Ballotpedia's Daily Presidential News Briefing - May 2, 2016
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Monday's Leading Stories
- Jeff DeWit, Donald Trump’s campaign chair in Arizona, accused Republican Party officials on Saturday of having “messed with the system” used to select national delegates at the state convention to guarantee a majority were anti-Trump. Although Trump’s delegate slate received approximately 39 percent of the vote, the slates presented by Ted Cruz and John Kasich, which were nearly identical, together received 42 percent of the vote. Additionally, some Trump supporters were not listed properly. Former Ariz. Gov. Jan Brewer (R) was incorrectly excluded from Trump’s slate and did not win a spot as a national delegate. “The people of Arizona got cheated, I got cheated, and the Trump delegates got cheated," she said. (CNN, Arizona Republican Party, The Arizona Republic)
- Hundreds of protesters gathered outside of the Republican Party of California’s state convention in Burlingame on Friday, blocking access to the road in front of the event site and attempting to enter the venue. Trump was forced to walk to a back entrance to enter the building. "Felt like I was crossing the border, actually. I was crossing the border, but I got here," Trump said on stage. He tweeted the following day, “The ‘protesters’ in California were thugs and criminals. Many are professionals. They should be dealt with strongly by law enforcement!” (The Hill, CBS News)
- At his final White House Correspondents' Dinner on Saturday, President Barack Obama made several jokes at the expense of each of the remaining presidential candidates:
- On Hillary Clinton: “Next year at this time, someone else will be standing here in this very spot, and it’s anyone’s guess who she will be.”
- On Bernie Sanders: “Bernie, you look like a million bucks. Or to put it in terms you’ll understand, you look like 37,000 donations of 27 dollars each.”
- On Ted Cruz: “He went to Indiana – Hoosier country – stood on a basketball court, and called the hoop a ‘basketball ring.’ What else is in his lexicon? Baseball sticks? Football hats? But sure, I’m the foreign one.”
- On John Kasich: “Meanwhile, some candidates aren’t polling high enough to qualify for their own joke tonight. The rules were well-established ahead of time.”
- On Donald Trump: “And there’s one area where Donald’s experience could be invaluable – and that’s closing Guantanamo. Because Trump knows a thing or two about running waterfront properties into the ground.”
- On the Republican race: “Meanwhile, on the Republican side, things are a little more — how should we say this — a little ‘more loose.’ Just look at the confusion over the invitations to tonight’s dinner. Guests were asked to check whether they wanted steak or fish, but instead, a whole bunch of you wrote in Paul Ryan. That’s not an option, people. Steak or fish. You may not like steak or fish but that’s your choice. (TIME)
Polls
- According to the Mike Downs Center for Indiana Politics, Ted Cruz leads Donald Trump in Indiana by 16 points, 45 percent to 29 percent. (The Hill)
- Two other polls out of Indiana released over the weekend, however, show Trump in the lead. The American Research Group has Trump ahead by nine points with 42 percent support. An NBC News/Wall Street Journal/Marist poll released on Sunday found Trump with an even larger lead of 16 points with 49 percent support. The pollsters also found that another 58 percent of respondents disapproved of the alliance between Cruz and John Kasich. (American Research Group, NBC News)
- In the Democratic primary, the Mike Downs Center for Indiana Politics has Hillary Clinton up by 13 points over Bernie Sanders in Indiana, 54 percent to 41 percent. An NBC News/Wall Street Journal/Marist poll has the race much tighter with Clinton leading Sanders by only four points, 50 percent to 46 percent. (The Journal Gazette, NBC News)
Democrats
Hillary Clinton
- In an interview on Sunday, Hillary Clinton said she “could really care less” about Donald Trump’s attacks against her. “I have a lot of experience dealing with men who sometimes get off the reservation in the way they behave and how they speak. I’m not going to deal with their temper tantrums or their bullying or their efforts to try and provoke me,” she said. A spokeswoman later apologized on behalf of Clinton for her use of the term “off the reservation” because it “has very offensive roots.” (TIME, Daily Caller)
- U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) said on Friday that rumors he would be Clinton’s vice presidential pick were not true. "I have a great feeling that I'm going to be on that podium with Hillary Clinton when she's taking the oath of office, but I'm going to be sitting with the other senators,” he said. (CNN)
