POLITICO Playbook: TRUMP ROLLS, GOP bigs creep toward Cruz, Rubio in rut

PLAYBOOK FACTS OF LIFE: Hey, Establishment! How's that "Trump's fading/peaking" theory working out for ya? Let's go to the numbers:

 

* Trump won three of four last night, in all corners of the nation. It wasn't even close in Michigan (12 points over Cruz) or Mississippi (11 points over Cruz).

 

* He has won 15 of 24 overall. Cruz has won 7.

 

* The establishment is now 2 for 24, with Rubio taking never-gonna-vote-Republican-in-a-general Minnesota and Puerto Rico.

 

* Trump leads all national polls (Real Clear average +14.2) and in Florida (CNN +16) and Ohio (+6).

 

* Marco, the establishment's great hope, didn't crack double digits in Michigan or Mississippi and appears to have the same chances of winning the nomination as Jeb.

 

By Mike Allen (@mikeallen; [email protected]) and Daniel Lippman (@dlippman; [email protected])

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NEXT GREAT HOPE: Kasich finished strong in Michigan (.6 behind Cruz) and is creeping up, steadily but surely, in national polls. He crushes Trump in national head-to-head polls (so do the others) and has a decent chance of winning Ohio, just as the race moves to the Midwest and West. He has a much better chance of winning Ohio than Rubio does Florida. BUT, Kasich has won the same number of states as Playbook has to date: zero. (If Paul Ryan can say he wants to write Playbook, I can say I have a shot at the nomination!)

 

Good Wednesday morning. AP's "Thought for Today" comes from the great David Broder: "Anybody who wants the presidency so much that he'll spend two years organizing and campaigning for it is not to be trusted with the office."

 

INSIDE THE CAMPAIGNS -- "GOP establishment creeps toward Cruz: 'Ted is the only possibility to stop Trump,' says Bush loyalist," by Katie Glueck: "Republican elites are begrudgingly embracing Ted Cruz-and hanging Marco Rubio out to dry. ... '[Cruz] seems to be the only guy who's got some momentum, and is probably the best situated if there is anybody out there to beat Trump,' said Austin Barbour." https://politi.co/1Ue0TBp

 

--"Worried GOP scrambles to adjust odds against Trump," by Alex Isenstadt: "Well-heeled donors ... are in preliminary talks to convene a meeting or conference call after March 15, a crucial day on the nominating calendar ... The purpose[:] ... to assess whether the multimillion-dollar offensive against Trump is working - and, in the words of one, 'what the path forward would be.'"  https://politi.co/1R5WFGJ

 

--"Marco on the brink: For ex-Jeb Bush backers and GOP elites, it's deja Rubio as he stalls out after trying to take on Trump," by Shane Goldmacher in Sarasota: "Rubio is flirting with the same political 'death spiral' that swallowed Jeb Bush only three weeks ago. He's fending off rumors of quitting, defending undersized crowds and promoting polls that show him losing (even in his home state), while also whining about Donald Trump's media coverage."  https://politi.co/1XbWY7q

 

--"George W. Bush has no plans to endorse," by Daniel Lippman: "'While I would never rule anything out, he definitely doesn't have any plans to make an endorsement,' said an aide to the former president. 'He and Mrs. Bush voted early in Texas for Jeb. Now, like a lot of voters, they are watching to see who can unite the party, represent conservative values and serve as president of all the people.'"  https://politi.co/1nv9BOI

 

AP DELEGATE COUNT: For Michigan, "Sanders will win at least 63 and Clinton at least 52. His gains will be canceled out by Clinton's ... win in Mississippi. ... Including superdelegates, her lead becomes ... at least 1,214 to Sanders' 566" ...

 

--Trump 428 ... Cruz 315 ... Rubio 151 ... Kasich 52  https://apne.ws/24QlyAC

 

TOP TWEETS: @ShaneGoldmacher: "Kasich said at his final town hall in NH, 'I have to win in Michigan'" ...@PhilipRucker: "Trump with quote of the night: 'Chris Christie's here someplace'" ...@chucktodd: "anti-Trump GOPers ... must feel like Charlie Brown & the football. Every time they think they have momentum to stop him, voters vote ... Neither Cruz nor Kasich w/ signif momentum and Rubio craters" ... @jmartNYT: "Trump wins Oakland Co, MICH by over 4pct! Mitt Country [where he went to prep school]" ...

