And now it is time for us to wrap up this liveblog and drink some wine in order to get over today. Here’s a look at the day’s big stories:
- Donald Trump said women “should be punished” for accessing abortion if it is outlawed, during a chat with Chris Matthews on MSNBC. He later flipped on his comments - after being widely criticized by many anti-abortion groups - and said that doctors or those who perform the abortions should be punished, not the women having them.
- Both Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton sat down for lengthy chats with Rachel Maddow today. Sanders spoke about winning over super delegates and the media focus on hot-button Trump stories rather than policy issues such as climate change. Clinton spoke about foreign policy, female reproductive rights and the media’s obsession with Trump. Both slammed Trump’s abortion comments.
- Trump supporter Ben Carson said Trump answered the abortion question poorly as he wasn’t expecting it to be asked.
- A 15-year-old was allegedly sexually assaulted and hit with pepper spray during a Trump rally in Wisconsin this mornign.
- Trump released a letter from his lawyers - rather than his personal tax return - saying that he was being audited by the IRS.
During his chat with Rachel Maddow, Bernie Sanders said his campaign is actively trying to convince superdelegates to back him.
“We have started off by going to those states, you know, states like Utah, states like Hawaii, states, that have given us very large victories and trying to get to those people and say you know what, your state voted overwhelmingly for us, listen to what your state has to say,” said the Vermont Senator.
Just a note on Trump getting his letter from his lawyers saying he is being audited by the IRS, rather than publishing his full tax returns.
Trump could publish his tax returns. There is nothing stopping him, IRS officials confirmed that someone being audited is still free to release them. He’s just choosing not to and offering this letter as a sleight of hand.
Updated
Bernie Sanders is getting very heated while speaking to Maddow about Donald Trump’s headline-grabbing comments about abortion today:
You know, you mentioned a moment ago, Rachel, that the media is paying attention to Donald Trump.
Duh?
No kidding. Once again, every stupid remark will be broadcast, you know, for the next five days.
But what is Donald Trump’s position on raising the minimum wage?
Well, he doesn’t think so.
What is Donald Trump’s position on wages in America?
Well, he said in a Republican debate he thinks wages are too high.
What’s Donald Trump’s position on taxes?
Well, he wants to give billionaire families like himself hundreds of billions of dollars in tax breaks.
What is Donald Trump’s position on climate change?
Oh, he thinks it’s a hoax perpetrated, shock of all shock, by the Chinese. You know, on and on it goes.
But because media is what media is today, any stupid, absurd remark made by Donald Trump becomes the story of the week. Maybe, just maybe, we might want to have a serious discussion about the serious issues facing America. Donald Trump will not look quite so interesting in that context.
Trump releases personal tax return docs
Donald Trump published a letter from his tax lawyers about his personal tax returns, after repeated questioning over whether his business was really being audited by the Internal Revenue System.
A letter from Morgan Lewis, a legal firm from Washington DC that specializes in corporate and tax law, says as filed in forms in 2015, Trump is the sole or principal owner of 500 entities, which collectively do business as The Trump Organization.
“Your personal tax returns have been under continuous examination by the Internal Revenue Service since 2002, consistent with the IRS’s practice for large and complex businesses,” it reads.
On Tuesday, CNN anchor Anderson Cooper queried why Trump hadn’t published his tax returns publicly.
“A lot of other candidates have released tax returns. You say you won’t release them because you’re being audited. There are some people who doubt you’re even being audited,” said Cooper.
Trump immediately offered to get a letter from his accountants.
He even managed to get his accountants to say how many large deals are involved in his businesses.
“These entities engage in hundreds of transactions, deals, and new enterprises every year. Because you operate these businesses almost exclusively through sole proprietorships and/or closely held partnerships, your personal federal income tax returns are inordinately large and complex for an individual,” it reads.
Updated
Now it’s time for Bernie Sanders’ sitdown with Rachel Maddow...
Maddow ended the interview by quizzing Clinton on donations to the Clinton Foundation and asked if it should not be run as a family foundation while Clinton is campaigning as president, in order to avoid a perception of buying influence.
But Clinton said as long as donations were transparent, the foundation is OK.
“When you have hundreds of thousands of people who are donating - as they do - I think that - the best - answer for that is what we have been doing for the last several years. And that is - to be transparent about it. And let - you know, let voters and others make their judgment,” she said.
Also, I hesitate to write about Clinton’s outfit because as a female politician, she’s been unfairly judged on her pantsuits and haircuts for years.
But she is wearing a black leather jacket that seems quite different to her normal colored suits and I think it’s pretty cool. Kudos to all politicians who stray briefly from wearing suits.
Clinton points out that Donald Trump’s rise is partly because media outlets were so infected with Trumpmania they couldn’t think clearly.
“For a long time, you know, I think the media just was in awe of the ratings spikes, and the amazing number of eyes that were willing to watch Trump do anything. And so he was basically unchallenged,” said Clinton.
Donald Trump criticizes NATO and says the US no longer gets enough out of the alliance. But Clinton warns against any threats to leave NATO as it could give more power to Russia:
You don’t, I think, get what you need out of NATO countries, all of them, including the smallest ones, by acting as though you could walk away from it. That could lead to the politicians and the forces within, let’s say the Baltic countries, who are favorable toward Russia, like Russian-speaking populations to say to their fellow leaders, ‘Hey, you know what? The U.S. is outta here. We better start making accommodations with Russia.’
Clinton, the former Secretary of State, notes that Donald Trump’s foreign policy ideas are questioned by other world leaders and would affect the US standing in the world.
“He’s in over his head,” said Clinton. “This idea he’s been putting out recently that we should withdraw from the Pacific. So, we’re no longer a Pacific power.”
“We’re no longer fulfilling our treaty obligations to Japan, South Korea, and others. In fact, off-the-cuff he said, ‘Let them have nuclear weapons.’ So, we’d have an arms race under his theory, not just in the Middle East, but also in Asia. I have no idea what that means, other than it scares me.”
Bernie Sanders might have won three states on the weekend, but Hillary Clinton pointed out that she’s still ahead in both votes and delegates.
Right now, I’m-- gratified that I have more votes than anybody in this-- election. Nearly nine million. And that’s a million more than Donald Trump, and it’s two-and-a-half million more than Bernie Sanders.
And I have a delegate count that is a higher margin between me and Senator Sanders than it ever was between me and President Obama.
Carson says Trump didn't 'really think about' abortion comments
Ben Carson, GOP wannabe turned Trump surrogate, said Trump made his controversial statements that women should be punished for having abortions today because he wasn’t expecting the question and hadn’t thought through his own abortion policies.
“Bear in mind, I don’t believe he was warned that that question was coming and I don’t think he really had a chance to really think about it,” said the retired neurosurgeon turned Trump backer on CNN.
The problem is that Trump isn’t enough of a answer-avoiding politician, said Carson. “What you develop with experience is how to answer that in a way that is not definitive. You know how politicians are. He hasn’t really learned that, because he’s not a politicians. But he has now had time to think about it and talk with his people about it and come up with a more rational and informed type of answer.”
