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| Jabin Botsford, Washington Post |
WASHINGTON POST DAILY 202
-- The returns from last night’s Nevada caucuses cast doubt on three assumptions that are widely held and often repeated by Republican elites in Washington, who are perhaps too eager to assure one another that Donald Trump still cannot actually win the nomination.
The first is that Trump has a relatively low ceiling of support. With 100 percent of precincts reporting, Trump won the Silver State with 46 percent. He beat Marco Rubio by 22 points. Ted Cruz finished a close third with 21.4 percent. As the Washington Examiner’s Byron York writes, “If he has a ceiling, at least in Nevada, it is higher than earlier thought.”
The second is that Trump will ultimately be hobbled by a lack of organization. Trump's rivals had built impressive ground games and his own supporters tend to be lower-propensity voters. Trump’s people proved last night that they will show up for caucuses.
The third is that, as the field of candidates condenses, every voter who is not currently for Trump will fall in line behind whoever emerges as his alternative. Many of Cruz’s voters actually look a lot like Trump voters demographically and ideologically. It should not be treated as a given that Cruz supporters would automatically move to Rubio if it becomes a two-man race. It stands to reason that many backing the Texan might prefer Trump over the other Cuban American senator, who continues to be dogged by his role in the Gang of Eight immigration bill.
The staggering breadth and depth of his victory suggests that the billionaire is poised to win big when 11 states vote next Tuesday.
According to preliminary network entrance polls, he won every single demographic. He carried men by 24 points and women by 18 points. He won those who describe themselves as very conservative, somewhat conservative and moderate. Just as in South Carolina, he bested Cruz among born-again evangelicals. The polling showed that he even won among Hispanics.
Trump is really tapping into the pervasive anger of the Republican base. Six in 10 of those who voted last night said that describes their feeling about the federal government. (36 percent said "dissatisfied," and only 4 percent picked "satisfied" or "enthusiastic.") Trump got half of the voters who called themselves angry, twice as much as Cruz.
Half of voters last night had a college degree. He beat Rubio 41-30 among this group. Among those without a college degree, he led Cruz 51-22. In his victory speech, he boasted: "We won with highly educated. We won with poorly educated. I love the poorly educated! We're the smartest people."
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| Ricky Carioti, Washington Post |
There is no sugarcoating it: Cruz was the biggest loser last night.Our reporter on the Cruz beat, Katie Zezima, reports this morning thatTed Cruz’s presidential bid is in turmoil after repeated allegations of unsavory campaign tactics by his Republican rivals, leading some key supporters to call for a shake-up in the candidate’s message and strategy a week ahead of the crucial Super Tuesday primaries.
Aides and allies of the insurgent senator from Texas acknowledged in interviews this week that the campaign has been damaged by attacks on Cruz’s integrity from Donald Trump and Marco Rubio. They have pointed to a series of questionable tactics by the Cruz camp, including calls to voters suggesting that candidate Ben Carson was dropping out and the sharing of an inaccurate video suggesting Rubio had disparaged the Bible.
-- The Texas primary next Tuesday now becomes either Cruz’s Alamo or his Waterloo, depending on what happens. A Texas Tribune/University of Texas poll published yesterday showed Cruz leading Trump there by 8 points, 37-29, with Rubio at 15 percent.