 

... @danpfeiffer: "The best and the brightest in the GOP are getting clobbered by a guy who uses election night speeches to peddle steaks with former Yankees" ... @KatyTurNBC: "Trump offers the press a bottle of Trump wine each to take home" ... Matt Viser (@mviser): "Donald Trump had massive victories tonight. He's talking about Trump-branded steaks, wine, magazines, golf courses, vodka, water, airlines" ...@dylanmatt: "What if this was all just a ploy to sell steaks."

 

PIC DU JOUR-- George Bennett of Palm Beach Post (@gbennettpost): "Display of @realDonaldTrump wines, steaks & spring water for [last night's] press conference in Jupiter"  https://bit.ly/221OTph

 

CLICK OF THE DAY: "Detailed Maps of Where Trump, Cruz, Clinton and Sanders Have Won" https://nyti.ms/1OZEEsb

 

SCOOP DU JOUR -- "Obama Meets With Supreme Court Candidates," by NPR's Nina Totenberg:"Sources close to the process say that among those being interviewed are Chief Judge Merrick Garland ... Judge Sri Srinivasan ... Judge Paul Watford ... Judge Jane Kelly ... and U.S. District Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson." https://n.pr/1Xca4lj

 

** A message from the Coalition to Save Medicare Advantage Retiree Coverage: Proposed new cuts to Medicare Advantage (MA) Retiree Coverage will hurt 3.3 million seniors - costing each retiree up to $264 a year in higher costs and reduced benefits. Fight the cuts at: https://bit.ly/1QP1GmR **

 

HOWARD WOLFSON to KATIE COURIC on Mayor Bloomberg campaign: "[W]e would've had to do an enormous amount of advertising. He was prepared to spend $1 billion on that to get his name out there... [W]e said to him, 'You know, this might cost $1 billion to do this.' And he sort of looked at it, he goes, 'It's just a number.'" https://yhoo.it/1TpwykH

 

WHY NEXT TUESDAY WILL CHANGE THE WORLD - DAN BALZ "The Take" column on WashPost p. A6, "As Trump continues to roll, next week may be make-or-break for his rivals": "Up to now, ... almost all states so far have awarded delegates on a proportional basis. But that begins to change next week in a waydesigned to help a front-runner and hinder those behind. Starting next week, many states will award delegates on a winner-take-all basis. Trump doesn't have to win half the vote to get all the delegates in upcoming states; he can do so with the kind of percentages he has rolled up so far. ...

 

"[W]inning either [Ohio or Florida on Tue.] would cripple efforts to prevent him from becoming the nominee. ... Cruz has done less well overall than former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum, who had a similar base of support, did in 2012. ... Trump is still an unusual front-runner ... Were he to falter next week or after that, the anti-Trump forces will be emboldened ... But they needed a better result on Tuesday than they got." https://wapo.st/1RR2080

 

GROUNDHOG DAY: Dan Balz last week, "The GOP has two weeks to take down Donald Trump" https://wapo.st/217EKoB ... Dan Balz today, "As Trump rolls again, opposition has one week to stop him." https://wapo.st/1RR2080

 

CHARLIE HURT, "'Big tent' Trump forcing party to attack itself": "The upshot of the autopsy was that the Republican Party needed to ... stop 'talking to themselves' ... Four years hence, we see a juggernaut front-runner who is reaching and appealing to new voters in creative ways with a fresh message ... Establishment Republicans' response[:] ... pulling out all the stops to thwart the will of Republican voters." https://bit.ly/1QCYldC

 

THE HEADLINES: Wall Street Journal 5-col. lead, "Trump Tightens His Grip on GOP" ... Drudge banner, with photoshopped pic of a child-sized mini Marco, "THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING CAMPAIGN" ... HuffPost banner, "SHOCK: MICHIGAN BERNS" ... USA Today, "TRUMP SWEEPS BIG STATES, SANDERS STUNS IN MICHIGAN" ... L.A. Times cols. 1-4, "Trump continues to roll; Sanders scores big upset" ... N.Y. Times 2-col. lead, "SANDERS IS VICTOR IN MICHIGAN UPSET; TRUMP TAKES TWO: Kasich and Cruz Vie for Second Place - Clinton Prevails in Mississippi" ... Detroit News, whose deadline just missed Sanders' Michigan victory, "Trump wins easily; Dems race tight" See the page. https://bit.ly/1U3sQgk