With surrogates like these...
Updated
Clinton also turns this around on Bernie Sanders - who told Maddow that Trump’s abortion comments were deliberately to distract the media and shouldn’t be focused on too much.
“To think that this is an issue that is not deserving of reaction shows a lack of determination of how serious this is,” said Clinton.
“This is a serious matter. The press needs to cover it,” said Clinton.
Actually Maddow ran back to interview Clinton after Trump’s abortion comments this afternoon.
“I’m constantly taken aback for the kind of things he agitates for... in fact, as he pointed out, if it were illegal, than women and doctors would be criminal. This is just beyond any position taken by someone running for president in a serious way in a very long time,” said Clinton.
“This kind of inflammatory, destructive rhetoric is really on the outer edges of what is permitted under our constitution,” said Clinton, noting that Roe v Wade protects women’s health decisions.
Before the interview airs, Maddow clarifies that Donald Trump’s comments about women being punished for having an abortion were said “literally while we were taping that interview.”
Which means, Clinton doesn’t speak about it because it wasn’t yet known while this was being recorded.
Hillary Clinton’s interview with Rachel Maddow, recorded this morning at the Apollo Theater in Harlem, about to air...
A beautiful moment of shade thrown onto Trump by MSNBC’s Chris Matthews.
“Were you the guy that gave people nicknames in high school?” asked Matthews.
“No, but I give some nicknames right now when I’m running for president,” said Trump.
So far his nicknames for opponents have included Lyin’ Ted, Incompetent Hillary, Little Marco.
But then Matthews replied: “Big ears, I mean, little hands. I’m sorry -- that was you, I’m sorry.”
Remember, it was Marco Rubio’s comments about Donald Trump’s hands that meant we all heard Trump assure the country he had a big penis during a Republican debate.
Hillary Clinton says she hopes Bernie Sanders is involved in her administration if she becomes President, comparing it to how she became Secretary of State after the bitter presidential campaign in 2008.
As she told Rachel Maddow, in a town hall chat that airs at 9pm ET tonight on MSNBC:
I’m ahead. I’m ahead by a significant-- number. I believe I’m going to continue to add to that number. And I believe that I will be the Democratic nominee. And I certainly hope that Senator Sanders and his supporters will join ranks, the way that I did-- with President Obama.
Someone just asked about LGBT rights, and questioned how Trump would improve the lives of transgender Americans.
“I would say that I’m going to go by the laws of the courts and the courts said -- really, it’s very much up in flux right now, but I’ll go by the laws,” said Trump, just days after North Carolina ruled that people must use public bathrooms based on their gender at birth, not on the gender they identify.
We published the full transcript of Trump’s abortion comments earlier, but the final lines were particularly telling.
Matthews questions if the man who got the woman pregnant is also responsible for an abortion and should be punished if an abortion is procured.
“I would say no,” said Trump.
“Well, they’re usually involved,” quipped Matthews.
“What is the punishment under the Catholic Church?” asked Trump, when Chris Matthews questioned what the punishment should be if he bans abortion.
“I have not determined what the punishment would be,” said Trump.
You can see in this interview that Donald Trump is really getting pinned down by MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, who is demanding that Trump clarify his position, while Trump tries to say “I don’t know” to questions of what the punishment should be.
Donald Trump’s comments on abortion beginning now. He tried to answer to a voter asking about women’s health that he was “pro-life” and end it there, but Chris Matthews continues to question him on if he would ban abortion or not and if it should be punished, if it is a crime.
From a Hillary Clinton LGBT event in New York tonight.
The incomparable @BillieJeanKing introducing the incomparable @HillaryClinton at #LGBT event in NYC. pic.twitter.com/fPpq9tVEuO
— Peter Ajemian (@PeterAjemian) March 30, 2016
A black voter questioned Trump on why a minority voter should support him in light of recent attacks against minority protesters at Trump rallies.
“Because I’m going to bring back jobs to this country and people are going to have jobs,” said Trump, noting rates of African-American youth unemployment and naming Baltimore, Oakland and Detroit as cities he would employment on.
Trump addresses the allegations by former Breitbart reporter Michelle Fields against Trump’s campaign manager grabbing her - which resulted in him getting charged yesterday.
Trump continued to question Fields’ take on the incident and tried to play it off as political correctness gone mad:
TRUMP: Excuse me. She grabbed my arm twice. You see the picture of me looking like, who is this person, and getting her off.
MATTHEWS: What do you make of the bruises on the picture?
TRUMP: I don’t know who created those bruises. I really don’t know. I mean, you know, two days later, she comes in and she said she had some bruises. I don’t...
MATTHEWS: But this kind of argument just infuriates her and a lot of women because you’re not showing belief in her credibility.
TRUMP: I just gave...
MATTHEWS: Why would she make up a story about bruises? Why would anybody do that?
TRUMP: You know what? Fifteen minutes away, in front of a very large crowd, I gave a speech, and we talked about that. And I said who saw the tape, and everybody raised -- almost -- a lot of people raised their hand. I’d say three-quarters raised their hands. Big audience. I said who thinks he did something really wrong? I said stand up please, or raise your hand if you don’t want to stand up. Not one person in the room -- your cameras were there -- not one person in the room raised their hand.
We’re getting -- it’s out of control, political correctness, whatever you want to call it, it’s totally out of control.
White House press secretary Josh Earnest responds to Donald Trump’s campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, getting charged with assault against a female reporter.
I am confident that neither President Obama nor President Bush would tolerate someone on their staff being accused of physically assaulting a reporter, lying about it and then blaming the victim. That is completely unacceptable behavior.
WATCH: @PressSec slams Trump campaign manager for "unacceptable behavior" https://t.co/NeB458XrjN https://t.co/GNAUUj1tS8
— ABC News Politics (@ABCPolitics) March 31, 2016
Trump addresses the fact that he doesn’t have the delegate numbers, noting the problem was the huge number of Republican candidates early in the race.
TRUMP: We had 17 people, we actually had 18 people, again, including Gilmore, OK?
So, we have 18 people. And during a long period of time, we’d have 14 people, 13 people, 12 people, you know, in primaries. We had a lot of people in the primaries.
So, I’d get 25 percent, 28 percent -- those are phenomenal numbers when you have that many people running. So, in those early states -- which I won, but you can’t get 50 percent when you have that many people running. There has never been so many people running.
I’m going to come very close to the 1,237. I think I’m going to beat the 1,237.
Bernie Sanders chatted today with MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow, which airs at 10pm, but his comments regarding Trump’s abortion comments are already out.
SANDERS: “To punish a woman for having an abortion is beyond comprehension. I -- I just -- you know, one would say what is in Donald Trump’s mind except we’re tired of saying that?
I don’t know what world this person lives in. So obviously, from my perspective, and if elected president, I will do everybody that I can to allow women to make that choice and have access to clinics all over this country so that if they choose to have an abortion, they will be able to do so.
