Yep, it’s Tuesday and here we go again: Could this be the primary that delivers the knockout blow? Probably not on the Democratic side, since Bernie Sanders appears content to ride his ebbing wave all the way to the convention.
What’s at stake in Indiana: 57 GOP delegates and 92 Democratic delegates. Live-blogging begins at 6 PM ET and Jeff Singer has a look at all the down-ticket implications here.
In terms of the GOP presidential, Ted Cruz’s rising star is burning out more like a shooting star than anything. So sad. Donald Trump might actually be able to secure enough delegates in winner-take-all Indiana to make his path to 1,237 inevitable. Several polls have put Trump at a double-digit advantage, but the relative scarcity of sophisticated surveys leading up to the vote and the hopscotch nature of their outcomes might make Indiana a wild card. Still, here’s how Trump could become inevitable:
Mr. Trump already has nearly 1,000 delegates, and even the most pessimistic projections would give him another 120 from West Virginia, New Jersey and three states — Washington, Oregon and New Mexico — that award their delegates proportionally, putting him about 120 delegates away from the nomination. A win in Indiana would cover about half of that number, since the state’s 57 delegates are awarded on a winner-take-all basis both statewide and by congressional district.
Trump’s also dominating polls in California and getting a healthy portion of its 172 delegates could easily push him over the top.
The question for Hillary is less about wrapping up the nomination—she already has—and more about improving her appeal among working-class white voters, a demographic that generally favored her in ’08.
Among the most significant of the voting blocs that have sided with her opponent, Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, are working-class white voters, whom Mrs. Clinton will need to claim in the general election. She began making progress with such voters in the Pennsylvania primary last week, effectively splitting whites without a college degree with Mr. Sanders, and will need to do so again in Indiana to win the state over all.
Clinton has barely competed in Indiana—no television spots, one rally, and two invitation-only events. Her aides are calling it a do-or-die contest for Sanders, who has dropped about a million dollars on the state. A loss for him will be devastating. A loss for Clinton could signal areas for improvement in a general election.