Summary
Here’s a summary of events, before we close our coverage for the day…
- Donald Trump said he doesn’t need a unified Republican party to win in the general election against a Democrat, rebuking other party leaders who have either hesitated or rejected him. “I think it would be better if it were unified, I think there would be something good about it,” he said, “but I don’t think it actually has to be unified in a traditional sense.”
- The de facto Republican nominee also called for an end to the federal minimum wage and retreated from several of the conservative promises he made during the primary. He insisted that his proposals are “flexible” so that he can negotiate later.
- He said that he would let states decide their minimum wages, but that he believes it should be higher than the current federal standard of $7.25 an hour. He also said he would like to tax the rich, a contradiction of his stated tax plan.
- Sarah Palin said she would campaign against Paul Ryan, the most powerful Republican in Washington, because he had refused to fall in line behind Trump. She said she’ll support Ryan’s primary challenger for re-election this fall.
- The one-time governor of Alaska also suggested she’s open to running as Trump’s vice-presidential pick. “I think I’m pretty much as vetted as anybody in the country could be vetted.”
- Senator John McCain demanded Trump retract insulting comments he made about prisoners of war last year (“I like people who weren’t captured). “A lot of things would have to happen,” McCain said, before he would appear with Trump anywhere.
Updated
Unnamed sources with Ted Cruz’s campaign tried to convince Marco Rubio to become his running-mate, CNN reports.
Top officials of the Cruz campaign are convinced there is one specific step that could have stopped [Donald] Trump – and they blame Sen. Marco Rubio for not taking that step. …
According to several sources close to Cruz, the Cruz campaign conducted several secret polls to see what the impact would be if Rubio joined Cruz as his running mate, with Cruz at the top of the ticket. Politico reportedin March that Rubio rejected the idea of a “unity ticket”.
But the sources close to Cruz and Rubio are now offering a much fuller picture of the extent of Cruz’s polling, the reasons why Rubio said no, and the resentment the Cruz people have about Rubio’s rejection of the idea.
The Cruz campaign polled in three March 15 primary states, Illinois, Missouri and North Carolina -- though not in Ohio, home to Kasich, or in Florida. They also tested the matchup in a poll in Arizona, which would hold its contest on March 22, and in Wisconsin, which would hold its primary on April 5.What did polls suggest a Cruz-Rubio ticket would do in those states?
“Blowout,” said a source close to Cruz. “65%-35%,” with Trump losing.
Through friends and emissaries, the Cruz campaign tried to get Rubio on board.But Cruz could not reach him on the phone, and others reported back to the Cruz campaign that Rubio did not seem interested in having a discussion about this at all.
“He went off the grid,” said a source close to Cruz. Cruz campaign officials speculated that Rubio was interested in preserving his political viability for a contested GOP convention or the 2020 race.
A source familiar with Rubio’s thinking says there never really was a concrete offer from the Cruz campaign to team up – just vague discussions from donors about polls and the potential for such a move – but either way, he was not interested. For one, the source said, Rubio thought the notion of two senators from Washington DC, teaming up against Trump would fit all too easily into the Trump outsider narrative.
Infidelity is the word of the day: Trump to the Republican party, his rivals to the party pledge, Paul Ryan to primary voters, Bill Clinton to his wife back in the 1990s by way of Trump’s accusation that Hillary Clinton “enables” him …
… all of which dovetails in a column by the New York Times’ Frank Bruni on the strange sexual tones of Donald Trump’s candidacy.
John F. Kennedy admitted nothing. Bill Clinton denied everything. He had to persuade a leery electorate that his libido was overrated so that he could demonstrate, in the White House, that it wasn’t.
From Gary Hart through Newt Gingrich, politicians raced to stay a step ahead of sexual scandal.
Or they were relished for their apparent immunity to it. Four years ago, the G.O.P. chose a nominee who wore special religious undergarments.
Now they’re about to anoint one who, metaphorically speaking, wears a thong. Yes, I know, he promises fidelity to his third and current wife, the former model Melania, 46. But given his own age, 69, that’s less a triumph of conscience than a surrender to biology. The motor surely doesn’t roar or even purr the way it used to.
And he doesn’t disown or try to atone for the many decades when he kept it in overdrive. There was too much on-the-record exulting about that at the time. Trump orbited like a horny planet around the snickering sun of the Howard Stern show, whose light and heat he couldn’t resist. And he braidedproclamations of sexual potency with boasts of entrepreneurial prowess so tightly that they’re inseparable.