The idea of punishing a woman, that is just, you know, beyond comprehension.
Donald Trump’s town hall chat with MSNBC’s Chris Matthews is just kicking off now. This is the interview where he said women should be punished if they got an abortion if it’s outlawed, comments he later walked back after widespread criticism from all sides.
Kasich explained why if he doesn’t get the GOP nomination, he would not accept a spot as someone else’s vice-president.
“I would be the worst vice president anyone could ever have. Trust me,” said Kasich.
“Because I’m Governor of Ohio and it’s the second best job in America. And secondly, I’m running for president and I’m going to finish my job as governor.”
Bernie Sanders name will not appear on the Washington DC primary ballot, after a screw-up by the DC Democratic Party, reports NBC4 Washington.
Both the Sanders and Hillary Clinton campaigns paid the $2,500 registration fee. But the state’s party filed the paperwork on March 17, a day late.
A Democratic voter filed a challenge against Sanders’ - but no one filed one against Clinton.
“We did what D.C. law requires in order to get Bernie on the ballot, and we are confident he will be on the ballot,” a Sanders spokesman told NBC4 Washington.
Speaking of Kasich and pizza, this tweet from NY1 TV reporter Grace Rauh shows just how seriously politicians take eating a slice in NYC.
I ask Eric Ulrich if he told @JohnKasich how to eat his pizza. Kasich tartly responds: "I've been eating pizza since before you were born."
— Grace Rauh (@gracerauh) March 30, 2016
Eric Ulrich is a Republican New York City council member, who represents Queens.
Kasich is in Queens, New York, for his MSNBC town hall event and there’s nothing more politicians-in-NYC than a chat about pizza.
KASICH: I know I’m going to get some good pizza when this is over, that’s what I know. That’s more important.
TODD: That’s the pandering we wanted to hear
KASICH: Maybe a little hot sausage while I’m at it. What do you think?
TODD: You don’t use a knife and fork for your pizza right? You’re gonna fold it and eat it like a, eat it like a New Yorker right?
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio once ate pizza with a knife and fork in 2014 and he is still routinely mocked for it.
John Kasich’s town hall with Chuck Todd on MSNBC is just kicking off now.
At 8pm ET is Donald Trump, in the interview where he made his controversial abortion punishment comments which he’s now flipped on.
At 9pm, it’s Hillary Clinton’s turn. At 10pm, Bernie Sanders is up. Stay tuned, we’ll be covering them all tonight.
Seems John Kasich is a RiRi fan, based on this interaction from tonight’s town hall interview with Chuck Todd on MSNBC.
KASICH: And, you have -- a lot of people, when they run in their small conservative towns ... I love that song by Rihanna. I mean, I wish they played it all the time.
Updated
Cruz responds to Trump's abortion comments
Ted Cruz responded to Trump’s comments on punishing women who undergo abortions - which he has now backtracked, after being slammed by major anti-abortion groups - by saying the GOP frontrunner will “say anything just to get attention.”
Cruz’s statement in full:
Once again Donald Trump has demonstrated that he hasn’t seriously thought through the issues, and he’ll say anything just to get attention. On the important issue of the sanctity of life, what’s far too often neglected is that being pro-life is not simply about the unborn child; it’s also about the mother - and creating a culture that respects her and embraces life. Of course we shouldn’t be talking about punishing women; we should affirm their dignity and the incredible gift they have to bring life into the world.
Cruz held a “celebration of strong women” event in Madison, Wisconsin today, with his wife Heidi, mother Eleanor, two daughters and competitor-turned-supporter Carly Fiorina. Dubbed “Women for Cruz,” the event avoided much discussion of his two Republican opponents.
“Listen, I have news for the Democratic Party: Women are not a special interest. Women are a majority of the United States of America and every issue is a women’s issue,” said Cruz.
https://twitter.com/kailanikm/status/715265218683740161
Republican John Kasich also sat down for a chat with MSNBC, moderated by Chuck Todd, in Queens, New York today. It’ll air at 7pm ET, but the transcript is already available. Kasich talks about fighting ISIS and Muslim extremism, jobs and how New York fits into the national presidential debate.
In light of Ted Cruz’s comments to patrol and secure Muslim neighborhoods and Donald Trump’s comments on implementing a ban on Muslims entering the US, Kasich’s comments on Muslims seem starkly different.
He speaks against monitoring Muslims - like the NYPD used to - instead saying police should work with Muslim communities in order to get information about extremists.
“Now, if you’re going to polarize one group on a basis of religious tests, how are you going to get the information?” he said.
“Look, the easiest people [to] attack in the world today are the Muslims, right? Attack them. I mean, then I can be popular...[but] that’s not what a leader does. Sometimes a leader has to say, hey, folks, let’s calm down. Let’s be smart about this because it’s our families, our neighborhoods, our civilization that’s at stake,” said Kasich.
Based on the amount of anti-abortion advocates who are coming out against Trump’s claim that he would seek punishment for women who access abortion if outlawed, it’s unsurprising how quickly the GOP candidate flipped his entire position and said that doctors performing abortions should be punished - not women who undergo them.
Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the national anti-abortion group Susan B. Anthony List, said in a statement: “We have never advocated, in any context, for the punishment of women who undergo abortion.
“As a convert to the pro-life movement, Mr. Trump sees the reality of the horror of abortion – the destruction of an innocent human life – which is legal in our country up until the moment of birth. But let us be clear: punishment is solely for the abortionist who profits off of the destruction of one life and the grave wounding of another,” said Dannenfelser.
NBC News reporter Ed Demaria posted transcripts of two Meet the Press interviews from previous elections with Mick Huckabee and Rick Santorum, both anti-abortion candidates, who decried punishment for women.
Context on Trump: here are two strong pro-life candidates on @meetthepress refusing to talk "punishment" for women pic.twitter.com/MD1y3aUuNx
— Ed Demaria (@Eddie_Dynamite) March 30, 2016
Ted Cruz’s rapid response director Brian Phillips responded on Twitter, saying Trump’s comments are evidence that he is not really anti-abortion, since the pro-life movement does not advocate for punishment of women.
Don't overthink it: Trump doesn't understand the pro-life position because he's not pro-life.
— Brian Phillips (@RealBPhil) March 30, 2016
Updated
Trump backtracks on 'punishment' for women who get abortions
Trump has entirely walked back his comments that “there has to be some form of punishment” for women who undergo abortions if they are outlawed.
Trump just released a statement saying instead that doctors or whomever performs an illegal abortion would be liable for punishment, not the woman undegoing the procedure. “The woman is a victim in this case as is the life in her womb,” said Trump.
Here is his full statement:
If Congress were to pass legislation making abortion illegal and the federal courts upheld this legislation, or any state were permitted to ban abortion under state and federal law, the doctor or any other person performing this illegal act upon a woman would be held legally responsible, not the woman. The woman is a victim in this case as is the life in her womb. My position has not changed - like Ronald Reagan, I am pro-life with exceptions.