 

DAILY DONALD -- "Trump outsourcing includes home goods, daughter's clothing line," by Yahoo's Jon Ward: "It isn't just the ties. ... Thousands of items with the Trump name on them - furniture, shirts, shoes, salad bowls, even 'Trump body soap,' and much of Ivanka's growing jewelry and clothing line - have been made by companies, often paying Trump simply for the use of his name on their goods, that employ foreign workers." https://yhoo.it/24Q8eMz

 

--WashPost Style cover, top of col. 6, "That time Trump sued over the size of his wallet: What a 2006 lawsuit says about the values, and valuation, the GOP candidate holds dear," by Paul Farhi: "Trump went to court in early 2006, claiming that he had been libeled in the book 'TrumpNation: The Art of Being The Donald,' by Timothy L. O'Brien, then a business reporter at the New York Times. ... O'Brien concluded that Trump was worth substantially less than what Trump publicly claimed ... 'We blew him up on the whole notion that I set out with reckless disregard and malice,' says O'Brien, now the editor of Bloomberg View. 'My lawyers drew and quartered him' on that issue."  https://wapo.st/1QGiuAO

 

--"Trump on Nancy Reagan: 'She was never very beautiful,'" by Michael Kruse: "Trump on Twitter called her 'the wife of a truly great President' and 'an amazing woman.' 'She will be missed!' ... In 2004, ... Trump [said:] 'She was never very beautiful' ... toward the end of an interview [with] gossip columnist Liz Smith." https://politi.co/1Lcv9ex

 

KEITH OLBERMANN in WashPost, "I can't stand to live in a Trump building anymore": "Okay, Donnie, you win. I'm moving out. ... Nine largely happy years with an excellent staff and an excellent reputation (until recently, anyway) - but I'm out of here."  https://wapo.st/1U394Sk

 

MATT RHOADES on Medium, "The UnDemocratic Democratic Primary": "I might have been wrong when I predicted last month that the Democratic primary was going to be a 'long slog.' U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders ... promises he's in the Democratic primary to stay, but that pledge may soon fall victim to simple arithmetic and an arcane Democratic Party process known as 'superdelegates.'"  https://bit.ly/1M65f76

 

MOOD MUSIC - USA Today, bottom of front page, "Battered bull market turns 7 against all odds," by Adam Shell (online: "Aging bull set to celebrate 7th birthday"): "born on March 9, 2009, three months before the official end of the Great Recession ... two years longer than the average bull market and the third-longest in history ... large-company U.S. stock index has yet to eclipse the 20% drop required to mark an official end to the bull market and usher in a bear market." With graphics on "Current bull's gains by year" (this is the first year in the red) and "The best bull markets of all time"  https://usat.ly/1US5Bpa

 

HOT VIDEO - "Mitt Romney Reads Mean Donald Trump Tweets" on Jimmy Kimmel -- 2-min. videohttps://bit.ly/1QGkvx4

 

LATE-NIGHT BEST - MITT on Jimmy Kimmel - why he's now against Trump: "For me the straw that broke the camel's back was the pretending that we don't know who David Duke is. We don't know about the Ku Klux Klan. You know, I was with my son and we were driving and he said to me, Dad, what are you going to tell the grand-kids you did to stop Donald Trump? And I said, I've gotta do something. Now's the time." 5-min. videohttps://bit.ly/1US6eiD ... Part 2  https://bit.ly/1UdOxJx

 

VALLEY TALK - N.Y. Times Quotation of the Day: DONNA BURKE, an entrepreneur and investor, on the animosity growing between San Francisco and the tech industry: "Silicon Valley traditionally valued changing the world over money. We need to get back to that ethos." Article by David Streitfeld at bottom of p. A1, "Tensions on the Rise in Tech's Capital City" (online: "San Francisco Journal: In San Francisco and Rooting for a Tech Comeuppance")  https://nyti.ms/2228aa6

 

MEDIAWATCH -- "Trump campaign manager gets rough with Breitbart reporter," by Hadas Gold: "Corey Lewandowski forcibly yanked Breitbart reporter Michelle Fields out of the way after his press conference in Florida on Tuesday night. Fields was attempting to ask Trump a question as he exited the press conference. Secret Service was starting to clear a path, when Fields was forcibly grabbed on her arm by Lewandowski, moving her out of the way and nearly bringing her down to the ground." https://politi.co/1TKmQtt