His carnal conquests are the cornerstone of his can-do braggadocio. I have always seized the best and the most, and this country deserves no less. I score, and so should you. His slogan might as well be Get America Laid Again.
You can read Bruni’s full take here.
Could Donald Trump “scramble” the electoral map in a general election against Hillary Clinton? My colleague Lauren Gambino takes that question to party gurus and political scientists.
“Trump could really shuffle the deck,” said Whit Ayres, a Republican consultant who advised Marco Rubio’s presidential campaign and is pessimistic about his party’s chances of success in November.
“We still start with the 2012 map, but Trump could scramble a number of the states on that map.”
For Clinton, early battleground maps show a favorable electoral playing field, while Trump’s path to the White House hinges on the states of the Rust Belt.
“Trump claims he is going to have a substantial[ly] higher turnout of blue collar whites,” Ayres said. “If indeed he can pull that off, it might put some overwhelmingly white” – and usually Democratic blue – “regions of the Great Lakes, states like Pennsylvania, into play. But both sides get to play this game.”
Joel Benenson, chief strategist for the Clinton campaign, has said in interviewsthat a Clinton-Trump general election could make Democrats competitive in traditionally red states with large minority populations, such as Arizona and Georgia. Strategists on both sides, though, say that wins in such states would be the “icing on the cake”.
“None of these states will be critical in getting to 270,” said Mitch Stewart, Obama’s 2012 battleground states director who now runs the firm 270 Strategies, in reference to the number of electoral votes needed to win the presidency.
Florida, which offers the most votes of any traditional battleground state, will be a priority for Clinton. A win there would likely hand her the presidency, Stewart said.
The Obama 2012 campaign, Stewart said, gamed out 42 possible paths to victory.
“Clinton probably has a lot more pathways to 270 with Trump on the ticket,” he said. “But there are also probably new pathways there on the Republican side as well.”
Democrats will also keep an eye on other states that traditionally lean their way, such as Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.
“We’re not going to take Trump for granted,” said Luis Miranda, a spokesman for the Democratic National Committee. “We’re going to fight to hold him accountable every single day and we’re going to make sure that we don’t let Democrats be complacent about this.”
Though Clinton appears to have the edge over Trump, both are historically unpopular. A CBS News and New York Times survey released in March found that Trump and Clinton have the highest unfavorable ratings of prospective nominees since the poll first asked the question in 1984, at 57% and 52% respectively.
“Clinton’s numbers are atrocious,” said Amy Walters, national editor of the Cook Political Report, which released its 2016 electoral ratings this week. “Her overall approval ratings are terrible. But for the fact that Trump is in worse shape than she is, she would be in a very different position.”
In an election that has already delivered near-daily surprises, political scientists say it is far too soon to predict whether Clinton and the Democrats can realistically expand their appeal beyond the familiar roster of swing states.
If anyone is anticipating a Trump defeat of Walter Mondale proportions – the Democrat lost 49 of the 50 states to Ronald Reagan in 1984 – such experts say don’t count on it.
“There is no chance of a blowout election, not with the level of polarization we have right now,” said Geoff Skelley, associate editor of Sabato’s Crystal Ball at the University of Virginia Center for Politics.
“It’s just not going to happen in this day in age. You’re not going to see Clinton win 47 states. That is absolutely not going to happen.”
Updated
Spleling!
"close the dael" pic.twitter.com/49noYd4G6Z
— Ben Jacobs (@Bencjacobs) May 8, 2016
Saturday Night Live resurrected the Church Lady (Dana Carvey) last night, for a cold open with Ted Cruz (Taran Killam), aka “Lucifer in the flesh”.
“Was it God’s plan for you to get humiliated by an orange mannequin?” the Church Lady asks.
“I’ve been told to go to Hell so many times, I think it’s finally time to check it out,” he cackles.
Then out strolls Donald J Trump (Darrell Hammond), to talk Bible: “Two Genesis Too Furious”, “the part where Jon Snow comes back to life”.
Updated
The Democrats’ quest for a nickname continues: “Loose cannon Donald”.
Sarah Palin has written a coherent pledge of support for Paul Ryan’s primary opponent in Wisconsin on Facebook.