Just as a reminder, this is the transcript of the MSNBC interview with Chris Mattews where he made the comments earlier today, which have horrified both anti-abortion and pro-choice activities alike:
MATTHEWS: Do you believe in punishment for abortion, yes or no as a principle?
TRUMP: The answer is that there has to be some form of punishment
MATTHEWS: For the woman
TRUMP: Yes, there has to be some form
Updated
Even anti-abortion groups are coming out against Donald Trump’s comments that women who choose abortions should be punished if abortion is outlawed.
“Mr. Trump’s comment today is completely out of touch with the pro-life movement and even more with women who have chosen such a sad thing as abortion,” said Jeanne Mancini, President of March for Life, the biggest anti-abortion event in the world.
“Being pro-life means wanting what is best for the mother and the baby. Women who choose abortion often do so in desperation and then deeply regret such a decision. No pro-lifer would ever want to punish a woman who has chosen abortion. This is against the very nature of what we are about. We invite a woman who has gone down this route to consider paths to healing, not punishment.”
However, worth noting that women are already being punished for attempting at-home abortions.
Full transcript of Trump abortion comments
MSNBC released the full transcript of Donald Trump’s Town Hall chat with Chris Matthews, including the entire conversation about abortion where Matthews pressed the GOP billionaire on if women should be punished if termination is illegal and they undergo one anyway.
Usually we wouldn’t run a post this long, but the transcript does reveal Trump dancing around his stance on abortion while Matthews is determined to pin him down. Trump goes going back and forth about the Catholic Church’s teachings and appears reluctant to name any actual punishment women would face.
QUESTION: Hello. I am (inaudible) and have a question on, what is your stance on women’s rights and their rights to choose in their own reproductive health?
TRUMP: OK, well look, I mean, as you know, I’m pro-life. Right, I think you know that, and I -- with exceptions, with the three exceptions. But pretty much, that’s my stance. Is that OK? You understand?
MATTHEWS: What should the law be on abortion?
TRUMP: Well, I have been pro-life.
MATTHEWS: I know, what should the law -- I know your principle, that’s a good value. But what should be the law?
TRUMP: Well, you know, they’ve set the law and frankly the judges -- I mean, you’re going to have a very big election coming up for that reason, because you have judges where it’s a real tipping point.
MATTHEWS: I know.
TRUMP: And with the loss the Scalia, who was a very strong conservative...
MATTHEWS: I understand.
TRUMP: ... this presidential election is going to be very important, because when you say, “what’s the law, nobody knows what’s the law going to be. It depends on who gets elected, because somebody is going to appoint conservative judges and somebody is going to appoint liberal judges, depending on who wins.
MATTHEWS: I know. I never understood the pro-life position.
TRUMP: Well, a lot of people do understand.
MATTHEWS: I never understood it. Because I understand the principle, it’s human life as people see it.
TRUMP: Which it is.
MATTHEWS: But what crime is it?
TRUMP: Well, it’s human life.
MATTHEWS: No, should the woman be punished for having an abortion?
TRUMP: Look...
MATTHEWS: This is not something you can dodge.
TRUMP: It’s a -- no, no...
MATTHEWS: If you say abortion is a crime or abortion is murder, you have to deal with it under law. Should abortion be punished?
TRUMP: Well, people in certain parts of the Republican Party and Conservative Republicans would say, “yes, they should be punished.”
MATTHEWS: How about you?
TRUMP: I would say that it’s a very serious problem. And it’s a problem that we have to decide on. It’s very hard.
MATTHEWS: But you’re for banning it?
TRUMP: I’m going to say -- well, wait. Are you going to say, put them in jail? Are you -- is that the (inaudible) you’re talking about?
MATTHEWS: Well, no, I’m asking you because you say you want to ban it. What does that mean?
TRUMP: I would -- I am against -- I am pro-life, yes.
MATTHEWS: What is ban -- how do you ban abortion? How do you actually do it?
TRUMP: Well, you know, you will go back to a position like they had where people will perhaps go to illegal places
MATTHEWS: Yes?
TRUMP: But you have to ban it
MATTHEWS: You banning, they go to somebody who flunked out of medical school.
TRUMP: Are you Catholic?
MATTHEWS: Yes, I think...
TRUMP: And how do you feel about the Catholic Church’s position?
MATTHEWS: Well, I accept the teaching authority of my Church on moral issues
TRUMP: I know, but do you know their position on abortion?
MATTHEWS: Yes, I do
TRUMP: And do you concur with the position?
MATTHEWS: I concur with their moral position but legally, I get to the question -- here’s my problem with it...
(LAUGHTER)
TRUMP: No, no, but let me ask you, but what do you say about your Church?
MATTHEWS: It’s not funny.
TRUMP: Yes, it’s really not funny
What do you say about your church? They’re very, very strong.
MATTHEWS: They’re allowed to -- but the churches make their moral judgments, but you running for president of the United States will be chief executive of the United States. Do you believe...
TRUMP: No, but...
MATTHEWS: Do you believe in punishment for abortion, yes or no as a principle?
TRUMP: The answer is that there has to be some form of punishment
MATTHEWS: For the woman
TRUMP: Yes, there has to be some form
MATTHEWS: Ten cents? Ten years? What?
TRUMP: Let me just tell you -- I don’t know. That I don’t know. That I don’t know.
MATTHEWS: Why not
TRUMP: I don’t know.
MATTHEWS: You take positions on everything else.
TRUMP: Because I don’t want to -- I frankly, I do take positions on everything else. It’s a very complicated position.
MATTHEWS: But you say, one, that you’re pro-life meaning that you want to ban it
TRUMP: But wait a minute, wait a minute. But the Catholic Church is pro-life
MATTHEWS: I’m not talking about my religion.
TRUMP: No, no, I am talking about your religion. Your religion -- I mean, you say that you’re a very good Catholic. Your religion is your life. Let me ask you this..
MATTHEWS: I didn’t say very good. I said I’m Catholic
(LAUGHTER)
And secondly, I’m asking -- you’re running for President.
TRUMP: No, no...
MATTHEWS: I’m not.
TRUMP: Chris -- Chris.
MATTHEWS: I’m asking you, what should a woman face if she chooses to have an abortion?
TRUMP: I’m not going to do that.
MATTHEWS: Why not?
TRUMP: I’m not going to play that game.
MATTHEWS: Game?
TRUMP: You have...
MATTHEWS: You said you’re pro-life.
TRUMP: I am pro-life.
MATTHEWS: That means banning abortion
TRUMP: And so is the Catholic Church pro-life.
MATTHEWS: But they don’t control the -- this isn’t Spain, the Church doesn’t control the government
TRUMP: What is the punishment under the Catholic Church? What is the...
MATTHEWS: Let me give something from the New Testament, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” Don’t ask me about my religion.
TRUMP: No, no...
MATTHEWS: I’m asking you. You want to be president of the United States.
