After “Mini-Tuesday,” the path towards the nomination of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton for their respective party candidacies seem clearer now than ever. Donald Trump carried four states on Tuesday night, winning by a fraction in Missouri and by larger margins in Illinois, North Carolina and Florida. By winning Florida, Sen. Marco Rubio’s home state, Trump essentially ended the Rubio campaign. On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton carried Florida, Illinois, North Carolina and Ohio, winning 371 delegates and extending her lead on Sen. Bernie Sanders.
At this point, Trump has a clear path to winning the Republican nomination outright. 1,237 delegates are needed to avoid a contested convention, and if Trump wins the remaining primaries by an average of 40 percent support, he should meet that threshold. By comparison, Ted Cruz would need to win the remaining primaries with 70 percent to meet the threshold, and Gov. Kasich is mathematically unable to do so.
When we look back on the 2016 primary race, questions will inevitably be asked: What if Marco Rubio had dropped out earlier? Why did he wait until he lost his home state by almost 20 points? Would the race have been different without another establishment Republican splitting the base vote? The answers are: “Who knows,” “Only Marco knows” and “Certainly," respectively. The political monster that is Trump was made possible only by the glut of solid-yet-underwhelming establishment candidates that failed to differentiate themselves from one another. If Trump wins the presidency — take a pause and let that sink in for a moment because this is now very real — he should promise Rubio a spot on the cabinet just like he may have for Ben Carson.
On the Democratic side, only the rosiest of glasses still see a path to the nomination for Sen. Bernie Sanders. Tuesday night, Clinton won with double-digit margins in Ohio, North Carolina and Florida; all three of which were much-needed boons to her campaign. Ohio, in particular, demonstrated that the Clinton campaign could win big in the Midwest; which was uncertain after her loss in Michigan. The Bernie Sanders campaign will not go away, and has been effective in pushing a progressive platform into the central Democratic base. But, for all intents and purposes, Hillary Clinton will most certainly be the Democratic nominee this summer.
The threat of a contested convention still looms over the Trump campaign, but it looms less and less with every primary they win. At a certain point, Trump’s nomination becomes inevitable, if it is not already. Speaker Paul Ryan has pledged to stand behind the potential nominee, so if there is no contested convention, there is no final line of resistance to Trump.
Some might say: Well, is that so bad? What do politicians do for us? Why not give a businessman a try? Well, it is so bad, politicians do plenty, and because the U.S. government is not a business, by design. Not to mention, this businessman falls into a particular is a brand of populism that we’ve seen before in men named Wallace, McCarthy and Goldwater; no good came out of them, either.
I feel safe saying, now, that Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump will run against one another for president of the United States. I haven’t decided how I feel about that yet, but it’s somewhere between depressed and terrified. Yet, this is the path for our nation that the people have so chosen.
Let it be known that I question this decision. Res Ipsa Loquitur.