Rep. Paul Ryan abandoned the district he was to represent as special interests dictated his legislative priorities. Without ever having a real job outside of politics, it seems he disconnected himself from the people, thus easily disrespected the will of the people. It’s time for a change. I’m supporting the independent conservative businessman, Paul Nehlen, to return the House Speakership to “We The People”. Here’s the worthy challenger, Paul Nehlen.
Twitter has a surprisingly long memory.
You quit your job as governor. https://t.co/hn2UYCarsk
— Stephen Hayes (@stephenfhayes) May 8, 2016
Trump: eliminate federal minimum wage
Next up: minimum wage. Trump said at a debate that he didn’t want to increase it, and now says he’s open to increasing it. So…
Trump says that after traveling the US he’s “seen what’s going on”. He’s discovered that it’s really hard to survive on minimum wage.
“I don’t know how people make it on $7.25 an hour. Now, with that being said, I would like to see an increase of some magnitude. But I’d rather leave it to the states. Let the states decide. Because don’t forget, the states have to compete with each other.”
Todd: “Should the federal government set a floor, and then you let the states…?
Trump: “No, I’d rather have the states go out and do what they have to do.”
But he adds he thinks “people should get more. I think they’re out there. They’re working.”
Todd changes the subject, noting that Trump praised Hillary Clinton when she was finishing her term as secretary of state. He attributed her vote for the Iraq war to “bad intelligence” at the time. (Despite his claims to the contrary Trump did not oppose the Iraq war in 2003; he told radio host Howard Stern “I guess so” when asked about his support for invasion.)
Now Trump calls Clinton “crooked”. He says he can explain. He says a magazine told him he’s “a world class businessman. And I am. I built an amazing company.”
He says he’s in Europe, in Asia, all over the world and “not looking to get in fights with politicians”. Finally he starts to argue that because he’s a businessman he’s trying to stay on good terms with everybody, and that four years ago he’d say Hillary Clinton is “doing great” because “I say everybody’s doing great.”
“The fact is she has not done a good job,” he then says – an implicit admission that his earlier statement of “everybody’s doing great” was a lie, if the fact is that he believes she was not doing great. Todd doesn’t call him out on this one.
Trump continues: “When I look at what happened with Libya. When I look at what happened with Benghazi. When you look at the migration. When you look at all of the things. But I’m not looking to criticize. You can look at many politicians that haven’t done a good job.
“How are they doing? They’re doing just fine. I’m not looking to get into wars with politicians, because I need politicians.”
Final question: where’re your tax returns?
Trump: “I have very big tax returns. I’m sure you’ve seen the picture where the returns are literally from the floor to up to here. They’re extremely complex.”
He says he’d like to release them before the election, but he won’t pledge to. “Sure. If the auditors finish.” He says he’s given his “financials” and that they show he’s worth “more than $10bn”.
He doesn’t say that those financials directly contradict court documents about at least one of his properties: a golf course that he claimed is worth $50m in one set of papers and then $1.4m to a judge.
More from Ed Helmore, this time watching the governor of North Carolina appear on Fox News Sunday to discuss the controversy over a state law which bans people from using public restrooms consistent with their gender identity…
Pat McCrory refused to say if his state would meet a Justice Department deadline to stop enforcing the controversial law on Monday. He was, he said, “looking at all my options”.
McCrory signed House Bill 2 in March. That triggered a 4 May letter from Principal Assistant attorney general for civil rights Vanita Gupta, warning that HB 2 violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and other non-discrimination statutes.
McCrory said the Justice Department deadline was “unrealistic” – and confirmed his administration has asked for an extension.
The NBC host finally asks Trump about “some issue things”. First up: taxes.
“Your tax plan is one where the biggest beneficiaries are the 0.1% when it comes to raw dollars that will be saved among taxes,” Todd says. “But then in an interview earlier this week, you seemed to say, ‘You know what, my tax plan, it’s not set in stone. And maybe I’ll raise taxes. Maybe I’ll actually raise taxes on the rich.’
What is your actual tax plan?
“I think nobody knows more about taxes than I do, and income than I do,” Trump says. “But I’ll explain how it all works. I come up with the biggest tax cut by far of any candidate. Anybody. And I put it in. But that doesn’t mean that’s what we’re going to get. We have to negotiate.