TRUMP: You told me that...
MATTHEWS: You tell me what the law should be.
TRUMP: I have -- I have not determined...
MATTHEWS: Just tell me what the law should be. You say you’re pro-life.
TRUMP: I am pro-life.
MATTHEWS: What does that mean
TRUMP: With exceptions. I am pro-life.
I have not determined what the punishment would be.
MATTHEWS: Why not?
TRUMP: Because I haven’t determined it
MATTHEWS: When you decide to be pro-life, you should have thought of it. Because...
TRUMP: No, you could ask anybody who is pro-life...
MATTHEWS: OK, here’s the problem -- here’s my problem with this, if you don’t have a punishment for abortion -- I don’t believe in it, of course -- people are going to find a way to have an abortion.
TRUMP: You don’t believe in what?
MATTHEWS: I don’t believe in punishing anybody for having an abortion
TRUMP: OK, fine. OK, (inaudible)/
MATTHEWS: Of course not. I think it’s a woman’s choice.
TRUMP: So you’re against the teachings of your Church?
MATTHEWS: I have a view -- a moral view -- but I believe we live in a free country, and I don’t want to live in a country so fascistic that it could stop a person from making that decision.
TRUMP: But then you are...
MATTHEWS: That would be so invasive.
TRUMP: I know but I’ve heard you speaking...
MATTHEWS: So determined of a society that I wouldn’t able -- one we are familiar with. And Donald Trump, you wouldn’t be familiar with.
TRUMP: But I’ve heard you speaking so highly about your religion and your Church.
MATTHEWS: Yes.
TRUMP: Your Church is very, very strongly as you know, pro-life.
MATTHEWS: I know.
TRUMP: What do you say to your Church?
MATTHEWS: I say, I accept your moral authority. In the United States, the people make the decision, the courts rule on what’s in the Constitution, and we live by that. That’s why I say.
TRUMP: Yes, but you don’t live by it because you don’t accept it. You can’t accept it. You can’t accept it. You can’t accept it.
MATTHEWS: Can we go back to matters of the law and running for president because matters of law, what I’m talking about, and this is the difficult situation you’ve placed yourself in.
By saying you’re pro-life, you mean you want to ban abortion. How do you ban abortion without some kind of sanction? Then you get in that very tricky question of a sanction, a fine on human life which you call murder?
TRUMP: It will have to be determined.
MATTHEWS: A fine, imprisonment for a young woman who finds herself pregnant?
TRUMP: It will have to be determined.
MATTHEWS: What about the guy that gets her pregnant? Is he responsible under the law for these abortions? Or is he not responsible for an abortion?
TRUMP: Well, it hasn’t -- it hasn’t -- different feelings, different people. I would say no.
MATTHEWS: Well, they’re usually involved. Anyway, much more from the audience here at the University of Wisconsin, Green Bay. We’ll be right back.
(APPLAUSE)
The entire interview will air at 8pm ET tonight.
Trump’s son, Donald Trump Jr, is coming out in support of his dad’s comments that if abortion is banned, women who undergo them should face “some sort of punishment.”
Be fair, was asked if it was ILLEGAL should there be punishment. Shouldn't there be consequences for breaking laws? https://t.co/FcR0IReRM5
— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) March 30, 2016
Trump calls himself “pro-life with exceptions”, those exceptions being if the life of the mother is at risk, incest and rape.
After The Guardian queried Donald Trump on his comments about women who have abortions should be punished if abortion is outlawed, he responded with a statement calling the issue “unclear” and noting that states should decide.
The full quote from Trump is as follows:
This issue is unclear and should be put back into the states for determination. Like Ronald Reagan, I am pro- life with exceptions, which I have outlined numerous times.
Updated
Hillary Clinton has responded to Donald Trump’s assertion that there should be punishment for women who have abortions, declaring it “horrific and telling” on Twitter.
Just when you thought it couldn't get worse. Horrific and telling. -H https://t.co/Qi8TutsOw9
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) March 30, 2016
MSNBC has released a few more quotes from the interview, which involved a fair amount of Trump’s refusal to provide details.
“I am pro-life,” Trump said.
Asked about a ban, he said that people would circumvent it: “Well, you go back to a position like they had where they would perhaps go to illegal places but we have to ban it.”
Trump: abortions may need 'punishment'
Donald Trump has suggested that “there has to be some form of punishment” for women who have abortions, should abortions be outlawed.
He told this to Chris Matthews of MSNBC at a town hall event that will be aired later on Wednesday
“There has to be some form of punishment,” Trump said.
Matthews: “For the woman?”
“Yeah,” Trump replied, adding that the details would “have to be determined”.
“They’ve set the law and frankly the judges, you’re going to have a very big election coming up for that reason,” Trump said. “Because you have judges where it’s a real tipping point and with the loss of Scalia, who was a very strong conservative, this presidential election is going to be very important.”
He added: “When you say what’s the law, nobody knows what the law is going to be. It depends on who gets elected.”
NPR’s Sarah McCammon has been trailing Ted Cruz today as the senator tries to highlight Donald Trump’s history of odious remarks about women.
There sure were a lot of men there, though.
Cruz at Women for Cruz event in Madison: "Every issue is a women's issue." pic.twitter.com/AooNGO3xs7
— Sarah McCammon NPR (@sarahmccammon) March 30, 2016
But Cruz seems to be enjoying it all, anyway.
Female reporters and writers have called on Donald Trump to fire his campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, in light of the clear video evidence that Lewandowski grabbed a reporter and lied repeatedly about it.
Most of the 16 signatories represent conservative media outlets. Their letter reads:
The press is to have an adversarial, yet civil approach to those in, or running, for elected office. Never in this line of work is it acceptable to respond to reasonable and legitimate questioning with use of physical force.
The photographs, audio, videos, and witness accounts documenting the treatment of Michelle Fields by Corey Lewandowski, Donald Trump’s campaign manager, are inexcusable and unprofessional.
Donald Trump should immediately remove Lewandowski from his campaign. The Trump campaign has stated that Lewandowski will not be fired even if convicted, however unlike the Trump campaign, we believe in making a statement on the record to clearly highlight the difference between right and wrong.
Signatories include Meghan McCain, the conservative senator’s daughter and a contributor on Fox News; SE Cupp, of the New York Daily News; Dana Loesch, of Blaze TV; and Mary Chastain, of Breitbart News, the same outlet that Fields worked for until her resignation over their lack of support.
Protesters disrupted an event this morning in Wisconsin – but not for the candidate from Queens.
Animal rights protesters took to a Bernie Sanders rally in Milwaukee. The senator from Vermont paid them no mind, and they left peacefully.
Security removed protesters -pulled down sign- as crowd chanted "Bernie" -Sanders kept talking, didnt acknowledge pic.twitter.com/JkeZp9GQIF
— MaryAlice Parks (@maryaliceparks) March 30, 2016
The Washington Post has been forced into a correction in a story about Hillary Clinton and the FBI investigation into whether her use of a private email server compromised security.
