March 5/6 Post Mortem: Cruz and Bernie Show Some Life, But Gain Few Delegates

The Donald Trump juggernaut encountered a bit of turbulence this weekend, as Ted Cruz unexpectedly won the Kansas and Maine caucuses and gave Trump a run for his money in the Louisiana primary and Kentucky caucus, though Trump won both.  Marco Rubio, who otherwise had a disastrous showing in those four races, did manage to win the Puerto Rico primary handily and swept all 23 votes.

But for all his efforts, Cruz only managed to pick up a net 16 delegates on Trump, garnering 69 to Trump’s 53.   That is the problem with proportional allocation, where wins make headlines but do not do much to close gaps.  Trump still leads Cruz by 84 delegates.

What does this mean for Cruz?  He has clearly established himself as the “alternative” in this race, the clear number two to Trump, outclassing Rubio.  He has now taken six states to Rubio’s two (Minnesota and Puerto Rico), and has just about double Rubio’s delegates, 300 to 151. 

But these results may actually be better news for Trump than anyone.  The assumption has been that the way to beat Trump was to rally the establishment, with all of its resources, money and clout, around Rubio, enabling him to go head-to-head with Trump and dethrone him once most primaries move to a winner-take-all format on March 15 – starting with a Rubio win in Florida.  This may have been a fantasy all along (since Trump is polling well ahead of Rubio in Florida) but at least it was a rational plan.  But the establishment cannot rally around Cruz; in fact, they have a tough time determining which of Cruz or Trump they hate more.  The Rubio and Kasich campaigns are both showing a very faint pulse, the last heartbeats of GOP establishment favorites.

Is Cruz a threat to Trump?  Frankly, I don’t see it.  Cruz has proven to be a strong regional candidate who does well in caucuses, which are low turnout affairs that favor the passionate wings of the parties and demand strong organizations, which Cruz has.  His regional strength is apparent in his home state win in Texas, and wins in neighbor Oklahoma and nearby Kansas.  He also has won caucuses in Iowa, Alaska and Maine.  But he must ultimately beat Trump in primaries that are outside of his region, and that will be a major challenge.

The first test for him will come on Tuesday, in primaries in Michigan and Mississippi.  Trump has a solid lead in virtually every poll in Michigan, and has been running roughly 40% to 20% over Cruz, with Kasich and Rubio also in the mix.  Polling has been far lighter in Mississippi, but Trump is up by 2 to 1 over Cruz in the only recent poll from last week.  I sense that these poll margins will translate to wins for Trump in both primaries, but I will await any last minute polls tomorrow before making our projections.

Despite Cruz’s understandable calls for Rubio and Kasich to exit, they will both almost surely stay in until their home state primaries on March 15 (Florida and Ohio), though I suspect they will both exit if they do not win those home states battles.

On the Democratic side, Bernie Sanders won three races over the weekend over Hillary Clinton, taking caucuses in Kansas, Nebraska and Maine while Clinton won only the Louisiana primary.  Sanders is much like Cruz, a caucus winner based on the fervor of his fellow lefties who get out to support him in low turnout events.  But the math shows his struggle – despite winning three out of four, he only picked up three net delegates, winning 66 to Clinton’s 63, and thus still trails her by a whopping 631 delegates.  To have such a great weekend result in such a minimal outcome in delegates underscores the virtually impossible nature of his task in attempting to overtake Clinton.

BTRTN PROJECTIONS

The combination of minimal polling and seven of out the nine races being caucuses did a number of us.  We forecast only five of the nine races correctly.  We did extremely well in both Louisiana primaries, and in Kentucky for the GOP and Nebraska and Maine for the Dems.  But Cruz and Sanders took the Kansas caucuses, and the Maine caucus and Puerto Rico primary were complete wash-outs.

State	Party	Candidate	Predict.	Actual	Abs.    Diff	Pred. Rank	Act. Rank	Abs Rk Diff
March 5/6	Dem				9.3			0.3
Kansas	Dem	Clinton	53	32	20.7	1	2	1
Kansas	Dem	Sanders	47	68	20.7	2	1	1
Nebraska	Dem	Clinton	45	43	2.1	2	2	0
Nebraska	Dem	Sanders	55	57	2.1	1	1	0
Louisiana	Dem	Clinton	70	71	1.1	1	1	0
Louisiana	Dem	Sanders	30	23	6.8	2	2	0
Maine	Dem	Clinton	46	36	10.5	2	2	0
Maine	Dem	Sanders	54	64	10.3	1	1	0

State	Party	Candidate	Predict.	Actual	Abs.    Diff	Pred. Rank	Act. Rank	Abs Rk Diff
March 5/6	GOP				11.5			0.6
Kansas	GOP	Trump	38	23	14.7	1	2	1
Kansas	GOP	Cruz	30	48	18.2	2	1	1
Kansas	GOP	Rubio	18	17	1.3	3	3	0
Kansas	GOP	Kasich	14	11	3.3	4	4	0
Kentucky	GOP	Trump	43	36	7.1	1	1	0
Kentucky	GOP	Cruz	25	32	6.6	2	2	0
Kentucky	GOP	Rubio	24	16	7.6	3	3	0
Kentucky	GOP	Kasich	8	14	6.4	4	4	0
Louisiana	GOP	Trump	47	41	5.6	1	1	0
Louisiana	GOP	Cruz	32	38	5.8	2	2	0
Louisiana	GOP	Rubio	14	11	2.8	3	3	0
Louisiana	GOP	Kasich	7	6	0.6	4	4	0
Maine	GOP	Trump	32	33	0.6	2	2	0
Maine	GOP	Cruz	15	46	30.9	4	1	3
Maine	GOP	Rubio	35	8	27.0	1	4	3
Maine	GOP	Kasich	18	12	5.8	3	3	0
Puerto Rico	GOP	Trump	34	14	20.4	1	2	1
Puerto Rico	GOP	Cruz	15	9	6.0	4	3	1
Puerto Rico	GOP	Rubio	32	74	41.8	2	1	1
Puerto Rico	GOP	Kasich	19	1	17.6	3	4	1