He’s done it again. The brash billionaire with “New York Values” had a banner night on Super Tuesday and there’s no doubt that the “Trump Train” is not being powered by gas, electricity or by solar power. Instead, evangelicals are the energy behind this locomotive.
Winning in the South has always been important to the fortunes of a GOP presidential candidate so Trump’s victories in Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama, Arkansas and Virginia are significant. But it’s even more noteworthy because he did it by securing the evangelical vote yet again, just like he did in South Carolina. Exit polls show that he’s doing it by appealing to middle class, blue-collar evangelicals who love their country and love God. In essence, many of them are former Reagan Democrats. They’re conservative but aren’t necessarily folks who always toe the GOP line. The fact that a billionaire like Trump can appeal to the, “regular guy” is an intangible that every candidate would love to have. Trump has it in spades. Trump was always expected to grab more of the non-evangelical vote but when you’re winning both evangelicals and non-evangelicals, it’s game, set, match.
As for what’s next for Trump, he’ll need to try and finish Marco Rubio off in Florida and fight off John Kasich in Ohio. Plus, he’ll need to maneuver whatever the GOP establishment folks throw at him in the next two weeks. So there are still potholes ahead but it’s going to be awfully hard to beat Trump at this point unless he implodes right before our eyes. Plenty of republican establishment types have been hoping for that moment since day one and time and time again they thought he had sunk himself. It never happened. With Trump so close to putting this nomination away, it’s hard to see him blowing it at this point. The GOP bigwigs want to blame Trump for running the GOP but they really should blame themselves. They never took Trump seriously and let him build his “Silent Majority.” They had plenty of chances to try and take him out earlier and they blew it.
For Cruz, Super Tuesday is a mixed bag. He won three states, which is better than winning no states but Super Tuesday was supposed to be his big day. Winning your home state of Texas, neighboring Oklahoma and remote Alaska doesn’t constitute a big night, especially considering you’re the “evangelical candidate” competing in evangelical-rich states. The exit polls showed that Cruz won the evangelical vote in Texas and Oklahoma. When he does that, he wins states, plain and simple. It happened in Iowa too. But the results Tuesday are a mixed bag at best. However, at least Cruz can say he has won four states overall now. It’s something but not much. He needs more. Actually, he needs Rubio to get out of the race. A Rubio loss in Florida and a Kasich loss in Ohio would be Cruz’s best shot at this point so he can get that coveted one-on-one matchup with Trump. Unfortunately for Cruz, it seems like that chance may come too late and I’m not convinced the one-on-one math will help him. Trump has started a real movement here. Cruz may be hard pressed to stop it.
As for Rubio, he won Minnesota so he can finally say he won a state. It’s something to build off of but for Rubio, this all comes down to Florida. It’s very simple. If he wins Florida, he’ll have renewed momentum and a whole lot more delegates. If he loses his home state, it’s goodnight nurse. It ends for him on March 16th. I can’t see how he continues unless he just wants to torment Trump.