The Post originally reported, via an anonymous “lawmaker”, that there are 147 FBI agents on the Clinton case. The figure was part of a long story about the investigation, and a short story in which a Post reporter asks: “W-H-A-T?” and “Doesn’t that seem like a ton for a story that Clinton has always insisted was really, at heart, a right-wing Republican creation?”
I-n-d-e-e-d. On Tuesday the Post issued the following correction:
The article cited in this piece said that 147 FBI agents had been detailed to the investigation, citing a lawmaker briefed by FBI Director James B Comey. Two US law enforcement officials have since told The Washington Post that that figure is too high.
The FBI will not provide an exact figure, but the officials say the number of FBI personnel involved is fewer than 50. The headline has been corrected accordingly. I apologize for the error.
Updated
Clinton invokes New York unity
On the stage where Duke Ellington, James Brown and Diana Ross played, Hillary Clinton invoked the New York spirit of unity after 9/11 and directed her ire toward both Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders my colleague Ed Pilkington reports.
“Trump plays coy with white supremacists, he says demeaning and degrading things about women, he wants to round up millions of immigrants in a nation founded on immigration. It’s cynical, it’s wrong and it goes against everything New York and America stand for,” she said.
On stage, Clinton sought to remind the 20 million residents of New York state of her achievements as their representative in the Senate. She said that she had fought for healthcare for first responders sickened amid the rubble of the Twin Towers, and led efforts to pump federal money into downtown New York for the rebuilding.
“It worked. Lower Manhattan has risen even higher and more magnificent,” she said.
Clinton promised to harness the post-9/11 spirit of New Yorkers, contrasting it with what she portrayed as a starry-eyed, ill-disciplined approach from Bernie Sanders. “My opponent says we are just not thinking big enough. Well, this is New York - nobody speaks bigger than we do. This is a city that likes to get things done, and that’s what we want from our president too.”
For many Democrats in the state, this year’s presidential primary is the most exciting in recent history. “You’d have to go back to 1988, Jesse Jackson against Michael Dukakis,” said David Birdsell, dean of the Public Affairs School at Baruch College in New York City. “Similarly then you had a liberal lion running against a person with a technocratic reputation – the governor of Massachusetts.”
Sanders is hoping to capture the same populist wave that carried Zephyr Teachout’s unsuccessful, but surprisingly credible, campaign against incumbent Democratic governor Andrew Cuomo in 2014, and that helped elect a progressive mayor the year before.
But Sanders has a lot of ground to make up. The most recent statewide poll by Emerson College showed Clinton with a 71% to 23% lead over Sanders.
“The state is in some respects truly up for grabs,” Birdsell said, acknowledging Sanders uphill battle to pry the state from Clinton.
A Chicago native, Clinton settled in Chappaqua, upstate New York, and chose to plant her campaign office in Brooklyn Heights, a residential neighborhood overlooking the East River.
But at the Apollo she reserved her most excoriating words for another New Yorker – the Republican frontrunner Trump. “On the Republican side what we are hearing is truly scary,” she said.
“When Donald Trump talks casually about using torture and allowing more countries to get nuclear weapons, and when Ted Cruz talks about treating muslims like criminals and racially profiling muslim neighborhoods that doesn’t make them sound strong it makes them sound over their heads.”
She exhorted New Yorkers to “stand up against bigotry. That’s what countless NewYorkers do every day in a million quiet ways.”
Updated
As we wait for my colleagues Ed Pilkington and David Smith to write in with their takes on Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump’s respective rallies, they and other campaign reporters tweet the New Yorkers’ speeches.
Clinton: "loose cannons tend to misfire" - hits out at Donald Trump
— Ed Pilkington (@Edpilkington) March 30, 2016
Clinton attacks Trump for "playing coy with white supremacists" and demeaning women
— Ed Pilkington (@Edpilkington) March 30, 2016
Trump: "The bikers love Trump... I'm not a huge biker, I have to be honest with you." They say "security, military, borders".
— David Smith (@SmithInAmerica) March 30, 2016
Trump: If I bring a Green Bay Packer up here and hit him, he'll go "Ah!" and then he'll beat the hell of you, right?
— David Smith (@SmithInAmerica) March 30, 2016
And down on the Upper East Side …
As Hillary speaks in Harlem, across the park, Bill Clinton drinks a Guinness and woos Irish power brokers on UES pic.twitter.com/tOvMlgnHhu
— Amy Chozick (@amychozick) March 30, 2016
Meme meets man.
Kid grabs selfie with @tedcruz at Wisconsin campaign stop today, writes pretty epic caption (cc: @darth): pic.twitter.com/bP2DNBaCBG
— Frank Thorp V (@frankthorp) March 30, 2016
On Monday Barack Obama blamed the media, in part, for fueling the rise of Donald Trump and the volatile sentiments that he’s stoked. But how much blame does the news deserve? My colleague Mona Chalabi takes a look at just how much the American people actually care about facts.
One argument is that the media neglected to sufficiently hold Trump to account by fact-checking his various claims. “There was a price if you said one thing and then did something completely different,” Obama told reporters on Monday night. “The question is, in the current media environment, is that still true?”
The problem is, there have been a large number of online articles that have fact-checked Donald Trump on a whole range of issues, but they don’t seem to have slowed down the groundswell in support for the candidate. TV journalism may have asked fewer tough questions of Trump (a supposition that’s hard to measure given that so few TV scripts are published online), but the speed of 24 hours news means it’s also practically tough for those journalists to conduct rigorous reality-checking research.
Back in 2008, rumors began to circulate that Barack Obama was a Muslim – a claim was often used in the context of discrediting the presidential candidate (and thereby exposed the hostility of some Americans towards Muslims).
Despite being factually disproven, it’s a claim that many still believe. A survey released on Tuesday by Public Policy Polling found that 52% of Republicans still think Barack Obama is Muslim. Among Trump supporters, that number climbed to 62%. Fact-checking articles have arguably done little, if anything, to change those numbers.
In statistics, we try to be watchful for “confirmation bias” – that’s the human tendency to interpret numbers in a way that conveniently confirms your world view rather than challenging it. Unfortunately confirmation bias also guides our online clicks and we’re all guilty of it (I’m ill-positioned to criticize Trump supporters who do not read my fact-checking articles if I refuse to be persuaded to click on their blogs claiming that Obama is a Muslim).
American confidence in the media is at a historic low, and that’s a fact that’s even more stark among the country’s Republicans. In 2015, Gallup found that just 40% of Americans said they had a “great deal” or “fair amount” of trust in the mass media. Just 32% of Republicans said the same.
Fact-checking articles may prove impotent in the face of such distrust. Worse, they may actually heighten those attitudes. In December 2015, Rasmussen foundthat 47% of likely voters think most reporters are biased against Trump - only 23% felt that Clinton was the subject of unfair coverage.
