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Via Politico, skip to 12:00 of the clip below for the key bit. Oh, it’s on. Or is it? Normally, a candidate for president claiming that he’s going to peel away his opponents’ supporters and win the nomination would be so banal that it wouldn’t qualify as news. It’s the ultimate “dog bites man” story. Of course Cruz believes this. If he didn’t, why would he be running? But these aren’t normal circumstances. Cruz is the only Republican in the field who has yet to utter a critical or discouraging syllable about Trump, part of his talk-radio-ish strategy not...

"I don't believe I have been given any credit by the voters for self-funding my campaign, the only one. I will keep doing, but not worth it!" @realDonaldTrump

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Via the Daily Rushbo, that’s the second time in a week that Rush has given Rubio a vote of confidence at a moment when the rest of the field (Ted Cruz very much included) is desperate to blow him up. That feels strange after so many months of Limbaugh mainstreaming Trump on the right — as I said in last week’s post, it’s hard to be pro-Trump and pro-Rubio — but it makes sense strategically. If Rubio collapses, conservatives are left with Cruz and … that’s pretty much it, given that the other remaining survivors in the field are...

Nevada, a state with a large Mormon minority, caucuses in a little more than 48 hours. If not now, when? In a major development in the Republican presidential race, 2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney will endorse Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) for president, The Huffington Post has learned from two Republican sources.Details of Romney’s endorsement were still being worked out as of Sunday morning. The sources said that the former Massachusetts governor had been eager to provide his backing to Rubio for days but had hesitated, due to his respect for former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R), who suspended his...

It’s a distant memory now but in the last two weeks of September, after her celebrated attack on Trump at the second Republican debate, she was in double digits nationally and in Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina. Then everyone just … moved on and she was a low single-digits candidate the rest of the way. Even now, I’m not sure what she did to fade so quickly and durably. I suppose it was a simple matter of her being outraised and outspent and then suffocated by Trump’s total domination of earned media.Of all the dark-horse candidates who’ve run in...

Even so, if I’m not mistaken, these are the first two polls anywhere since Trumpmania broke big that don’t show him on top.

Yep, says Philip Klein. I hope he's right, but I'm not sure the takeaway from a blowout win for Trump in New Hampshire is that it's now Ted Cruz's race to lose. Though Trump's victory in New Hampshire was no doubt impressive, the electorate of independent voters and super high turnout was tailor-made for him, whereas Cruz didn't put substantial effort into winning the state -- where very conservative candidates don't typically do as well. He is currently in position to win third here, with votes still outstanding. As the race moves to South Carolina, however, Cruz has a ground...

Cruz’s numbers here aren’t a shock — he’s been in the high teens and low twenties for awhile — but Trump hasn’t dipped as low as 25 percent in a national poll since November and Rubio hasn’t seen a number as high as 21 percent since … ever. That makes some righty poll-watchers nervous since PPP’s credibility has been attacked in the past. Not only are they liberal, they were the subject of a famous critique of their methodology by Nate Cohn in TNR a few years ago. If you’re looking to throw out this result, which no other...

Man. Lotta 2010-vintage tea-party heroes are climbing aboard the Trump train these days, huh? First Palin, now this. Presumably Trump’s holding the Joe the Plumber endorsement in reserve for just the right moment.This is a decent get for Trump. Brown's move could give Trump a significant boost, one day after the mogul lost the Iowa caucuses to Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas. Although Brown was defeated in his senatorial bid here, he has been popular GOP figure in New England ever since his stunning, come-from-behind victory in Massachusetts's special election to fill the Senate seat in 2010.Brown is also...

I wonder if any surprise guests will show up to endorse him. I have great respect for Governor Mike Huckabee and we have a mutual admiration for our wonderful families. It is great to have his daughter, Sarah, join the campaign, Trump said in a statement. What makes Mr. Trump my choice for president is he will break the grip of the donor class on our government and make it accountable to working families again, said [Sarah Huckabee] Sanders, who is joining Trumps team as a senior advisor. Huckabee endorsing Trump now makes sense. He was probably torn between Trump,...

I'm starting to think this guy might not vote for Trump. Skip to 8:50 of the clip below for the interview. You already know where he stands on Trump if you read his Facebook post this morning, but the video's worth watching for a few reasons. One: Although Sasse acknowledges that Super Tuesday and March 15th will be "significant" in deciding the nominee, the unmistakable sense here is that it's going to be Trump and conservatives need to begin preparing for that reality. Is that a fair conclusion to draw? Given this AP report of early voting in Florida, I'm...

Said this before, but given his role in the 1994 conservative revival in Congress, the eventual Gingrich endorsement of Trump will cause the right much, much more grief than tough-guy opportunist Chris Christie’s has. He blamed Marco Rubio for some of that mudslinging, saying the Florida senator’s personal attacks on Trump after last Thursday’s debate may have backfired. “I suspect it hurt Rubio,” Gingrich says. “Rubio’s not an attack dog. Chris Christie’s an attack dog. Christie knows how to do that, Rubio doesn’t. And Rubio ends up, I think, looking silly.”Gingrich also chided Republicans suggesting they won’t get behind Trump...