The Cruz-Kasich Gambit in the Never-Trump Game
In previous articles I have emphasized that Trump can win the nomination on the first ballot if he wins most of the remaining winner-take-all states. In the Indiana winner-take-all primary on May 3, Trump is on the polling road to winning most of its 57 delegates. Rather than Cruz and Kasich splitting the remaining vote and letting Trump winner-take-all with about 43%, Kasich has agreed not to campaign in Indiana, which brings Cruz almost up to Trump in the latest poll. Kasich has little to lose since it is a winner-take-all state.
In return, Kasich has a Cruz-free crack at Oregon with 28 delegates, and New Mexico with 24, for a total of 52 delegates. Kasich is said to be low on funds. The Never-Trump donors were hesitating to waste more money unless they took effective action. These are proportional states, so they won’t pay off as much in delegates as the winner-take-all state of Indiana. Kasich may have done better in Indiana since it is nearby Gov. Kasich’s home state of Ohio. However, Kasich needed to win or do well in another state than Ohio, and to stop Trump.
They should have read Trumps’ book on how to make a deal, since soon after the deal was announced, Cruz said that Kasich has withdrawn from the Indiana primary, but Kasich said it was okay to vote for himself in Indiana. Now Cruz has come out and said that it is okay to vote for Cruz in Oregon. And he also said to vote for Cruz and not Kasich because only Cruz can beat Clinton. Oregon has mail only ballots, and they come out soon. The primary date is May 17.
Kasich also came out and said we really needed to go to an open convention, as if that was the most desirable kind. What is the point of the last year of letting Republicans vote on their candidates state by state, if ignoring Republican voters and going back to the old method of selecting the candidate by party insiders is better?
