Voters in Arizona and Utah might hear a familiar voice on the other end of the phone this week, “Hello, this is Mitt Romney”.
Advertisement
Three billionaires supplied more than 80 percent of the cash last month for a super political action committee dedicated to derailing Donald Trump. “Utahns are conservative, certainly, but they are also pragmatic and very polite so the discourse here tends to be a little less rough and tumble”.
But Solop said it’s also possible Trump will lose some key states and fall short of 1,237 delegates.
Primaries serve as nothing more than free publicity and get-out-the-vote awareness for Republicans and Democrats.
The Badger State on April 5 in particular is expected to be ground zero for the forces hoping to stop Trump, with McIntosh saying his group is planning a large ad buy in the state. But, after Trump suggested a total ban on Muslims entering the United States, the church issued a statement in support of religious freedom. Kasich made the odd choice to compete in Utah despite having developed little traction in the state when it was in his best interest to see Cruz get the winner-take-all majority of the vote, and slow down Trump’s progress to the nomination.
The poll comes on the heels of campaigning by most of the candidates in the state.
Cruz’s campaign has been taking advantage of this leadership void and planting his people on the “inside” of the delegate pools around the nation to secure a backdoor win on the path to the White House.
Charles Foster, a Houston immigration attorney who backed Bush until he left the race in February, said Friday he is urging establishment Republicans to line up behind Cruz. Trump now has 678 delegates of the 1,237 needed to outright win the nomination, but Texas Sen.
At a rally in Salt Lake City on Friday evening, Trump continued to dig in, jokingly questioning Romney’s faith.
Romney, perhaps the country’s most prominent Mormon politician, could give Cruz a boost in Utah’s caucuses, where Mormons form a majority of the state’s population and the candidate is scheduled to campaign this weekend. About 1,200 people inside the Infinity Event Center welcomed their candidate Friday night, even as protesters against Trump faced off with supporters of Trump outside the center.
The Deseret News/KSL poll conducted by Dan Jones & Associates released Sunday, March 20, puts both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders ahead of Trump in a hypothetical match-up.
Utah state Sen. Ralph Okerlund came around to Trump by looking past his antics and realizing he agreed with Trump’s policies that include granting states more power and scaling back federal government overreach.
“He has a solid record as governor”, Romney said of him. “But I like that he’s coming at it from an outside viewpoint”. Marco Rubio. “Mitt Romney is a mixed up man who doesn’t have a clue”, Trump wrote.
Romney’s position is one that is gaining momentum among party leaders, but directly undercuts the third candidate in the race: Ohio Gov. John Kasich, someone Romney campaigned with just five days prior.
Trump also stressed his own connection to Mormons, saying he has employed many who follow the religion, including some who asked him to “make the payment directly to the church”.
Advertisement
In a Facebook post, Romney said a vote for Cruz in Utah’s caucus on Tuesday, March 15 was the best way to prevent Trump from locking down the nomination, which would give opponents a chance to select another candidate at the party’s July convention.
