Regardless, the basic dynamic of the election is set. Nothing that happened in New York suggests that Trump has made a giant leap out of the tar pit into which his candidacy has sunk. A real frontrunner would be planning his convention, and getting his donors to max out in preparation for the national campaign. Trump is not racking up real endorsements. Nobody is putting pressure on his rivals to drop out and endorse him. He is limping to the finish line. He may cross it. Hey may come so close that the party just gives him a pity-shove over it. He may fail just enough for Cruz to make a convention play. In any case, absent a white knight, the party will nominate Trump or Cruz, both of whom are unpopular sure-losers.
Trump doesn’t seem to have anything up his sleeve to change this dynamic. Earlier in the primaries, when it seemed like media or voter attention was drifting away from Trump, he simply announced a more extreme position on immigration or trade. It allowed him to seize the initiative, and the press. He would occasionally hint that some of this was just for the rubes voting for him. He said that, as president, he could become politically correct…
Trump also hasn’t done anything to unite himself with the parts of the party that have opposed him so far. He announced a plan to list a number of judges from which he would select Supreme Court nominees. Social conservatives remain unmoved. His announcement of his foreign policy advisory team was as reassuring as entering into the most important meeting of his life with a joy-buzzer and a can of nuts filled with a gag-snake ready to pop out. Trump has quite literally spent more time trying to reconcile with Megyn Kelly of Fox News than with the party that he is dividing and maybe-sorta-almost-not-quite conquering.