The loaded question asked this week, “is the media to blame for Trump?” demonstrates the dangers of the shaky assumptions that have dominated this election – assuming that Trump would probably never make it past 20% support, assuming that Trump is one social phenomenon (rather than a symptom of many) and assuming that Trump supporters are simply misguided in their choice for the next American president.
The question also assumes that American opinions are flexible and that the media is playing a large role in changing those minds. We might need to wait until this election is over and the votes are counted to see how reliable those assumptions are.
Elsewhere on the trail, Hillary Clinton has arrived at the Apollo, where she’s welcomed by Charlie Rangel, a Democratic representative so durable in Harlem that not even being found guilty of ethics violations could unseat him.
Charlie Rangel just danced across the stage at the Apollo, then ended with a peace sign to the crowd pic.twitter.com/H0xrwS2G8G
— Jennifer Epstein (@jeneps) March 30, 2016
In Wisconsin, Ted Cruz is drawing a sharp contrast between himself and Donald Trump by emphasizing how much he respects women. Especially his mom.
Cruz, who speaks far more often of dad Rafael on trail, says his mom used to tease: "Did you have a mother? Were you raised by wolves?"
— Matt Flegenheimer (@mattfleg) March 30, 2016
Cruz: "I admire her business career, and she was a pioneering professional - but my mother loves unconditionally."
— Sarah McCammon NPR (@sarahmccammon) March 30, 2016
An anti-Trump Super Pac has began airing an ad last week of insulting comments made by Trump about women.
Speaking at a town hall in De Pere, Wisconsin, Donald Trump has told a long and rambling story about a friend of his who has terrible luck and was hit by a road sign.
Then he singles out people in the audience. He asks whether anyone else is “injury prone”. Someone stands up, but he’s too big for Trump: “he looks like he could be on the Green Bay Packers.”
He extemporizes on the nature of success, and points out a guy in a red hat. “You’ve made millions, maybe less? US marine corps?” Trump says he must be very proud. “And you’re very happy? It’s all the same, folks.”
Then he reflects on people who are not successful. Namely the other men who tried to run for president. “Jeb Bush, expected to win. Gone. Scott Walker, expected to win. Gone. I miss them. I’m kind of lonely.”
Donald Trump: "Always be around unsuccessful people because everyone will respect you."
— Jose A. DelReal (@jdelreal) March 30, 2016
WI police: teen attacked at Trump rally
The Janesville police have reported that a 15-year-old girl was “pepper sprayed in the crowd by a non-law enforcement person” and a 19-year-old woman also hit with “2nd hand spray” outside a Trump event on Monday.
“A male in the [crowd] groped the 15-year-old] girl, when she pushed him away; another person in the [crowd] sprayed her. We are currently looking for two suspects, one for the sexual assault and one for the pepper spray.”
The incident took place on Monday, outside the event Trump was speaking at. Members of the crowd captured video of the incident, and of Trump supporters calling out slurs to the teens.
The police put out an advisory late on Tuesday night. They added that they intended “to facilitate the constitutional rights of free speech and assembly in a safe and nonviolent environment”.
They said they arrested six protesters on charges of disorderly conduct, obstructing an officer and trespassing. About 60 other protesters acquiesced to police requests to leave, the department said.
Among the crowd of about 1,000 people, “Two persons concealed carried weapons, and two persons open carried weapons, all four were cooperative with law enforcement. “
Right now, Trump is speaking at a town hall in De Pere, Wisconsin. He’s unusually quiet, trotting out old lines about “low-energy” and “lying” rivals. “The Republican establishment has treated me very unfairly,” he says.
Protesters too: “I call them agitators.”
Trump events have seen more and more violence in recent weeks, including clashes in Chicago and St Louis, sucker-punches in Arizona and North Carolina, and a criminal charge against his campaign manager for grabbing a reporter.
Updated
Before the former secretary of state takes the stage in Harlem, my colleague David Smith was with her in Green Bay, Wisconsin, on Tuesday night, where she took voters to a simpler time – politics before retweets, Tea Parties, hipster Marxists and reality TV candidacies.
In the zaniest and least predictable of election years, Hillary Clinton went retro on Tuesday night. She contrasted the records of Bill Clinton and George W Bush and drew classic battle lines between Democrats and Republicans. Just for once, the 2016 presidential race felt a little traditional.
Addressing a few hundred supporters in Green Bay, Wisconsin, Clinton aimed at familiar ideological targets, rather than wild cards thrown up in the year of Donald Trump. Republican-bashing goes down well among Democratic voters in a state governed by Scott Walker.
“Help me become the Democratic nominee and help me keep the Republicans out of the White House,” the former secretary of state said to a huge cheer. “Let’s start with a basic fact: the economy does better when we have a Democrat in the White House.”
Clinton sought to contrast what she portrayed as a golden age of the 1990s with the financial malaise that followed. “When my husband was president, we had eight years of peace and prosperity,” she said.
“And when he finished those eight years we had 23 million new jobs but, more importantly, incomes went up for everybody, not just people at the top.
“Middle class families, working families, even poor families – more folks were lifted out of poverty because we had so many more good jobs than at any time in recent history. And we ended up with a balanced budget and a surplus on top.”
Then George W Bush entered the White House, she noted, with the help of the supreme court’s ruling on the disputed 2000 election against Democrat Al Gore. “Now you would have thought, anybody looking at where we were economically would say, ‘Hey, let’s keep that going,’” she said.
“But instead, the Republicans went back to the same old failed economic policies, so-called trickle down economics.
“My husband had raised taxes on the wealthy; they cut them. They took their eye off the financial markets, took their eye of the mortgage markets, and you know what happened: the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. Now, I want us to remember this because they’re asking Americans to give them another chance.”
Using a phrase that Bush once memorably garbled, she added: “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me, right?”
Turning to Walker, who ran for the Republican nomination but dropped out earlier than most, she said: “Here in Wisconsin you have a governor” – the crowd booed – “who has been taking a wrecking ball to the rights of workers, to the rights of women, to the rights of
Wisconsinites who deserve a better future. Disinvesting in higher education, turning his back on what it was that made this such a great progressive state.”
There were a couple of swipes at Democratic rival Bernie Sanders but the central message was clear: “I think it’s important when you go to vote on Tuesday to think about what the real prize here is, my friends.
The real prize is winning in November by beating the Republicans whoever they nominate at the end.”
Clinton was heckled by one man and there were a handful of protesters outside with placards such as, “Hillary for prison 2016.” But supporter David Gerzin, 55, a retired salesperson, said: “I think Hillary will be good for the country. She’s the most qualified person every to run for this office. Look at her resumé: nobody’s even close. She’s smarter than Barack Obama or Bill Clinton: she’s got a lot more nuance in what she says that’s right for this particular time in history.”
Mary Wilkosz, 55, a caregiver, is still deciding who to vote for but leaning towards Clinton. “I wish Bernie Sanders was coming to Green Bay too. There are clearly a lot of women supporting Hillary tonight.