“The thing I’m going to do is make sure the middle class gets good taxes – uh, tax breaks. Because they have been absolutely shunned. The other thing, I’m going to fight very hard for business. For the wealthy, I think, frankly, it’s going to go up. And you know what, it really should go up.”
This boils down to tax breaks for the middle class and increased taxes on the wealthy, which is not what Trump’s tax plan lays out.
Trump calls his plan “a floor” and “a simplification”. But he says he has “no illusions” that he’ll get his plan in action.
“We lower the number of brackets. We lower the taxes on the middle class, on business. And we lower the taxes on everybody, very substantially. But I have no illusions. I don’t think that’s going to be the final plan.
“Because they are going to come to me, including the Democrats and everybody else, they’re going to come to me. They’re going to want to negotiate. But that’s a floor. That’s where we’re starting.”
Todd calls Trump out on this – his plans aren’t plans at all, they’re starting positions for negotiations.
“Excuse me. It’s called life,” Trump says. “It’s not my word, of course. I put in a proposal. You know what they are? They’re really proposals. People can say it’s a tax plan. It’s really a tax proposal.”
He says he’s “not under the illusion” that his tax plan is going to pass Congress. “They’re going to come to me. They’re going to want to raise it for the rich”
“… But the middle class has to be protected. The rich is probably going to end up paying more. And business might have to pay a little bit more. But we’re giving a massive business tax cut. Remember this, we’re the highest taxed nation in the world.”
Todd stops him right after that direct contradiction of two sentences that say two different things: businesses might have to pay a little bit more, but we’re giving a massive business tax cut. “You just said it within 10 words.”
Trump rejects this. “No, no, I didn’t say it. Excuse me.”
He clarifies that businesses might have to pay more than his proposal, which will give them a tax break, but that the goal is still a tax break.
Trump: Mitt Romney is 'ungrateful'
Trump concedes that he’s never going to get endorsements from many old guard Republican leaders, including 2012 nominee Mitt Romney.
“You know, the party’s come together. I have tremendous numbers of endorsements. I’m never going to get Romney’s endorsement. He choked. He blew the last election. I’m never going to get that. I’m neighbor going to get Bush’s election. You know, he thought I was too rough on him.”
He kicks the former Florida governor while he’s down. “He’s not a very tough guy, but, you know, I was very tough on him.”
He goes back to the infamous Republican pledge to stay loyal to the eventual nominee. “He pledged that he would support the nominee. And so did this lightweight, Lindsey Graham.”
Todd points out that Trump threatened to abandon the pledge repeatedly, but Trump says that “one of the reasons” he didn’t give it up is, “despite what a few people think, I happen to be a very honorable guy. I signed a pledge.
“And that’s a binding pledge. You know, I heard, ‘It’s not binding.’ Well, it is a binding pledge. I have the best lawyers in the world. They say it’s an absolutely binding pledge.”
Jeb Bush and Lindsey Graham “are not honorable people”, says Trump, who is being sued for defrauding students of “Trump University”.
Todd asks about the rumors that Romney is being recruited to run as an independent candidate.
“Here’s the story. I helped Mitt a lot,” Trump says. “I raised a lot of money for him. I ruined the carpet in my apartments, I had so many people come.
Trump says he had two fundraisers in his apartment. That he “did robocalls”, “did speeches”, “did everything during the primary season”. He says that “every single robocall I made, he won that state” in the primaries.
“When it came time to the general election, I waited for the call. I didn’t care. Look, if they don’t want to call me, that’s okay. I’m a busy man.”
Todd: “You think he’s been ungrateful.”
Trump: “He was. He was ungrateful. Which is okay. A lot of people are ungrateful. But he was ungrateful. They did not respond accordingly. And that’s okay.”
Paul Ryan 'blindsided' Trump
They move on to Paul Ryan, the Republican Speaker of the House who repudiated Trump this week by saying he would not support him until he saw definitive changes in his policy and tone.
Todd says Trump seems “pretty annoyed by this. Are you?”
“It’s just the way it is. I don’t think it hurts me at all,” Trump says. “And I’d like to have his support, but if he doesn’t want to support me that’s fine. And we have to go about it. Look, I’m going to get millions and millions of votes more than the Republicans would have gotten.”
He points out in so many words that he’s on par to win more votes than George W Bush did in the 2000 Republican primary, and that he’s managed to outlast 16 other candidates. His argument boils down to the the voters picked me, get on the Trump train.
