Subject: Stitch: PRES-TRUMP-TIVE
From: Jonathan Allen <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 27 Apr 2016 13:06:05 +0000
List-Id: dff5dea186e38c29c57ca6f8fmc list <dff5dea186e38c29c57ca6f8f.326717.list-id.mcsv.net>

** THE BIG QUESTION

Trump tossed out a number of lines of attack against Clinton last night. What's his best argument against her?

THE BATTLE OVER WHETHER IT'S OVER
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As JANET HOOK reports for the Wall Street Journal (http://www.wsj.com/articles/northeast-primaries-set-up-republican-candidates-for-home-stretch-1461709702) , DONALD TRUMP's better-than-expected victories in all five of the states that voted yesterday led him to give himself the title most analysts aren't ready to bestow on him.
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"I consider myself the presumptive nominee, absolutely. ... We should heal the Republican Party.”

—Donald Trump/via WSJ (http://www.wsj.com/articles/northeast-primaries-set-up-republican-candidates-for-home-stretch-1461709702)

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TRUMP'S RIVALS and some of his other detractors in the Republican Party say he's less presumptive nominee and more presumptuous front-runner.

Whatever you call him, it's getting pretty damn hard to see a scenario in which Trump is denied the nomination.

TED CRUZ & JOHN KASICH seem to be pursuing the strategy MARY KATE CARY, the U.S. News columnist and former George H.W. Bush speechwriter, suggested they should pursue last night on Sidewire.
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"I'd look forward to Indiana publicly and leak possible VPs to stay in the news. And keep the dream of a contested convention going. As Jesse Jackson would say: keep hope alive!"

—Mary Kate Cary/Sidewire (https://pass.sidewire.com/politics/dashboard/articles/485108b9bac877ddc03be590bb871e15/commentary/8afc460a-8cde-4bfc-9488-e18401bb1ef0)

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It's true that both sides are still operating in the realm of ifs. If Trump can win Indiana and California — and a good number of districts in the latter — he'll probably surpass the threshold without having to twist the arms of unbound delegates before the first ballot at the GOP convention. If he is denied a victory in Indiana or one or both of his rivals over-perform in California, he could be denied the magic number.

RUSS SCHRIEFER, who advised the Chris Christie campaign, told DAN BALZ of the Washington Post (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/indiana-looms-large-for-cruzs-slender-hopes-after-trump-sweeps-northeast/2016/04/26/e0c111f4-0b2d-11e6-8ab8-9ad050f76d7d_story.html?hpid=hp_rhp-top-table-main_take-1025pm%3Ahomepage%2Fstory)  that Ted Cruz's is executing well in sowing doubts about Trump's path to 1,237 and presenting himself as a viable candidate by vetting potential vice presidential picks.
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"Cruz is playing the hand that he has been dealt as well as he can play it, ... Whether it’s real or not, optically it’s smart."

—Russ Schriefer/WaPo (https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/indiana-looms-large-for-cruzs-slender-hopes-after-trump-sweeps-northeast/2016/04/26/e0c111f4-0b2d-11e6-8ab8-9ad050f76d7d_story.html?hpid=hp_rhp-top-table-main_take-1025pm%3Ahomepage%2Fstory)

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TRUMP'S BIG NIGHT BY THE NUMBERS

CT: Trump 58% | Kasich 29% | Cruz 12%
DE: Trump 61% | Kasich 20% | Cruz 16%
MD: Trump 54% | Kasich 23% | Cruz 19%
PA: Trump 57% | Cruz 22% | Kasich 19%
RI: Trump 64% | Kasich 24% | Cruz 10%

OVERALL DELEGATE COUNT (via Green Papers (http://www.thegreenpapers.com/P16/) ):
Trump 957 | Cruz 562 | Kasich 154
* It takes 1,237 delegates to win the nomination.
* There are 582 delegates still available, according to a Green Papers estimate that takes into account delegate selection around the country that already has occurred.

REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST JOSH HOLMES said on Sidewire last night that it looked like the bottom was dropping out of Cruz's support.
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"If Trump is closing the door it suggests Cruz has just collapsed rather than Trump consolidating. Perhaps it's just geography tonight but the timing could not be worse."

—Josh Holmes/Sidewire (https://pass.sidewire.com/politics/dashboard/articles/485108b9bac877ddc03be590bb871e15/commentary/98a5aca7-31eb-45c8-bbf5-1b8189e3e69d)

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Kasich, as Trump noted last night, still trails Marco Rubio, who dropped out last month, in the race for delegates.
THE MOST MEMORABLE line of last night — and potentially the most damaging — was a Trump shot across Hillary Clinton's bow.
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"If Hillary Clinton were a man, I don't think she'd get 5 percent of the vote."

—Donald Trump/via The Hill (http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/277795-trump-if-hillary-were-a-man-she-wouldnt-get-5-percent-of)

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**
TRIVIAL PURSUITS
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ABOUT TODAY
Abraham Lincoln suspended habeas corpus on this day in 1861.

