Archives for April 12, 2016 at 4:36 pm EDT

McCrory Backtracks on New Bathroom Law

April 12, 2016 at 4:36 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard 138 Comments

North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory (R) “issued an executive order that changes two provisions in the controversial LGBT-protections law, and reaffirms private sector and local government rights to enact their own non-discrimination policies,” the Raleigh News & Observer reports.

“The law has led to substantial opposition from major companies, and hundreds of quantifiable lost jobs.”

However, the “most controversial part of the new law, requiring people use bathrooms of their sex at birth and not their gender identity, remains intact.”

Washington Post: “If this saga has gone terribly for McCrory, it’s been great for Democratic Attorney General Roy Cooper, who is trying to unseat McCrory.”

Trump’s Support Is Deeper Than Many Expect

April 12, 2016 at 2:41 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard 47 Comments

“Donald Trump’s support among Republican voters appears to be as deep as his hard-core GOP opposition, suggesting that the forces seeking to block his nomination will have to do more than just prevent him from winning enough delegates for a first-ballot victory,” according to a Politico analysis of voting and polling data.

“Trump has won only about 37 percent of the vote in the GOP primaries and caucuses thus far. But that doesn’t mean the entire 63-percent majority of Republicans who voted against him are resolutely opposed.”

Ted Cruz Is Hillary Clinton In Reverse

April 12, 2016 at 1:59 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard 62 Comments

Joshua Green: “When Cruz declared he was running for president last year, he was as unpopular in Washington as Clinton was popular at the outset of her first run. The certainty about their respective prospects was also about the same — Jeb Bush was the candidate whom Washington insiders expected to win the GOP nomination this cycle; Cruz was regarded as a fringe candidate of the far right.”

“But as they often do in politics, events have a way of interfering with our preconceptions. Bush flopped, and, until recently, Trump looked like the strongest candidate in the field… In the end, it may not matter. If Trump can’t secure the 1,237 delegates necessary to win the nomination by June 7, Republicans will probably head to an open convention in July. Trump will start out in the lead, but after the first ballot, many of his delegates will be free to support another candidate. Were the candidate to be chosen by Washington Republicans, it would almost certainly be a figure like Bush — or, more likely, House Speaker Paul Ryan.”

“But by and large, these delegates are state and local party officials from around the country who don’t see things the way their counterparts in Washington do. By piling up wins in states like Wisconsin, Cruz gains strength, support, and credibility in the eyes of these Republicans. If Trump comes up short, they’re likely to back Cruz and deliver the same kind of rebuke to their party’s Washington establishment as Democrats did by choosing Obama eight years ago.”

Ryan Will Rule Out Presidential Run

April 12, 2016 at 12:31 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard 125 Comments

Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) will definitively rule himself out as a contender to be the GOP presidential nominee in a formal statement this afternoon, The Hill reports.

Said an aide: “He’s going to rule himself out and put this to rest once and for all.”

Just Half of Trump, Cruz Voters Would Choose the Other

April 12, 2016 at 10:57 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 37 Comments

A new NBC News/Survey Monkey poll finds that only 56% of Ted Cruz supporters and 53% of Donald Trump supporters said they would vote for the other GOP candidate in a general election should the Democratic candidate be Hillary Clinton.

Married Women Really Don’t Like Trump

April 12, 2016 at 10:05 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 29 Comments

A new Bloomberg Politics/Purple Strategies survey of women voters finds that 70% of married women who plan to vote in November have a negative opinion of Donald Trump.

Just under 60% of women voters think comments about women are “offensive and embarrassing” and disqualify him from being a serious candidate.

The Outcomes Look Bleak for Republicans

April 12, 2016 at 9:22 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 20 Comments

Chris Riback and Taegan Goddard discuss how the Republican presidential nominating process might end.

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Special thanks to the Cook Political Report for sponsoring this episode.

Trump Is Now the Underdog

April 12, 2016 at 9:08 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 11 Comments

This piece is only available to Political Wire members.

Donald Trump leads the Republican presidential race in term of delegates won and he’s led the national polling averages for more than nine months. But after a rough few weeks, it appears Trump is now the underdog to win the GOP nomination.

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Clinton Makes Fun of Subway Mishap

April 12, 2016 at 9:07 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 60 Comments

The 404 error page on Hillary Clinton’s website is a photo of her struggling to swipe her New York City subway card: “Trying to get where you want to go?”

Obama’s Worst Moment Is Clinton’s Best?