- According to an analysis by Politico, less than one percent of the $61 million raised for the Hillary Victory Fund, the joint fundraising venture between Clinton’s campaign, the Democratic National Committee, and 32 state party committees, has been transferred to state parties. “I don’t think anyone wants to get crosswise with the national party because we do need their resources. But everyone who entered into these agreements was doing it because they were asked to, not because there are immediately clear benefits,” one official told Politico. (Politico)
- On Monday, Mark Landler of The New York Times profiled the conflicting approaches to diplomacy between Clinton, future Secretary of State John Kerry, and President Obama in the early stages of a potential Iran nuclear agreement beginning in 2009. “Clinton had a more cynical view of the endgame. We’re going to engage them not because we think they’re going to reciprocate, but because when they rebuff us, it will expose the fact that the problem lies in Tehran, and not in Washington,” said Karim Sadjadpour of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. (The New York Times)
Bernie Sanders
- In an interview last week, Jane Sanders discussed the FBI investigation into Hillary Clinton’s private email server, saying, “We want to let it go through without politicizing it, and then we’ll find out what the situation is. And that’s how we still feel.” She added, “I mean, it would be nice if the FBI moved it along.” (Politico)
- Sanders’ presidential campaign announced on Friday that it would no longer pursue a lawsuit against the Democratic National Committee (DNC) after it restricted the campaign's access to voter files. "With the investigation behind us, the campaign has withdrawn its lawsuit against the DNC today but continues to implore the DNC to address the systemic instability that remains in its voter file system," Sanders' campaign said in a statement. (CBS News)
- During a press conference on Sunday, Sanders predicted, “It is virtually impossible for Secretary Clinton to reach the majority of convention delegates by June 14 — that is the last day that a primary will be held — with pledged delegates alone. ... She will need superdelegates to take her over the top at the convention in Philadelphia.” He continued, “In other words, the convention will be a contested contest.” (The Huffington Post)
- Sanders’ campaign raised $25 million in April, a sharp drop from its $44 million haul in March. “The campaign said the average contribution in April was smaller than $26 and that just 3 percent came from donations that maxed out at $2,700. Sanders' campaign has long prided itself in being able to raise large sums of money from small donations,” Politico reported. (Politico)
Republicans
- Indiana Gov. Mike Pence (R) said on Friday that he would be voting for Ted Cruz in his state’s primary on Tuesday, noting Cruz’s "knowledge of the Constitution" and history of challenging the leadership of the Republican Party. Pence added, however, that he was “not against anybody” in the race and praised Donald Trump for giving “voice to the frustration of millions of working Americans with the lack of progress in Washington, D.C.” He continued, "Let me be very clear on this race: Whoever wins the Republican nation for president of the United States, I'm going to work my heart out to get elected this fall.” (CNN)
- U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said on Sunday that he was advising Cruz to “go to the last vote” because he believed a Trump presidency would compromise national security. He said, “There's a civil war going on in the Republican Party, obviously. John and I are very close friends, but he's embracing Donald Trump, and I am not. Why? Because I believe Donald Trump's foreign policy is isolationism. It will lead to another 9/11." (CBS News)
Ted Cruz
- On Friday, Ted Cruz questioned former Speaker of the House John Boehner’s intentions when he called him “Lucifer in the flesh.” He said, “I kind of wondered if Boehner was auditioning to be Donald Trump's vice president. You know, a Trump-Boehner ticket would really say the Washington cartel in all its force. One has been funding the cartel. The other has been giving in to Democrats for years, which is why Boehner lost his speakership. … We need, instead, someone fighting for the people and not for Washington." (CBS News)
- In an interview on Sunday, Cruz maintained his position on North Carolina’s bathroom law after transgender activist Caitlyn Jenner used a women’s bathroom in Trump International Hotel and said, “By the way, Ted, nobody got molested.” Cruz said in response, "This is the height of political correctness. Frankly, the concern is not the Caitlyn Jenners in the world. But if the law is such that any man if he feels like it can go in a women's restroom and you can't ask him to leave, that opens the door for predators." (Business Insider)
