A Big Night for One Man

Tuesday’s five primaries are in the books (almost), and Donald Trump walked away with three big wins and a virtual tie. The big one, of course, was winner-take-all Florida. Trump won “yuge” over the Sunshine State’s hometown boy, Marco Rubio, and the latter dropped out after his shellacking. Ted Cruz fought Trump to a draw in Missouri (as we go to press, the two are separated by just 1,800 votes). But the night was a good one for the frontrunner in just about every way. “You explain it to me, because I can’t,” Trump said to his supporters. “I don’t understand it. Nobody understands it.”

Actually, we totally understand it, and we have from the beginning.

John Kasich won his home state of Ohio (his first and only victory), giving him all the justification he wanted for staying in the race. Yet he sounded delusional declaring, “I may go to the convention before this is over with more delegates than anybody else.” Unless Trump and Cruz both drop out today, that’s not going to happen. Nonetheless, Kasich’s strategy surely must be to keep fighting for a brokered convention where he can either hope for a lifeline from the party’s establishment or play kingmaker with his delegates.

“In the meantime, however,” writes David French, “he’ll split the anti-Trump vote even further, allowing Trump to continue to win contest after contest with a plurality of voters. It’s self-serving, it’s vain, and it’s Kasich.”

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