Most of the suspense has been taken out of the presidential primaries. Neither Donald Trump nor Hillary Clinton have clinched their party’s nomination, but it would take a cataclysmic event to derail any of them at this point.
Ted Cruz may make vague threats to come re-enter the Republican race he just departed and on the Democratic side Bernie Sanders won’t go away, winning in West Virginia Tuesday night. But a Trump-Clinton general election showdown seems nigh.
Here are four takeaways from West Virginia and Nebraska.
1. West Virginia Democrats have soured on Clinton.
This was a state the Democratic front-runner won easily in 2008. She lost it badly this time around and many Democratic primary voters — not necessarily the same thing as Democrats — seem inclined to vote for Trump rather than her in November.
West Virginia Democrats are a quirky bunch. About 21 percent said race was a factor in their 2008 primary votes and they overwhelmingly picked Clinton. (Robert Byrd was an Obama endorser that year.) Four years later, 40 percent voted for someone sitting in a federal prison rather than the incumbent Democratic president sitting in the Oval Office.
It’s hard to fault them for reacting badly to Clinton’s coal comments, however, a bell that she probably won’t be able to un-ring come the fall.
2. Sanders is trying to stay on-message about the general.
Until the last couple months, the Vermont senator has been a perfect opponent for Clinton: strong enough that her campaign is forced to actually compete with him, but not capable of actually beating her provided they do everything they need to do.
After a string of caucus and small-state wins, Sanders began to become a bit more of a nuisance, especially after he stepped up attacks on her or her husband’s deviations from liberal orthodoxy and criticizing her character and judgment. That’s when pro-Clinton Democrats began kvetching about Sanders’ tone. Trump has started citing Sanders’ complaints about both Clinton and the Democrats’ nominating process on the stump.
At a victory rally of sorts in Oregon, Sanders made sure to mention that Trump was “insulting women” daily. While campaigning in New Jersey Monday, he spent time assailing the billionaire’s business record in Atlantic City.
For all his and his supporters’ talk of a contested convention in Philadelphia, Sanders understands the jig is up.
3. That was a non-trivial anti-Trump vote in Nebraska.
Nebraska was a state where Cruz was expected to compete or even win had he stayed in the race. It shouldn’t be surprising that Trump’s most recently vanquished rivals combined for close to 40 percent of the vote there, even with lots of demoralized supporters of other Republicans presumably not showing up.
But neither Cruz nor Kasich got particularly close to Trump individually, which has been the problem for both men since the tide turned after the Texas senator’s Wisconsin win in April. Exit polls and public polls are starting to show Trump moving toward winning a normal share of the Republican vote for a GOP nominee in hypothetical matchups with Clinton.
4. West Virginia GOP voters are angry.
The preliminary exit polls showed 92 percent were angry or dissatisfied with the federal government, with 85 percent of the angry voting for Trump. This was one of the first signs that it was going to be a big night for Trump, even accounting for the fact that he has cleared the field of notable rivals.
