When confronted with the possibility of a contested convention, both Donald Trump and Ted Cruz argued that Marco Rubio and John Kasich have no path to the Republican nomination.
Trump and Cruz said only they will be in position to earn the delegate total necessary the nomination and explained what they would do if they encounter a fight on the convention floor in Cleveland this summer.
“I think I’m going to have the delegates, OK?” Trump said during Thursday’s GOP presidential debate. “But if somebody doesn’t have the delegates and I guess there’s two of us up here that can and there are two of us that cannot at this moment. … If two of us get up there, I would say this, if Marco, if the governor, if Ted had more votes than me in the form of delegates, I’d think whoever gets to that top position as opposed to solving that artificial number that was set by somebody, which is a very random number, I think that whoever gets the most delegates should win.”
The number Trump describes as “random” is actually an outright majority of the Republican National Convention delegates.
Hugh Hewitt, a CNN debate questioner, then asked how Cruz would prevent Trump supporters from bolting the GOP if the Texas senator secured the nomination, but Trump interrupted with some advice.
“Make me president,” Trump demanded.
“Donald, you are welcome to be president of the Smithsonian,” Cruz replied. “You know there’s some in Washington who are having fever dreams of a brokered convention, they are unhappy with how people are voting and they want to parachute in their favorite Washington candidate to be the nominee. I think that would be an absolute disaster and we need to respect the will of the voters.”
Cruz urged Republican viewers to support his candidacy because, he argued, a Trump nomination would mean Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton wins the presidency in November.
Trump replied by counting the number of states in which he has defeated Cruz and reiterated his belief that he would beat Clinton.
Kasich indicated that he believed he could still succeed in a contested convention, and Rubio avoided discussing the delegate math and instead made an emotional case for why he has chosen to keep running for president.
Five nominating contests will take place on Tuesday, as the calendar shifts toward winner-take-all states that could cut the Republican field in half. Rubio’s home state of Florida and Kasich’s home state of Ohio will hold their primaries on Tuesday, alongside Illinois, Missouri and North Carolina.