- Cruz defended Carly Fiorina’s business record on Sunday after an interviewer noted that she laid off 30,000 people at Hewlett-Packard, with many of those jobs being outsourced to Indiana and China. He said that “she was the first female CEO of a Fortune 20 company in history, and she helped HP become the largest technology company in the world, achieve remarkable success. Many of those jobs, by the way, were transferred from one state to another within the United States.” (Fox News)
- Cruz criticized Trump for saying that “all the tough guys endorse me” when noting an endorsement from boxer Mike Tyson. “Donald Trump was proudly trumpeting the support of Mike Tyson, a convicted rapist who served three years in prison here in Indiana for rape. … I don't think rapists are tough guys. I think rapists are weak, they're bullies and they're cowards. And Donald may be really proud of his support from a convicted rapist. I'm proud of the support of Carly Fiorina and Governor Mike Pence,” he said. (CBS News)
- Over the weekend, individuals supporting Cruz won 80 of the 170 national delegate slots filled over the weekend in Arizona, Virginia, and Missouri. (Politico)
John Kasich
- During a town hall on Friday in San Francisco, an attendee asked John Kasich if he believed that people were “born gay.” He answered, “Probably. I’ve never studied the issue, but I don’t see any reason to hurt you or discriminate [against] you or make you feel bad or make you feel like a second-class citizen." (ABC News)
- The 66 delegates pledged to Kasich from Ohio said that they would to continue to support him after the first ballot at the national convention in July. Former Ohio House Speaker Jo Ann Davidson and Don Thibaut, both Kasich supporters, were selected to serve on the convention’s rules committee. (Dayton Daily News)
- Before speaking at the state convention for California Republicans on Saturday, Kasich said of his campaign, “It isn’t working out right now, but you look at the national polls, when everybody gets to vote, it’s a different story.” He also expressed concern for how rhetoric in the Republican primary could alienate minority voters. “Do the Republicans actually think that they win an election by scaring every Hispanic in this country to death? Scaring them to the point that they’re afraid their families are going to be torn apart and disrupted? Do you have any idea what those folks are going to do in a general election? How about our friends in the African American community? How do they feel about this stuff? About this division and separation,” he said. (Breitbart)
- According to Public Policy Polling on Monday, 58 percent of Republicans in Ohio want Kasich to drop out of the presidential race. (Cincinnati.com)
Donald Trump
- Of the 27 delegates elected to represent Massachusetts at the Republican National Convention over the weekend, 22 were listed on Donald Trump’s slate of preferred delegates. (The Boston Herald)
- Trump spokeswoman Katrina Pierson said on Friday that Trump’s campaign could invoke allegations of sexual misconduct by former President Bill Clinton if Hillary Clinton calls Trump “sexist.” She said, “It boggles my mind that if a woman is criticized all of a sudden that makes you a sexist, and that's just simply not the case. So if Hillary Clinton or her team wants to go after Donald Trump as a sexist, then he will absolutely bring up that topic because there is a lot to discuss that was not brought out into the public.” Politico)
- Journalist Julia Ioffe said last week that she has received anti-Semitic messages and death threats since publishing a profile of Melania Trump, including a call from a funeral casket seller and another featuring a speech by Hitler. She said it was the type of harassment she had “only ever seen in Russia” before. (The Guardian)
- Trump convention manager Paul Manafort said on Sunday that Trump “will work with leaders of the Republican Party and various committees to help raise money for them as part of the overall ticket.” (The Huffington Post)
Third Party Candidates
Jill Stein (Green Party)
- Jill Stein lost her first primary contest over the weekend when she only secured three delegates at the state convention for the Green Party of South Carolina. Political science professor Bill Kreml won five. (Green Party Watch)
Gary Johnson (Libertarian Party)
- Last week, Gary Johnson released “Never Trump,” an ad presenting Johnson as an alternative to Trump for conservative voters. “Look, I can’t support Trump, you can’t support Trump. We can fight for small government and conservative values. Just google Gary Johnson and find out,” he says in the video. (The Libertarian Republic)
See also
- Presidential election, 2016
- Presidential candidates, 2016
- Presidential debates (2015-2016)
- Important dates in the 2016 presidential race
- Polls and Straw polls
- 2016 presidential candidate ratings and scorecards
