Ted Cruz spent the weekend winning in Colorado, while Donald Trump’s campaign went on a whining fit.
In Colorado, Cruz swept the delegate count, picking up 13 delegates on Saturday to complete a clean sweep of the state’s available 37 delegates. While Trump’s campaign concentrated on the more favorable New York primary, Cruz spent time building support in the western state, which cancelled its primary to hold local and state delegate conventions instead.
In addition, Cruz picked up delegates in Virginia— in a district that Trump won—and began the process of wasting the Trump campaign in Indiana, picking up 21 delegates in the state’s early caucuses, and paving the way to pick up 21 more when the state committee meets this week.
The Trump campaign, which fought allegations of internal struggles all week last week, completely fell apart in Colorado, issuing delegate fliers with the wrong names, the wrong delegate numbers, and in some case misspellings—one of which accidentally led the campaign to promote a Cruz supporter.
In response to the shellacking, Trump’s campaign turned to its most effective tactic thus far: weaponized whining.
In an interview with NBC’s Chuck Todd Sunday morning, newly minted Trump “delegate guru” Paul Manafort claimed that Trump’s efforts to court delegates was perfectly sound, and explained that Ted Cruz was using “Gestapo tactics” to steal delegates in states Trump counted as his own. Although Manafort failed to provide evidence that Cruz’s crew was routinely rounding up, jailing and torturing potential Trump supporters, NBC’s Chuck Todd countered Manafort by sharing audio of Trump surrogate Roger Stone apparently threatening RNC delegates. In the video, Stone casually mentions that the Trump campaign would have a list of delegate hotel rooms and that delegates should expect some personal persuasion in Cleveland.
That’s a nice delegate count you’ve got there, Ted Cruz—shame if something were to happen to it.
Rounding out Trump response to Cruz’s weekend victories, the candidate himself accused the Cruz campaign of offering state-based supporters “goodies” for their unwavering commitment. But while Donald Tweets, his delegate count slowly burns, as Cruz’s superior system—and far superior organization—takes hold.
This week, Cruz will be eyeing Indiana’s convention, while The Donald focuses on New York. With only a couple hundred delegates now separating the two, and the race for the nomination growing closer, the results for both contests will make a significant impact on the race and will likely expose a significant chasm between the two campaigns. From now until Cleveland, it will be readiness, not popularity, that will make the difference.
