This time they really mean it, you guys. No, really. After months of trying to get up their nerve, some members of the freaked-out-by-Trump Republican establishment are going to try to do something to beat him.
In what will be the first sustained ad assault Mr. Trump has faced since the final week before the Iowa caucuses, the anti-tax Club for Growth has reserved $1.5 million in cable television time in Florida, the conservative America Future Fund has reserved $1.75 million in broadcast time and the “super PAC” supporting Mr. Rubio, Conservative Solutions, has laid down another $1.75 million.
Our Principles PAC, which is devoted solely to defeating Mr. Trump, is also expected to begin running ads in Florida. All told, the anti-Trump groups are likely to spend more than $7 million in the state
The focus is on Florida because this isn’t just an effort to defeat Trump, it’s an effort to prop up Marco Rubio. Even though Ted Cruz is well ahead of Rubio in states and delegates won at this point, Rubio is still the establishment’s golden boy and if they can push him over the finish line in Florida by dragging Trump down, they’ll take it as a sign he was always meant to be.
These are not the people we want determining the direction of the Supreme Court. Please give $3 to help turn the Senate blue.
Some Republicans, though, are starting to accept that Trump is winning and they can’t or shouldn’t launch an all-out war against him:
“Trump has earned the nomination,” [media consultant Alex] Castellanos wrote in an email. “Donald Trump whipped the establishment and it is too late for the limp GOP establishment to ask their mommy to step in and rewrite the rules because they were humiliated for their impotence.”
Similarly, William J. Bennett, a Reagan education secretary, said he could not support the anti-Trump movement.
“I’m used to being the moral scold, but Trump is winning fair and square, so why should the nomination be grabbed from him?” asked Bennett, now a conservative radio host.
Running ads against a candidate isn’t typically thought of as a dirty, unfair tactic, but running ads against a candidate only once he’s taken a significant lead to be your party’s presidential nominee is a little more unusual. Also, some top Republican donors aren’t prepared to throw more of their money away after giving generously to Jeb Bush’s failed campaign.