“A female president would be fabulous: it’s time for us to join the rest of the world.”
Updated
Hillary Clinton is due on 125th Street, at one of Manhattan’s most storied venues, where she’ll speak to voters and reporters – including my colleague Ed Pilkington, on the scene.
Harlem’s Apollo Theater is starting to buzz ahead of Hillary Clinton’s appearance here in about half an hour’s time. The event fires the starting gun of the New York state primary, on 19 April, which is shaping up to be an unexpected nail-biter.
The race will be particularly charged given the personal histories of the two Democratic candidates. Clinton is a Chicago transplant who lives in New York, represented it in the Senate, and has her campaign headquarters in Brooklyn. Bernie Sanders is an outer-borough kid with a diploma from James Madison High School and a Brooklyn accent that never left him. With 291 delegates in play, a massive crop second only to California’s, there is going to be much riding on the outcome.
The crowd at the Apollo this morning is surprisingly white, given the venue’s storied history. But then, perhaps, that’s all too predictable, given the relentless gentrification of Harlem.
Eddie Caldwell, a Harlem resident and Vietnam veteran aged 58, is one of the relatively few African Americans who are here to welcome Clinton. He has an interesting theory as to why his neighborhood has changed so dramatically.
“The white folks figured that terrorists are only interested in downtown – they aren’t interested in uptown because we ain’t got anything up here. That’s why the white folks moved up here to be our neighbors.”
Joyce Diggs has travelled in from the Bronx to be at the Apollo, which she has been visiting for most of her 66 years. She has seen James Brown and Earth, Wind & Fire perform here and is a regular at Amateur Night
She says she’s backing Clinton because of her deep knowledge of foreign policy. Asked which of the candidates she sees as the true face of the city, Clinton or Sanders, she replies: “Bernie left New York to go to Vermont and he never came back. Hillary came to be with us – so I know who is the better New Yorker.”
Rubio: keep delegates bound
Marco Rubio wants to keep his delegates pledged to his name at the Republican convention this summer – and has sent the party a letter to demand it.
Retaining his 171 delegates on the first ballot would make life harder for Donald Trump and Ted Cruz, both of whom would eagerly snap up the delegates as soon as possible.
“It is my desire at this time that the delegates allocated to me by your rules remain bound to vote for me on at least the first nominating ballot at the National Convention,” Rubio wrote.
He also mentions his erstwhile “campaign for President of the Untied States” [sic].
.@marcorubio making unprecedented bid to keep his GOP delegates for a contested convention https://t.co/MjDdzRC5MB pic.twitter.com/22iJ2Cmt1l
— NBC News (@NBCNews) March 30, 2016
Updated
Donald Trump appeared on NBC’s Today show this morning, where the hosts took him to task on his continued defense of an aide despite video evidence that he grabbed a reporter.
Trump has repeatedly mocked the reporter, Michelle Fields, and minced her words down to the level of “touch”. He defended the manager, Corey Lewandowski, even when pressed about what the security footage clearly shows.
Host Savannah Guthrie: “Why are you parsing her words and then giving the benefit of the doubt to your campaign manager, who clearly states I didn’t touch her. The video clearly shows he did touch her.
“She said I didn’t fall down, but I almost did and I was shaken.”
Trump: “Savannah, the incident was so minor that I honestly believe, I don’t think, look, I know this guy. He’s an honorable guy. He’s a decent man. He’s got four beautiful kids and a wife in New Hampshire.
“I’m not gonna, you know, these other candidates they’re weak. They said, ‘Oh well, you should immediately get rid of him.’ For what? They want me to fire him. For what? Because of this incident?”
Host Matt Lauer then asked wouldn’t an apology have “taken care of this”?
Trump: “I actually don’t think so. I think she would have pressed charges anyway because I think she likes it. That’s my opinion. Maybe I’m wrong. I think if he called up, I think if he said he’s sorry, I think she would have used that against him. I’m not a believer in, in that, because, you know, I’ve heard that. Oh, call up.
“Certainly if that could have happened, he would have done that. But, and I wasn’t involved in that. I really heard about this – I will tell you, I don’t think, I don’t think anything would have happened. I think we’d be in the same place. She’d just have a little bit better evidence. Right now she’s got no evidence.
Laure: “We’ll agree to disagree.”
Updated
Hello and welcome to our rolling coverage of the 2016 race, just a week before Wisconsin could dash the underdogs’ dreams, and with attention already turning to New York – a delegate bonanza, a money pit of donors and an electorate of Brooklynites, Buffaloans, Albanians, immigrants, billionaires and Trumps.
But first a recap.
The three Republican candidates took turns facing the voters and the press on Tuesday night, speaking at a town hall event in Milwaukee. Frontrunner Donald Trump defended his campaign manager, whom Florida police have charged with assault against a reporter, Michelle Fields, and mocked her, saying: “My arm has never been the same, folks.”
The businessman, who spent a decade on reality TV telling people “you’re fired”, insisted: “I don’t discard people.”
Then Trump swiftly discarded a promise, made to the Republican party, that he would support the eventual GOP nominee even if his name doesn’t turn out to be Donald. But he didn’t want to get into the personal politics, Trump said. “I really would rather talk about nuclear proliferation.”
Although he said he feared “nuclear global warming” more than anything on earth, Trump said he thought nuclear weapons should probably proliferate in Japan and South Korea, so that those countries could counteract China and North Korea.
His main rival, Texas senator Ted Cruz, trails Trump by 274 delegates (1,237 are needed to win). Pressed about his call to “carpet bomb” terror groups, Cruz equivocated, dodging the warning from generals and rights groups that such heavy bombing would cause huge civilian casualties. He similarly ducked a question about the balance of privacy and national security, saying that he could “walk and chew gum” at the same time, and that in “my home state of Florida” (he is from Texas) a shooter shouted “[Allahu] akbar”. It was unclear exactly which incident he was referring to.
He also invoked the singer Sonny Bono, the sitcom Gilligan’s Island, and declared: “My favorite food in all the world is cheese.”
The third GOP candidate, John Kasich, is nearly 600 delegates behind Trump. He rebuked Trump and Cruz for their proposals to target Muslims for policing, and suggested Nato needs to become a counter-terror version of Interpol.
Like Cruz, Kasich suggested he would not support a nominee named Trump.
Meanwhile Hillary Clinton, the Democratic frontrunner, is off to Harlem and already targeting Trump in ads that refer to his proposal to temporarily ban foreign Muslims from the US. Her campaign has also said she is open to debating her rival, Bernie Sanders, in his native borough of Brooklyn. Clinton leads Sanders by 268 pledged delegates and 440 superdelegates (party elites who can vote however they choose). A total of 2,383 delegates are needed to win.
We’ll be covering their tribulations and trials (at least one literal one) on the streets of New York, the hills of Wisconsin and everywhere else right here throughout the day. And tonight Kasich, Trump, Clinton and Sanders will all be interviewed one after the other on MSNBC, and we’ll follow that too ...