“Well, I would say that’s true. I mean, to be honest. I like Paul Ryan. I think he’s a very good guy,” Trump says. “He called me three weeks ago, and he was so supportive. It was amazing. And I never thought a thing like this. I got blindsided by this.”
But “stunned” is too strong a word, he says.
“I’m never stunned by anything that happens in politics,” Trump says. “Yeah, I was blindsided a little bit, because he spoke to me three weeks ago, and it was a very nice call, a very encouraging call. I was doing well. He called me, I think, to congratulate me about New York, ‘cause I won by massive numbers. I won everything. And then the next week, I won the five states in a row by all landslide numbers.
“And he called me to congratulate me. Couldn’t have been nicer. And again, I have a nice relationship with him. Don’t know him well. Met him one time. But have a nice relationship with him. And then all of a sudden, he gets on and he does this number. So I’m not exactly sure what he has in mind.”
Todd presses Trump on whether Ryan should be chairman of the national convention this summer, where Trump will be officially nominated.
“I don’t want to mention now. I’ll see after,” Trump says, promising “a very solid answer”.
“Okay? But there’s no reason to give it right now.”
Donald Trump is also appearing on NBC’s Meet the Press, where host Chuck Todd opens by asking about what the businessman has called “a rigged system”.
Trump says it’s definitely still rigged. “It’s going to be an interesting things [sic],” he says. “Bernie Sanders is not being treated fairly. Not being treated fairly. You know, it’s a rigged system against him also. I’m no Bernie fan, I can tell you that. But it is a rigged system.”
Todd asks whether the Republican system is rigged too.
Trump: “Yeah, totally rigged. It was totally rigged. And it was only that I was winning by so much. I was winning in landslides every week. And if I weren’t, I wouldn’t have been able to do it, because it was dictated by the bosses. But you know what, I’m happy with it. It’s like a boxer. You have to go and you have to knock out the opponent.”
The NBC host tries to get Trump to explain his position on same-day voter registration, and for making voting easier in general – he’s luring the businessman to a Democratic position of greater voting rights.
Trump argues that closed primaries don’t help “expand the party”. Then he muddles his way into some inaccuracies about New York voting (a closed primary in which there’s no same-day registration).
“I want to see voting laws so that people that are citizens can vote. Not so people that can walk off the street and can vote, or so that illegal immigrants can vote.”
The businessman seems to realize what Todd is doing: “I don’t think people should sneak in through the cracks. And whether that’s an ID or any way you want to do it. But you have to be a citizen to vote.”
He insists there are “places were people just walk in and vote,” which Todd repudiates but then moves on from.
Back on ABC Stephanopoulos presses Trump on some of the many inconsistencies between his written proposals and his verbal statements.
Taxes for instance. How can your plan cut taxes for the rich and then you say taxes on the wealthiest Americans will go up?
“It’s just a concept,” Trump says. “The real concept is lower taxes for business, lower taxes for the middle class, lower taxes for everybody.”
He argues that he’ll change his position however he sees fit – it’s all just a negotiation. Personally, “I wouldn’t mind paying more, we’ve got to do something,” he says. “But business would pay less, the middle class would pay less.”
“It’s not a plan, it’s a negotiation,” Trump says. “By the time it gets negotiated it’s goign to be a different plan.”
So you’re OK abandoning what you’ve promised before?
“I’m allowed to change, you need flexibility,” Trump says. “From a practical standpoint it’s going to get renegotiated.”
Stephanopoulos moves on: the minimum wage. Leave it alone before, Trump said, and now he’s suggesting it should be increased.
Trump says he wants to leave it to the states: “My real minimum wage is I’m going to bring companies back into this country.”
He wants to use tariffs and taxes to force companies to return. “We have to use the power of the tariff, we have to use the power of taxation.”
The ABC host notes that Trump makes lots of products – suits and ties, for instance – in China. Trump more or less ignores the question, saying that there aren’t American companies who even do the manufacturing anymore – he disregards Stephanopoulos’ mention of Brooks Brothers.
“I cannot buy a television set made in this country,” Trump says. “They don’t even make ‘em here anymore. … I make my hats. Make America great again.
Hillary Clinton: Trump is a loose cannon
CBS’s Face the Nation has an interview with Hillary Clinton, the likely Democratic nominee for president. Ed Helmore has read the transcript…
In her CBS interview, Hillary Clinton was asked if she thought Donald Trump was not of “sound mind”, and what she meant when called him, as she has on the campaign trail, “a loose cannon”. Her answer focused on issues of foreign policy and national security.
