Donald Trump liked to call Ted Cruz “Lyin’ Ted” during their fierce battle for the Republican presidential nomination over the past year.
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The Texan argued that the “politically easy option” would be to back the nominee no matter who it might be, but insisted: “This is not a game, it is not politics”.
The dispute was the latest misstep at the four-day party meeting, which was meant to show Republicans rallying behind Trump, a NY businessman who has never been elected to public office but who saw off 16 rivals to win the White House nomination.
A Cruz adviser, however, tells Reuters the Texas senator anticipated a backlash. They agreed, that is, to allow what Trump’s people are now treating as a calamity. Ohio Gov. John Kasich and other prominent Republicans have done so.
But instead of sounding the starting gun on the general election and placing his candidacy in the sweep of American history, Trump faces a much more basic task. He can not become the next US President unless Senator Cruz’s “courageous conservatives” support him.
Last month, Mr Kasich had compared breaking his endorsement pledge to a “divorce” – an unpleasant but occasionally necessary action.
“I’m not looking for an entrance, George”. “If they fulfill their obligations to us, the answer is yes”, he said. “But at this point, I can’t do it”. But nothing in it could compete for attention with the blow to party unity that Cruz – and the delegates who booed him off stage – delivered.
“You can not make comments about Muslims and about the handicapped and about women and not expect that at some point that pledge gets thinner and thinner until it breaks”, said former Ohio Attorney General Betty Montgomery.
The thought makes me shudder.
Many delegates were less forgiving. Polling from the Texas Politics project sponsored by the University of Texas and Texas Tribune show Cruz entering the convention with a 75 percent favorability rating among Republicans and over 90 percent favorability among Tea Party identifiers.
“The problems we face now – poverty and violence at home, war and destruction overseas – will last only as long as we continue relying on the same politicians who created them”, Trump will say.
The super-PAC, Correct the Record, obtained the drafts hours before the actual address from “a Republican source who had access to it and they sent it to us”, founder David Brock, a Clinton ally, told Politico.
On Wednesday, leading Republicans filling out the primetime lineup sent mixed messages to delegates and television viewers alike.
On the second day there was a convention floor fight over rules that was driven by anti-Trump forces and Cruz loyalists.
Not to be outdone, Trump tweeted that he knew about the speech prior to the address. Trump is not exactly addressing the controversy head on, but he took to Twitter earlier Thursday morning saying: “Other than a small group of people who have suffered massive and embarrassing losses, the party is very united”.
Clinton, who will formally accept the Democratic nomination at her own convention next week, is expected to steal the limelight on Friday or Saturday by announcing her vice presidential running mate.
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For now, however, some prominent politicians are not playing along – pledges be damned.
