Crippling loss?

Cruz braces for crippling loss

Indiana could deal a fatal blow to Cruz and put Trump on a glide path to the nomination.

By Kyle Cheney

Ted Cruz hurled every slight in the book at Donald Trump on Tuesday, but it might not be enough to stave off a debilitating defeat in Indiana.

The Texas senator is bracing for a loss that could cripple his chances to block Trump’s ascent to the Republican presidential nomination. He spent his morning skewering the New York billionaire -- “utterly amoral,” “a serial philanderer,” “a pathological liar” and even ridden with venereal disease. But it only served to underscore the political reality: Trump could be close to a knockout blow. And he knows it.

“Ted Cruz is a desperate candidate trying to save his failing campaign,” Trump said in response to Cruz’s tirade. “Today’s ridiculous outburst only proves what I have been saying for a long time, that Ted Cruz does not have the temperament to be President of the United States.”

Trump’s campaign, meanwhile, has taken on a new swagger. Though polls are notoriously spotty in Indiana, the few reliable ones showed Trump coasting to an easy victory over Cruz, dampening any optimism about a resurgent anti-Trump movement.

Indiana could be a back-breaker for those still hoping to stop the mogul. A strong finish by Trump would earn him most of the state’s 57 allocated delegates and put him on a trajectory to clinch the Republican nomination without the threat of a contested national convention. A big win in Indiana, combined with victories in New Jersey and California next month, would likely seal the nomination.

While Hoosiers cast ballots, Trump and Cruz engaged in some of their most hostile exchanges of the entire campaign. Trump launched the first unusual strike when he cited a National Enquirer story that linked Cruz’s father Rafael with John F. Kennedy’s assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald. It was the latest takedown by Trump of a Cruz family member, weeks after the mogul tweeted an unflattering picture of Cruz’s wife Heidi. And it sent Cruz into a fury.

“I actually think Donald, if you hooked him up to a lie detector test, he could say one thing in the morning, one thing at noon and one thing in the evening, all contradictory and he’d pass the lie detector test each time,” Cruz told reporters during a press conference in Evansville, Indiana. “Whatever lie he’s telling, at that minute he believes it, but the man is utterly amoral.”

Trump, though, has already shown signs that he’s looking past his contest with Cruz and toward the general election. He’s taken more direct shots at Hillary Clinton, the likely Democratic nominee, and has repeatedly insisted the Republican primary is over – especially following six straight dominant wins in New York and across the northeast.

The math seems to bear him out. Trump has accumulated 996 bound delegates in the first 46 primary contests. He needs another 241 delegates to clinch the nomination, and his haul from Indiana will put him on that trajectory. He expects to pick up a majority of delegates in West Virginia next week, as well as shares of delegates in Oregon and Washington later in May. But it’s the June 7 contests – including California and its 172 delegates – that will likely push him over the top in his race for 1,237.

Though Trump appeared closer than ever to the nomination, flashes of his problem unifying the GOP were evident.

“[T]he GOP is going to nominate for President a guy who reads the National Enquirer and thinks it's on the level. I'm with her,” tweeted Mark Salter, a former senior adviser to John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign.

Cruz, on the other hand, is already mathematically precluded from winning the nomination outright. His only hope, along with that of Ohio Gov. John Kasich, is to limit Trump’s gains and force a contested convention in which most delegates are free to vote their conscience. If Cruz can’t keep Trump from an outright clinch, his only remaining options will be the more desperate kind: relying on delegates at the convention to derail Trump’s bid by rewriting rules or blocking Trump’s supporters from being seated.

Cruz has given no indication he’s pursuing those approaches, but he’s been dominant so far in the state-by-state fights to elect friendly delegates to the convention. Continued victories there could give him enough leverage to control the convention.

But Cruz himself predicted a dire outcome if he doesn’t win big on Tuesday. "If Indiana does not act, this country could well plunge into the abyss," Cruz said.