“Being a loose cannon means saying that other nations should go ahead and acquire nuclear weapons for themselves when that is the last thing we need in the world today,” Clinton said. “Being a loose cannon is saying we should pull out of Nato, the strongest military alliance in the history of the world, and something that we really need to modernize but not abandon.
Going back to torture. Killing terrorists’ families, which would be a war crime. And those are just some of the concerns that I hear people talking about, which I think does fit the definition of a loose cannon.
Clinton noted that with former Republican presidents and high-ranking Republicans in Congress raising questions about their presumptive nominee, that showed “deep concern about what kind of leader he would be”. The conversation turned to domestic matters, first job creation. Clinton attacked Trump’s lack of policy specifics.
“He doesn’t have a view,” said Clinton. “He has a slogan. And he needs to be really pressed on that.”
What about climate change? “When he says, ‘Climate change is a Chinese hoax,’ what does that mean? You know, has he ever talked to a scientist or is he just, again … assuming a slogan?”
Clinton asked what Trump meant when he said women should be punished for having abortions. “How would he go about that?” The same went for his remarks on immigration. “Or rounding up 11, 12 million people, which … would entail the most comprehensive police and military action inside our borders that is imaginable.”
Host John Dickerson switched to the general election, asking what that might look like given that both candidates have high unfavorable ratings. Will it be ugly?
I’m not going to run an ugly race. I am going to run a race based on issues and what my agenda is to the American people. I don’t really feel like I’m running against Donald Trump. I feel like I’m running for my vision of what our country can be.
Could she win over disaffected Republicans? “A lot of people, again, who take their vote seriously really see this as a crossroads kind of election.”
Clinton said she also hopes she can bring her own party together, including supporters of the Vermont senator Bernie Sanders, who has not dropped out despite an almost impossible path to the nomination.
“I see a great role and opportunity for him and his supporters to be part of that unified party,” she said.
Clinton then denied that the FBI had contacted her team in terms of talking to her about her use of a private email server while serving as secretary of state.
“I’ve encouraged all of, you know, my assistants … to be very forthcoming,” she said. “And I hope that this is close to being wrapped up.”
Was she worried about about the impression this might have on voters?
“It’s a security inquiry,” she said. “I always took classified material seriously. There was never any material marked ‘classified’ that was sent or received by me. And I look forward to this being wrapped up. As I have said many times … that was absolutely permitted and I did it and it turned out to be a mistake. It wasn’t the best choice.”
Updated
Trump: I don't need unified Republicans
Donald Trump is now on ABC’s This Week, in a pre-taped interview with George Stephanopoulos.
The host talks up some of Trump’s achievements: he’s on course to win more votes than George W Bush did in the 2000 primary, and he’s got vice-president Joe Biden warning Democrats not to dismiss the businessman’s chances.
Stephanopoulos sat down with Trump at the airport in Ohama, Nebraska.
Trump lays out his reasoning for why Paul Ryan should support him. “This is what the people want,” he says, before touting some of the people who’ve backed him. “I’ve had so much support, I’ve had support from all the people Paul Ryan works with.”
“Even Governor Perry came out, and he was very rough, and he came out with a very beautiful statement and we came out with a magnificent statement.”
Ryan’s decision not to support the businessman – yet – hurt Trump, he says. “I was very surprised and very disappointed”.
“I think it’s a mistake,” he says. “It hurts the party.”
Stephanopoulos presses the point: you don’t think you need a unified Republican party?
“I actually don’t think so. I think it would be better if it were unified, I think there would be something good about it but I don’t think it actually has to be unified in a traditional sense.”
He starts rambling about how he wants trade but not such free trade. “I don’t want to be an isolationist,” he says, rattling off a number of Asian countries that he finds objectionable. “They’re just absolutely eating our lunch.” He insists he won’t give up his own principles.
Stephanopoulos changes topic, turning to the Democrats’ likely nominee, Hillary Clinton. “She’s playing the woman card so much, and so loud,” Trump says. “She’s gonna get hit for it and it’s not appropriate.”
On Friday Trump told a rally: “I mean all of the men, we’re petrified to speak to women anymore, we may raise our voice. You know what, the women get it better than we do, folks.”