 

--"Fox News ... Longest Winning Streak Ever" - TVNewser's Chris Ariens: "With the massive audience for the GOP debate last Thursday, which was the most-watched show on all of TV last week, Fox News Channel was once again the top cable network for the week. FNC has now been No. 1 for 7 weeks in a row in total day viewing - a streak the network has never seen in its nearly 20-year existence. A 6-week winning streak, tied last week, was set during the early days of the Iraq War in 2003."  https://bit.ly/1RQU2vM

 

SUBJECT LINE DU JOUR - From the First Lady using the Democrats' list: "I'm in awe of you, Daniel." 

 

PLAYBOOK METRO SECTION -- "Q-Tip joins Kennedy Center as hip hop director," by AP's Ben Nuckols: The "Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts announced ... that veteran rapper and producer Q-Tip will join the institution as its artistic director for hip hop culture. ... Cellist Yo-Yo Ma and soprano Renee Fleming ... will serve as at-large artistic advisers. ... Q-Tip is a founding member of the seminal hip hop group A Tribe Called Quest, known for its genre-bending music and socially conscious lyrics." https://apne.ws/1RQUr1g ... The Kennedy Center's just-announced 2016-2017 season  https://bit.ly/1QGqCBq

 

TRAILER OF THE DAY - "Game of Thrones Season 6: Trailer (RED BAND) (HBO)" https://bit.ly/1TKnpDu

 

--"How ... 'House of Cards' gets Highland Park all wrong," by Dallas Morning News' Sarah Blaskovich:"When Claire travels back home to Dallas' wealthiest neighborhood to see her estranged mother, that's where her Dallas personality takes a wrong turn: It just doesn't look like Highland Park. In fact it isn't. A Netflix spokeswoman confirms none of Season 4 was filmed in Texas. The sprawling home in 'Highland Park' was filmed in a suburb of Baltimore."  https://bit.ly/1QL5bM8

 

CLINTON ALUMNI - "David Leavy promoted to chief operations and communications officer, Discovery Communications ": "Leavy will add to his portfolio oversight of Discovery's global technology and operations function, which includes broadcast operations; technology strategy and architecture; IT infrastructure, systems and data solutions; and information security. ... Leavy served as Chief Spokesman and Senior Director of Public Affairs for the National Security Council ... under President Bill Clinton." https://bit.ly/1nu6RRO

 

OUT AND ABOUT -- Friends and colleagues gathered last night for a celebration in honor of Sen. Corker's communications director Tara DiJulio, who is leaving the Senate after a decade in the Senate for a gig at GE. Sen. Corker hosted the reception at Stanton and Greene on Capitol Hill.

 

SPOTTED: Micah Johnson, who will take over for DiJulio, Rob Strayer, Liz Johnson, Jim Billimoria, Lauren Culbertson, Suzanne Kianpour, Mandi Critchfield, Anne Marie Hauser, Emily Schillinger, Pam Stevens, Shana Marchio, Julia Lawless, Aaron Fobes, Katie Niederre, Brian Kaveny, Meghan Roh, Amanda Maddox, Megan Whittemore. 

 

WEEKEND WEDDING -- DCers were spotted all over Dallas this weekend as Kate Henvey, policy specialist at the World Bank, tied the knot with Robert Lee "Tripp" DeMoss III, former LA to Rep. Dennis Ross (R-Fla.) and current Georgetown law student. After the ceremony at Preston Hollow Presbyterian, friends and family danced the night away at the Dallas Petroleum Club, including a surprise performance by the groom and his band, Tripp and The Ripp. Pic  https://bit.ly/1M65a3e

 

SPOTTED : Sarah Hudson, Stephanie Fontenot, Philip Swartzfager, Kelsey Stroud, Austen Shearer, Brent Del Monte, Reagan Moseley, Olivia Weiss, Drew Marrs, Nic Breeding, Paul Gutierrez, Jared Michael, Rachel Hicks, Owen Rogers.

