Trump has criticized the organization, even saying it would be OK for the U.S. if it broke up. In an interview with the New York Times last week, Trump said the alliance was designed “for the Soviet Union, which doesn’t exist anymore,” and that it “wasn’t designed for terrorism.”
Obama did not take on Trump directly but clearly expressed a contrasting view. The recent bombings in Brussels reaffirm the importance of staying focused on fighting Islamic State, he said.
“We recognize there are a broad set of challenges that have to be addressed,” Obama told reporters. He said that, during their meeting, he and Stoltenberg agreed that one of NATO’s main functions is stabilizing Iraq and other war-torn parts of the Middle East.
Decker: In California, Bill Clinton is star surrogate, and a reminder how Democrats have swung left from the Clintons
Bill Clinton is the star surrogate of his wife’s presidential campaign. His speeches on her behalf carry echoes of his winning arguments from a generation ago; his pledge then that Americans would “rise and fall together” has morphed into his promise that his wife’s policies will make the nation “rise together.”
But for all of his wow factor and the crowds’ enthusiasm, Bill Clinton’s presence is a reminder of something less positive for his wife’s campaign: Much of the Democratic base has moved further to the left than the former First Couple.
That came through during a campaign event Sunday in Los Angeles, where Bill Clinton praised the California Legislature’s passage of a measure that eventually will raise the state’s minimum wage to $15 an hour.
“God bless you for passing the minimum wage law,” the former president told an audience that included some of the legislative leaders who pushed it.
In contrast to the leap the legislators had taken, however, Hillary Clinton’s view on raising the minimum wage has been the definition of caution. She has backed a substantially smaller federal pay raise, to $12 per hour, with states encouraged to set their own levels as they see fit. (She plans to attend New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s signing of that state’s $15 minimum wage measure on Monday).
The Clinton approach of incremental change may get workers in places like California and New York to the same place, but to many activists it seems weak compared with the full-throated support for a national increase from Clinton’s opponent Bernie Sanders, the Vermont senator.
Bill Clinton’s Sunday remarks, made at a venerable Democratic campaign stop, the campus of Los Angeles Trade Tech College, also included reminders of past policy positions that run counter to where the party’s voters are today.
Trump, Cruz want Kasich off the GOP convention ballot
Ted Cruz and Donald Trump agree on one point — neither wants John Kasich on the Republican National Convention ballot.
The two GOP rivals each want the 1,237 delegates needed to clinch the nomination, but Ohio Gov. Kasich refuses to give up his campaign. Cruz and Trump accused him of dividing the delegate votes.
“If I didn’t have Kasich, I automatically win,” Trump said Sunday in Wisconsin, according to the Associated Press.
Cruz said in March that Kasich’s campaign helps Trump. “Every day John Kasich stays in, the race benefits Donald Trump,” Cruz said in a March 16 interview with CNN.
Either way, the rivals don’t want a third opponent in the race.
Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus continues to assure the news media that the party will not alter its convention rules this year.
He did acknowledge the small possibility of a contested convention, but told ABC on Sunday that the convention will settle on a nominee currently in the race.
And Kasich wants that possibility, which is why he refuses to quit.
“Kids will spend less time focusing on Bieber and Kardashian and more time focusing on how we elect presidents,” Kasich said on ABC Sunday about the novelty of a contested convention. “It will be so cool.”
Arianna Huffington likens Donald Trump to Kim Jong Un
We think that he’s a little bit like Kim Jong Un. You know, he’s both a buffoon and he’s dangerous.
— Arianna Huffington, editor in chief of the Huffington Post, speaking to CNN on Sunday about how the media fail to acknowledge GOP candidate Donald Trump as a danger.
With Ted Cruz looking strong before Wisconsin vote, Donald Trump scrambles for delegates
Ted Cruz’s expected strength in Tuesday’s Republican presidential primary in Wisconsin is threatening to obstruct Donald Trump’s path to the nomination and heighten the odds of a contested convention in Cleveland.
The senator from Texas is favored to win most of Wisconsin’s 42 GOP delegates, making it harder for Trump to capture the 1,237 he needs to avert a floor fight in July.
At the same time, signs are emerging that Cruz is outmaneuvering Trump in battles among party insiders for the loyalty of delegates. If Trump falls short on the first ballot at the convention, many delegates will be free to ignore their states’ popular vote and switch from him to another candidate.
At a weekend gathering of bear hunters in central Wisconsin, Gov. Scott Walker said Cruz’s strength in winning over delegates at state and local party conventions was laying the groundwork for the senator’s capture of the nomination in Cleveland despite Trump’s current lead.