April 12, 2016 at 8:33 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 68 Comments

Vanity Fair: “Hillary Clinton has often found herself on the defensive when asked to name her accomplishments as secretary of state, and Barack Obama isn’t making things any easier. Asked during an interview Sunday to name the ‘worst mistake’ of his presidency, Obama said it was failing to anticipate the fallout from toppling Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi in 2011—one of the policies cited by Clinton as one of her chief accomplishments when she headed the State Department.”

Said Obama: “Probably failing to plan for the day after, what I think was the right thing to do, in intervening in Libya.”

“As secretary of state, Clinton was one of the strongest proponents of the U.S. intervention in the Libyan civil war against Gadhafi; according to the New York Times, the decision to commit military assets to ending the dictator’s 42-year-old regime was ‘arguably her moment of greatest influence as secretary of state.’ While Obama has now pointed to that decision multiple times as one of his biggest regrets, he has also used the same logic to defend his reticence to intervene in Syria, where Clinton has urged a more militaristic approach, including a no-fly zone.”

Colorado GOP Swamped with Calls from Trump Supporters

April 12, 2016 at 8:26 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 18 Comments

The Colorado Republican party chairman said he’s “received more than 2,000 calls from people complaining that the process was a sham,” after Ted Cruz swept Donald Trump in the delegate race, the New York Times reports.

“His telephone number was mysteriously disseminated across the Internet.”

Is GOP Headed for Its Own Bush vs. Gore?

April 12, 2016 at 8:05 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 57 Comments

Byron York: “And it could be worse than that. The 2000 winner of the popular vote, Al Gore, lost the presidency because of the constitutional structure under which electors, not popular vote totals, determine who enters the White House. Seeing the popular vote loser, George W. Bush, win the election was unfortunate — it hadn’t happened since the 19th Century — but it was specifically provided for in the Constitution. Democrats unhappily accepted the result because they accepted the Constitution as the bedrock of our system of government.”

“In an intra-party Republican fight, on the other hand, the winner of the 2016 nomination could be determined not by the Constitution but by rules written by party activists and insiders the week before the GOP convention. If those rules can be reasonably viewed as unfair, they won’t command the fundamental respect and consensus of a constitutional provision. And the resulting nominee won’t command that respect, either.”

Why Paul Ryan Won’t Run for President

April 12, 2016 at 7:25 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 41 Comments

Politico: “The backdrop of all his denials is the political reality that Ryan would likely lose. Most public polling has him faring relatively poorly in a potential matchup with Clinton. … Ryan would be forced to launch and run a presidential campaign in three months. His experience from 2012 would help, but even the most talented campaigner would be at a disadvantage on such a compressed timetable.”

Quote of the Day

April 12, 2016 at 7:16 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 12 Comments

“For him to win a floor fight, he’s going to need more friends, not less. And I think he’s reaching out to people, and we’ll see how that goes.”

— Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), quoted by the Texas Tribune, on Sen. Ted Cruz’s chances of winning the Republican nomination.

Trump Names Possible Veep Picks

April 12, 2016 at 7:07 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 44 Comments

Donald Trump told USA Today that he would consider Sen. Marco Rubio, Gov. Scott Walker and Gov. John Kasich as his potential running mate.

Said Trump: “I do like Marco. I do like Kasich. … I like Walker actually in a lot of ways. I hit him very hard, … but I’ve always liked him. There are people I like, but I don’t think they like me because I have hit them hard.”

Trump, Clinton Headed for Big Wins In New York

April 12, 2016 at 7:02 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 28 Comments

A new NY1/Baruch College poll in New York finds Donald Trump leading the GOP presidential race with 60%, followed by John Kasich at 17% and Ted Cruz at 14%.

On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton leads Bernie Sanders 50% to 37%.

For members: New York Primary Cheat Sheet

There Are Few Limits on Wooing Delegates

April 12, 2016 at 7:00 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 9 Comments

Washington Post: “The already freewheeling Republican presidential contest is fast turning into a personal persuasion game as the candidates pursue no-holds-barred efforts to lock up delegates — and there are relatively few limits on how far they can go.”

“Under regulations established in the 1980s, delegates cannot take money from corporations, labor unions, federal contractors or foreign nationals. But an individual donor is permitted to give a delegate unlimited sums to support his or her efforts to get selected to go to the convention, including money to defray the costs of travel and lodging.”

Said campaign finance lawyer Brett Kappel: “They’ll live like kings at the convention.”

Attacks Ads Threaten to Undermine Trump

April 12, 2016 at 7:00 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 2 Comments

New York Times: “More than half of the record spending on negative advertising during the 2016 presidential primary has been directed at a single candidate, Donald J. Trump, a barrage that threatens to undermine his candidacy even as he continues to march toward the Republican nomination.”