(CNN)Donald
Trump won some outstanding victories on Tuesday night, solidifying his
lead. He saw off two competitors while humiliating a third. From Nevada
to Michigan and from Massachusetts to Mississippi, The Donald is the
only candidate with a national following that translates into victories
that are as consistent as they are deep. He is on track to be nominee.
The evolving narrative of "Trump can be beaten" is getting a little tired.
First, we were told that he'd lose when the field narrowed. Then that Marco Rubio could defeat him with sarcasm. Next that his delegate totals could be chipped away by a coalition of anti-Trump forces working in separate states.
Strange
alliances were formed. Lindsey Graham, who once joked that a jury of
senators wouldn't convict a man for killing Ted Cruz, announced that "Ted and I are in the same party, Donald Trump is an interloper."
The
GOP is thus fighting to win its own primary. But while the prospect of a
brokered convention remains a real one, Tuesday made it look less
likely.
Cruz,
for instance, entered Mississippi enjoying the governor's endorsement
and signs of a late surge in the Louisiana primary next door, but the
bounce failed to materialize. Exit polls suggest that eight out of 10 voters described themselves as evangelical or born again.
Cruz
won those who said religion determined their vote; Trump won those who
put other factors first. Cruz swept those described as "very
conservative"; Trump did better among the less ideological. Cruz has won
the most contests against The Donald, but usually only in caucuses and
with the support of a narrow band of philosophical fellow travelers.
It's hard to see him translating that vote into a national bandwagon.
Not impossible, but it would require other candidates dropping out.
In Michigan, Trump easily saw off a challenge by John Kasich, who had spent so much time campaigning in the state that he joked:
"I may have to start paying taxes" there. Trump benefited, much like
Bernie Sanders in the Democrat primary, from disaffection toward free
trade. His vote tended to be located among poorer, less educated or
older voters.
Cruz, again, scooped the
"very conservative" people; Trump took the "conservatives"; Kasich
dominated the "moderates." And just as Cruz's base is too small to beat
Trump single-handedly, so Kasich's hardly seems to extend beyond the
North and Northeast. It's possible that he'll still win his home state
of Ohio next week. Marco Rubio, by contrast, is surely in trouble down
in Florida. The man who the GOP establishment most prefers as nominee
placed fourth in both of Tuesday's crucial contests.
Trump,
already in Florida, congratulated himself on his wins next to a table
covered in Trump products that included Trump wine and Trump steaks. If
he wins the White House, he'll probably be the first president to
self-cater the inaugural.
Many pundits,
myself included, struggle to understand why people are voting for this
vulgar salesman. But the time has come to accept that they are. His
achievement is great. Other conservative populists have run for the
Republican nomination on an anti-free trade ticket; none has succeeded.
Neither
Pat Buchanan in 1996 nor Rick Santorum in 2012, both of whom courted
blue-collar voters and wore their faith on their sleeve, managed to win
Michigan -- the state most associated with the pains of
deindustrialization.
Yet
Trump, who is not especially religious and is stinking rich, has
managed to draw enough of the angry and dispossessed to his cause to
win. One exit poll found that 53% of Michigan Republicans believe that
free trade "takes away jobs."
This
represents a crisis of faith not just in the GOP leadership but in its
very orthodoxy. Growing numbers of conservatives do not take it as
axiomatic that the free market works for them, war is a necessity or
that big government is always evil.
Of
course in the other race, large numbers of Democrats have signaled
anger along similar lines. Working-class whites, left behind by
globalization, are joining idealistic young students to support Sen.
Bernie Sanders.
Perhaps the real
significance of Tuesday is what it means for the winner-takes-all
bonanza scheduled for March 15. Establishment hopes have been pinned on
beating Trump in Ohio and Florida. Neither proposition now looks so
sure.
If Trump wins both contests, or
even just one, then the GOP has got to find some way of reconciling
itself both to the man and the people who have voted for him. A
conspiracy to steal the nomination from such a popular candidate will be
interpreted as an anti-democratic coup.
Eze Afrika
