PALM BEACH, Fla.—Donald Trump took a major step toward the Republican nomination Tuesday night, winning presidential primary races in Florida, Illinois and North Carolina (with Missouri declared too close to call after vote-counting was suspended late into the night). Trump’s landslide victory in winner-take-all Florida represented a stunning defeat for home-state Sen. Marco Rubio, who suspended his campaign for the White House.
But Ohio Gov. John Kasich eked out a win in his home state primary, denying Trump a much hoped for victory in the other crucial winner-take-all state of the night and increasing the likelihood of a contested GOP convention this summer.
While Trump nearly ran the table Tuesday, Illinois, North Carolina and Missouri (where he held a slim lead over Cruz) were not winner-take-all primaries, meaning that he will have to share the delegates awarded, once again prolonging the race for the GOP nomination.
And though Trump’s wins Tuesday looked to put him at least halfway to the 1,237 delegates he needs to claim the nomination, neither Kasich nor Cruz signaled any plans to leave the race. “Do you want a candidate who shares your values? Or a candidate who has spent decades opposing your values?” Cruz told his supporters at an election night rally in Houston.
For his part, Rubio did not immediately give up his delegates, delivering a concession speech that was more confrontational towards Trump than conciliatory. “The easiest thing to have done in this campaign [would have been]… to make people angrier, make people more frustrated,” Rubio said in a clear reference to Trump. “But I chose a different route, and I’m proud of that.”
“In a year like this, that would have been the easiest way to win, but that is not what’s best for America,” Rubio added. “The politics of resentment against other people will not just leave us a fractured party, but they will leave a fractured nation… where people literally hate each other because they have different political opinions.”
Rubio’s slow decline over the last three months became precipitous after a series of crude attacks on Trump in late February failed spectacularly in the minds of many voters. Rubio’s broadsides against Trump during the Feb. 25 GOP debate in Houston spiraled down in the following days on the campaign trail into jokes about Trump wetting his pants and even a reference to the size of Trump’s penis, which the businessman later defended during a raucous debate in Detroit March 3.
Sen. Marco Rubio, onstage with his family, tells supporters at a primary night rally in Miami that he is suspending his campaign for the Republican nomination. (Photo: Angel Valentin/Getty Images)
As he left his election night event Tuesday, Rubio pleaded with the electorate, “I ask the American people, do not give in to the fear. Do not give in to the frustration,” as supporters in the crowd wept. “America needs a vibrant conservative movement, but one that’s built on principles and ideas, not on fear, not on anger, not on preying on people’s frustrations.”
Donald Trump, speaking to supporters at his Mar-a-Lago beach club here, was surprisingly cordial towards his former rival, whom he had repeatedly ridiculed as “Little Marco” in campaign speeches as recently as Monday. But Trump, clearly trying to appear more presidential as he gains in his bid to be the party nominee, congratulated Rubio for running a tough campaign. “He’s got a bright future,” Trump said.
Trump's big win in Florida only puts him an inch closer to the nomination
Donald Trump may have knocked Marco Rubio out, but his wins on Tuesday didn’t change the race that much. Clinton, however, is on more solid ground
It was always billed as a pivotal night in the 2016 election calendar and in some ways, it was. Marco Rubio’s presidential hopes were laid to rest, Donald Trump looks set to win four out of five states and Hillary Clinton won either four or five (vote counters in Missouri have gone home for the night – the numbers below are based on the 99.9% of precincts that have reported results so far).
But actually the primaries on 15 March didn’t change the Republican race all that much: Trump started the night needing 54.8% of all remaining GOP delegates to clinch the nomination. Now, he needs 51.4% of all remaining delegates.
With so many states with large numbers of delegates left to vote, it’s likely that the Republican presidential contest will continue for weeks to come.
Trump’s steady position may seem surprising given the way that the night played out. North Carolina wasn’t a landslide victory. Trump won the primary, but the 72 Republican delegates available there weren’t distributed on a winner-takes-all basis, so the fact that the businessman won 40% of the vote meant that he only picked up 27 extra delegates.
More importantly, Ohio was a big loss for Trump (albeit one predicted by polling averages). All 66 delegates in this winner-take-all state went to Governor John Kasich. That doesn’t mean that Kasich, whose delegate count currently stands at 138, has any real chance of winning (at least through the primary process) – but he did give hope to Republicans wanting to erode Trump’s chances of getting the 1,237 delegates he needs to secure the party’s nomination. Increasingly, that appears to be the only viable strategy for preventing Trump from winning – forcing Trump to a contested convention in July at which the crown could be snatched away from him. And it explains the rise in anti-Trump Super Pac spending in recent weeks.
Whether or not that strategy works depends in part on what Rubio’s delegates do now. The Florida senator had 168 delegates at the time he made his resignation speech from the race on Tuesday evening. But the rules governing what those delegates do now vary from state to state.
Rubio’s delegates could head to the Republican convention uncommitted and switch their vote to Trump. But it’s also possible that Rubio will endorse another candidate such as Cruz and in so doing transfer some of his delegates to the Texas senator. Which of those outcomes happens could give Trump a significant boost or dent his chances.
For Democrats too, on the face of it, the race didn’t change too dramatically. Clinton started the night needing 59.2% of all remaining pledged delegates and she finished the night needing 59.4%. As ever, though, Democratic numbers look very different if you factor in so-called “superdelegates” – party luminaries who aren’t bound to voting for a specific candidate at the national convention.
Once those delegates are taken into account, Clinton already started the night in a much stronger position, needing only 40.3% of remaining delegates to get the party nomination. And she finished the night even stronger, needing just 34.2% of remaining delegates.
Analysts will no doubt predict in earnest the end of Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential chances. There’s good reason for those forecasts – nationally, Sanders is trailing 11 percentage points behind Clinton. But it’s also worth remembering that Clinton might not maintain her advantage. In 2008, despite winning against Obama right up until May (thanks largely to her superdelegate lead) Clinton eventually slipped behind. What’s more, dozens of superdelegates in 2008 used their right to switch between candidates and opted for Obama over Clinton. The same may yet happen again.
The basic takeaway? Trump’s performance in these primaries shouldn’t be overstated, while Clinton has edged much closer to securing the party’s nomination.