 

BIRTHDAYS: Charlie Gibson is 73 (hat tip: Ann Compton) ... Michael Kinsley is 65 (h/t Patty) ... Faith Daniels is 59 ... Kristy Campbell of Jeb Bush-world, who studied criminology at Florida State (h/ts Tim, Matt) ... Sarah Swinehart of Speaker Ryan's comms. team is 30 (h/ts #TeamRyan and Tommy Andrews) ... former USAID Administrator Raj Shah (h/ts BMF, JBB, JMA, PIR) ... Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer David Hume Kennerly, the pride of Roseburg, Ore. and a Politico contributing editor ... former Sen. James L. Buckley (Conservative-N.Y.), is 93 (h/ts John Fund, John Barnes) ...NBC's Andrew Rafferty, who plays a mean acoustic version of Taylor Swift's "Blank Space," is 29 (h/t Dan Knight) ... Jake Lipsett, a fellow USC (California, not Carolina) grad and a founding partner at Mothership Strategies (h/t Sam Dorn) ... John Bisognano, White House associate director of public engagement, is 31 (h/t Heather Reid) ...

 

... Amb. Anthony (Tony) Harrington , who heads Albright Stonebridge Group's Latin America practice and was Ambassador to Brazil in the Clinton admin. (h/t Julie Mason) ... Sadie Weiner, DSCC comms. director, a Kay Hagan alum and a "TexMex enthusiast. UT Longhorns fan," per her Twitter ... NBC News senior politics desk editor Doug Adams ... Tom Matzzie, founder and CEO of Ethical Electric and MoveOn alum ... Julian Ingram ... Marjorie Dannenfelser, Susan B. Anthony List President ... TIME's Haley Sweetland Edwards ... Stefani Jones ... Gordon Platt, ABC News alum and now the founder of PR and content marketing firm Gotham Media ... Terri Fish ... Menza Weiss ... Matt Vogel, chief of staff at USTR ...

 

... Amit Paley, engagement manager at McKinsey and a WashPost alum ... Rev. E. Terri LaVelle, alum of The Faith & Politics Institute, DNC and Obama '08; now director of the VA Center for Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships ... Didem Nisanci, managing director at Promontory and an SEC, Jack Reed and Treasury alum ... David Ginsberg, VP and global head of corporate strategy at Intel and a John Kerry, John Edwards and Gore alum ... Russell Drapkin ... Manish Kumar ... Stefanie Aarthun ... former Sen. James L. Buckley (Conservative-N.Y.) ... Sarah Burke ... Neal B. Shapiro, president and CEO of WNET, is 58 (h/t Jewish Insider) ... Phil Neuenfeldt ... Lowell Junkins ... Kathryn Mitchell Ramstad ... Pat Alea (h/ts Teresa Vilmain) ... Oscar Isaac ("Star Wars: The Force Awakens") is 37 ... Bow Wow is 29 ... YG is 26 ... actress Cierra Ramirez is 21 (h/ts AP)

 

DESSERT - "Chick-Fil-A Is Testing A New Solution To Crazy-Long Lines," by BuzzFeed's Venessa Wong: "[T]he chain is ... to have a team of four to six servers walk up to cars in the drive-thru to take orders via tablet, rather than having drivers wait to reach the usual pair of speakers. ... The second is to have another set of servers walk to cars with their orders when they are ready."  https://bzfd.it/1R5Ww6g

 

 

 

SECOND HELPING - "Fasting Diets Are Gaining Acceptance," by NYT's Anahad O'Connor: "In a culture in which it's customary to eat three large meals a day while snacking from morning to midnight, the idea of regularly skipping meals ... has been gaining popular attention and scientific endorsement. It has been ... endorsed by celebrities like the actors Hugh Jackman and Benedict Cumberbatch. The late-night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel claims that for the past two years he has followed an intermittent fasting program known as the 5:2 diet, which entails normal eating for five days and fasting for two."  https://nyti.ms/1M64Npv

 

** A message from the Coalition to Save Medicare Advantage Retiree Coverage: Bringing together seniors, employers and labor organizations, the Coalition is fighting to protect the high-quality, affordable Medicare Advantage (MA) Retiree Coverage that 3.3 million seniors rely on for their health and financial security. New cuts to MA Retiree Coverage proposed by CMS will cost each enrolled senior up to $264 a year in higher costs and reduced benefits. CMS should listen to the bipartisan, bicameral supermajority of 369 members of Congress that urged the agency to protect the MA program from further cuts. Fight the cuts and protect retirees at: https://bit.ly/1QP1GmR **

 

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