“Look, we’re living in the real world. This political correctness is killing our country.”
In the interview, he doesn’t back down from those comments. He instead says it’s fair to criticize Bill Clinton because the former president is on the campaign trail supporting his wife. He called him “one of the great abusers of the world”.
Updated
McCain demands Trump retract PoW insults
John McCain is next, in a pre-taped interview with CNN’s Manu Raju, who asks McCain how he can support Donald Trump when his best friend in the Senate (Lindsey Graham) has adamantly rejected the businessman.
“I’ve said all along that I would support” the nominee, McCain says.
He frames his support for Trump as a vote against Hillary Clinton, who he says “would cause the economy to continue to stumble along and put us in the economic malaise that basically we’ve had for eight years”.
But he concedes “there is some distance if not a disconnect between party leadership and members of Congress and many of the voters who have selected Donald Trump.”
Some of those voters are “older, white, blue-collar workers who see no prospect of a job ever again,” he says. Others are “dissatisfied young people” and people who see “the reality that there is gridlock” in Washington.
“You have to listen to people that’ve chosen the nominee of our Republican party, I think it’d be foolish not to,” McCain says.
He grows a little reflective. “I believe that the Republican party must maintain its viability,” he says. “I am a Teddy Roosevelt, Ronald Reagan republican, and I will do everything I can to continue to steer the Republican party along those lines.” (Roosevelt was far more progressive than Reagan, breaking up major corporations and setting an environmentalist agenda.)
McCain offers lukewarm support for Trump at best: “I think that he could be a capable leader. I think it’s obvious that there has to be outreach on his part to heal many of the wounds.”
“I have never seen the personalization of a campaign like this, where people’s integrity and character are questions. That bothers me a lot. Because you an violently almost disagree with someone on an issue, but to attack their character and their integrity, then those wounds take a long time to heal.”
Could McCain ever appear on stage with Trump?
“A lot of things would have to happen. I think it’s important for Donald Trump to express his appreciation for veterans – not John McCain.”
“What he said about me, John McCain, that’s fine,” the senator continues. Last year Trump said McCain was “not a war hero” for having been captured by the Viet Cong. McCain suffered over five years as a prisoner of war, refusing early release for being the son of a prominent American commander.
Last July Trump said: “I like people who weren’t captured.”
McCain gets exercised about this: “When he said I don’t like people who were captured, then there’s a body of American heroes who’d like to see retract that statement. Not about me, but about [them]”
Tapper then asks about McCain’s remarks earlier this week that he’s in “the race of my life” because of Trump’s inflammatory remarks about Hispanic people.
The senator doesn’t deny it. “There is a Hispanic vote which I have to continue my good relationship with because of the turmoil that exists in this whole national campaign. And so anybody who doesn’t agree that there’s great turmoil and that any incumbent that doesn’t recognize that … is unaware of the passing scene.”
Finally Tapper asks about Sarah Palin, McCain’s former running-mate in 2008 and currently one of Trump’s most prominent supporters. McCain defends the former governor of Alaska.
“I still believe that contrary to what is becoming the popular information and opinion is that Sarah Palin energized our ticket. I have polling data,” he says. “She beat Joe Biden in the debate.”
McCain concedes: “of course she made some big mistakes” but adds “obviously I made mistakes. I will take full responsibility for my failure. I will not put that responsibility” on her.
“She energized our campaign and I’m very proud of her,” he concludes, adding: “That is the only thing I will ever resent about my presidential campaign was her treatment by the media.”
Tapper then casts around for VP recommendations. McCain says Senator Joni Ernst “would be tremendous” but that there’re lots of qualified people in the Senate and House.
Updated
Tapper asks Palin about her former running-mate, Senator John McCain, who was caught on tape this week saying that Trump has turned his re-election into “the race of [his] life” because of anti-Trump sentiment.
Palin hedges on whether McCain should be worried by the fact that Trump has repeatedly denigrated Hispanic people: “I sure wish that politicians wouldn’t worry about these racial divides that are for the most part made up.”
Tapper presses her on McCain. “John McCain and I have gone through a lot of battles, separately and together, and I really respect the man,” she says.
“He doesn’t have any more to worry about with Latinos than he would have explaining his record to the general populace in Arizona,” she insists.
Next up is McCain himself (in a pre-taped interview).