YESTERDAY'S TRIVIA
Three senators were sworn in before their 30th birthdays: Henry Clay in 1806, Armistead Mason in 1816 and John Eaton in 1818.

TODAY'S TRIVIA
Courtesy of BOB SHRUM: Who told a 5-year-old FDR "My little man, I am making a strange wish for you. It is that you never be president of the United States"?

Send answers to [email-masked]. You'll win the right to pose tomorrow's trivia question if you're the first person to respond correctly.

PLEASE SEND TIPS, suggestions, comments, complaints, corrections and the basketball rim Ted Cruz had measured (http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/onpolitics/2016/04/26/ted-cruz-hoosiers-norman-dale/83568962/)  during his "Hoosiers" moment last night to [email-masked]

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**
CLINTON PIVOTS (AGAIN) TO THE GENERAL ELECTION
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HILLARY CLINTON's night wasn't quite as good as Donald Trump's, but it was even more decisive in terms of removing the last trace of suspensein her party's nomination fight.
Clinton won four of the five states where voters went to the polls.:

CT: Clinton 52% | Sanders 47%

DE: Clinton 60% | Sanders 39%

MD: Clinton 63% | Sanders 33%

PA: Clinton 56% | Sanders 44%

RI: Sanders 55% | Clinton 43%

OVERALL DELEGATE COUNT (via Green Papers (http://www.thegreenpapers.com/P16/) )
Clinton 2,134 | Sanders 1,387

Needed for nomination: 2,383 | Still available: 1,243 (includes Green Papers estimates and superdelegates)

IT WAS BERNIE SANDERS' campaign that signaled the denouement last night in a press release in which he vowed again to continue campaigning for votes, and delegates, in the remaining states on the primary calendar.
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"That is why this campaign is going to the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia with as many delegates as possible to fight for a progressive party platform"

—Bernie Sanders/Press release

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CLINTON AND HER ALLIES are, again, trying to shift their focus away from Sanders and toward the general election. AMY CHOZICK & ALEX BURNShave details (http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/27/us/politics/democratic-race-sanders-clinton.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=a-lede-package-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0)  of her plans in the New York Times, and there's good reason to think that she'll actually be able to stop battling Sanders with the same intensity between now and the end of the nomination contests in June.
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"Her advisers and allies say she will spend the coming weeks honing her message for the general election, and stepping up fund-raising that has lagged in the face of Mr. Sanders’s challenge."

Chozick & Burns/NYT (http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/27/us/politics/democratic-race-sanders-clinton.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=a-lede-package-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0)

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They also report that the pro-Clinton Super PAC Priorities USA, which has put together Web videos hitting Republicans in recent weeks, may start spending on general election ads under certain circumstances.
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"Depending on how the Republican primary develops and whether they decide to launch attacks against Hillary."

—Guy Cecil, Priorities USA/NYT (http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/27/us/politics/democratic-race-sanders-clinton.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=a-lede-package-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0)

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THE MAIN QUESTION FOR DEMOCRATS is whether they can repair the rift opened by their primary.
JAIME HARRISON, chairman of the South Carolina Democratic Party and a Clinton supporter, said last night on Sidewire that there are things she can learn from the primary fight.
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"I think she really has to figure out the anxieties felt around the issue of wage stagnation and she has to address the issues faced by young voters ... particularly rising college costs and student loan debt."

—Jaime Harrison/Sidewire (https://pass.sidewire.com/politics/dashboard/articles/485108b9bac877ddc03be590bb871e15/commentary/73b679f2-1707-4e28-a112-f36a978dec59)

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**

THE OTHER BIG RACES
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CHRIS VAN HOLLEN defeated fellow House Democrat Donna Edwards, 53 percent to 39 percent, to win the party's nomination in the race to succeed Sen. Barbara Mikulski in deep-blue Maryland.
* Former Md. Lt. Gov. Anthony Brown won the nomination to succeed Edwards in the 4th District
* State Sen. Jamie Raskin was the victor in Van Hollen's 8th District, defeating self-funded wine-seller David Trone and Kathleen Matthews, a longtime TV reporter and anchor in Washington who is married to MSNBC'S Chris Matthews.

KATIE McGINTY, once the top aide to former Pennylvania Gov. Tom Wolf, won a heated Democratic primary, fending off former Rep. Joe Sestak and Braddock Mayor John Fetterman to win the right to challenge GOP Sen. Pat Toomey in the fall.
* Rep. Chaka Fattah, who is facing trial in a federal corruption case, became the first incumbent to lose a House primary this year. State Rep. Dwight Evans, who was the top vote-getter in the multi-candidate race, should win the Philadelphia seat easily in the fall.
* House Transportation & Infrastructure Committee Chairman Bill Shuster narrowly fended off a Republican primary challenge from Art Halvorson.

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—30—

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