Why the Cruz-Kasich alliance will fail

It’s hard enough to see how this vote-throwing arrangement has a chance in coming contests. But the deal would have had zero effect on past primaries, even if the two candidates shook hands weeks ago.

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Let’s presume this deal only became possible after Marco Rubio dropped out—after all, the Florida senator’s last-ditch efforts to direct support toward Kasich were rebuffed. The next major contest was Arizona, a winner-take-all state that Trump won with 46 percent of the vote. Kasich and Cruz, as much as they tried, only got a combined 40 percent. No amount of vote-swapping would have changed that outcome.

New York, the next stop in our time machine, looks a bit more promising. Kasich won parts of Manhattan and Queens in New York City, albeit by a mere 70 votes, and came close in several counties upstate. Some extra juice from Cruz could have pushed the Ohio governor over the top in a few districts, though probably not enough to top Trump’s 60-percent lead statewide.

Paradoxically, Kasich could have actually performed worse in an Empire State primary without Cruz in the competition. The polls don’t uniformly agree, but at least one pre-election survey showed the average New York Cruz supporter would pick Trump, not Kasich, if forced to drop the Texan.

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