Palin: Paul Ryan erred, I'm vetted for VP
Sarah Palin is the first up this morning on CNN’s State of the Union, where host Jake Tapper asks the former governor of Alaska about the divisions in the Republican party surrounding Donald Trump, whom she supports.
Tapper notes that Paul Ryan, the Republican leader of the House of Representatives and the vice-presidential nominee in 2012, has said he cannot support Trump until the businessman changes the tone and substance of his campaign.
“I think Paul Ryan is soon to be ‘Cantored,’ as in Eric Cantor,” she says, alluding to the former Republican leader who was knocked out of his seat in 2014, by a more conservative candidate.
“His political career is over but for a miracle because he has so disrespected the will of the people,” she says. “And yeah, as the leader of the GOP, the convention, certainly he is to remain neutral. And for him to already come out and say who he will not support is not a wise decision of his.”
“If the GOP were to win now, that wouldn’t bode well for his chances in 2020, and that’s what he’s shooting for,” she says. Palin says Ryan’s decision “kinda screws his chances for the 2020 bid”.
Tapper asks whether Palin then would support the man challenging Ryan in a primary race in Wisconsin this fall. Palin says sure. “I will do whatever I can for Paul Nehlen,” she says. “This man is a hard-working guy, so in touch with the people.”
“Paul Ryan and his ilk, their problem is they have become so disconnected by the people whom they are elected to represent.”
Republicans like Ryan are threatened by the likes of Trump, she continues: “They feel so threatened at this point that their power, their prestige, their purse will be adversely affected by the change that is coming with Trump and with someone like Paul Nehlen, that they’re not thinking straight right now.”
She says “we are fed up” by politicians, lumping herself in with “the American people”.
“We worked so hard to get Paul Ryan in there and so many other quote-unquote conservatives, and look what they have done?”
Palin says most Americans are worried about who will appoint a supreme court justice than Bill Clinton’s “obvious discretions” and Donald Trump “having been divorced a few times”.
Tapper asks whether Palin would be interested in running for vice-president again, this time with Trump.
“I think I’m pretty much as vetted as anybody in the country could be vetted, already. I think there are so many other great people out there in America who could serve in this,” she says.
“They already know who I am, what I stand for. They wouldn’t be in for any surprises,” she continues. “I wanna help and not hurt. … I wouldn’t want to be a burden on the ticket, and I recognize that in many, many eyes I would be.”
“I just want the guy to win. I want America to win.”
She says that she knows Trump well, and she respects him “because he respects women”.
Updated
Hello and welcome to our rolling coverage of the 2016 presidential election, with nine states left to vote in the Democratic and Republican primaries but the race turned toward two candidates: heavy favorite Hillary Clinton and the only Republican left standing, Donald Trump.
Now Ted Cruz and John Kasich have dropped out, Trump faces the unenviable task of uniting a party that has splintered around him. Two former presidents, the 2012 nominee and a handful of leading senators, representatives and governors have already vowed never to vote Trump. The sitting Speaker of the House has tentatively rejected him. Others have offered tepid support and pleaded with him to reconcile with the party. Only a minority of outliers have embraced the de facto nominee.
Trump continues to rebuke them all, straying from his promises to “act presidential” and instead saying he doesn’t need any of ’em. The businessman with a flaky relationship to truth will make an emphatic return to the talk show circuit today, after a single appearance in the last month.
Joining the TV circus are Senator John McCain – the Republicans’ 2008 nominee, a comparative moderate and a man who Trump ridiculed for being imprisoned by the Vietcong during the Vietnam war – and McCain’s 2008 running mate, Sarah Palin, who was almost a single-term governor of Alaska, then starred on reality TV and now supports Mr Trump. Does Team 2008 talk? Probably not.
For the Democrats, Clinton has amassed enough of a lead in pledged and unpledged delegates to all but eliminate Bernie Sanders from mathematical contention. She’s already turned to start undermining Trump – his offensive remarks about women, Hispanic people, Muslims, prisoners of war, the disabled, Europe – but it’s not clear how well these criticisms will work after he steamrolled through them to the nomination.
Sanders has stuck to the race and continues to urge Clinton to the left on inequality, cracking down on Wall Street malfeasance and other issues. Sanders has promised an unlikely contested convention but stands as a powerful new figure in the Democratic party nonetheless, having gathered an impressive coalition of young voters across racial demographics and enough delegates to have an important say in the party’s platform.
