Bill Kristol: I’m A Never Trump Guy, But ‘I’ll Say Never Say Never’

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by PAM KEY2 May 2016253

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Monday on Newsmax TV’s “The Steve 

Malzberg Show,” Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol, who is a self-described member of the “never Trump” movement, was asked if there’s anything GOP presidential front-runner Donald Trump could do to win him over. Kristol said he was “never Trump,” but added a “never say nyever” caveat.

Kristol said, “For me it’s more of a matter of character. I don’t know that you can change your character at age 69, and given the things he’s said even very recently about other people, the way he demeans other people. But I mean, I guess never say never. On the one hand, I’ll say never Trump, and on the other hand, I’ll say never say never and I’ll leave it ambiguous.”

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PRINCE R.I.P. - TRUMP YUUG WIN - CRUZ STEALS MORE

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24Apr16 Sunday Show Notes

+ Prince Dead at 57

-          Superbowl 2007 Spectacular

-          Dave Chappel skit on Prince

-          Charlie Murphy on what Prince thought

2.       Trump  #CruzCrazy

-          Wins NY Primary 89 – Kasich 4 – Cruz 0  (844 – 543-148)

a.       60% - 25% - 14%

b.      Won 50% Hispanic vote

-          Ted Stealing Delegates on Hannity heated (2C)

-          LGBT comment on the Today Show (2A) NC Law says must use bathroom of your birth sex.

-          Change the platform RNC on abortion (2B)

-          Ted Cruz: Donald Trump Joining the ‘PC Police’ by Allowing a ‘Grown Adult Man’ and ‘Stranger’ in Restroom ‘With Little Girls’

a.       People for Cruz posting Fake delegate sheets for Trump supporters

b.      Sean Hannity has posted the official ballot for Penn.

-          California Poll – Trump shooting up and Cruz falling down +15

-          CNN “How do you Unite The Party? ” (2D)

-          Donations

a.       GLSEN 10K and Gay Men’s Crisis 10K

b.      100k to Billy Gram

c.       100k To American Cancer Society

d.      50K Red Cross

e.      65K American Heart Association

f.        50k Child Mind Institute

g.       100k Citizens United for Research in Epilepsy

h.      50k Columbia Grammar and Prep school

i.         200k Dana Farber Cancer

j.        150k Martin B Greenberg Foundation

k.       100k Jewish Museum Heritage

l.         Total $1,712,089

3.       Hillary Clinton

-          Hot Sauce on the Radio (3A)

-          America has TOO MANY GUNS I will remove them

4.       CNN Jeruslem Bus Bombing not terrorism it was a Bus Fire 21 dead.

-          Leading Jewish groups harshly denounced CNN on Monday for failing to refer to a major bus bombing in Jerusalem as a terrorist attack….

-           

-          Simon Plosker, managing editor of the media watchdog HonestReporting, told The Algemeiner, “CNN’s headline implies that the bus spontaneously combusted. The bus did not simply catch fire – it was a deliberate act and CNN fails to acknowledge this. That the headline is still online hours after terrorism has been confirmed as the cause of the blaze is absolutely appalling.”

5.       Obama

-          Obama: Britain Should Stay in the EU Because Of Iran, Climate Change, TTIP, And Because Sovereignty Is Outdated

-          Barack Obama tonight warned Britain would be at the 'back of the queue' for a trade deal with America if it quits the EU.

-          In an extraordinary intervention standing alongside David Cameron at the Foreign Office, the US President warned there was no prospect of a deal 'any time soon'.

-          Mr Obama defended his right to comment on Britain's June 23 poll despite claims from Leave campaigners that he was being 'hypocritical' and had 'double standards'. 

-          The President insisted his remarks, which have been long planned by Mr Cameron's In campaign, were not a 'threat' to Britain.

-          But the speech enraged campaigners who support Brexit, with Tory MPs immediately warning that drumming up support from foreign presidents was 'not a good look' for Mr Cameron. DailyMail

-           

SS Cruz Sinking - ABORTION IS MURDER - Trump EPIC GOP Battle

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Trump

- Corey Lewandowski incident – Rush (1D)

a.       David Muller fillin host “After the video is it now not true he touch her?”(1E)

b.      Matt Lauer tries to blast Trump (1F)

c.       Ted Cruz responds at the town hall meeting CNN (1G)

-          Sheriff David Clarke Milwaukee WI. (1A) GOP insanity

-          Abortion If You're a Republican Candidate, You'd Better Be Ready for an Abortion Trick Disguised as a Journalist's Question RUSH April 01, 2016

-          The Thom Hartmann Program on Cruz from 1997 (1B)

-          Stefan Molyneux – Ted Cruz Wife, Cruz Craziness all exposed (1C)

-          Ted Cruz Funded by GOP (Cruz email confirmation on the AshleyMadison.com database) money Posted by sundance Erick Erickson Redstate.com

a.       Thanks to the candidacy of Donald Trump the financial intersection of money and political opinion, as guided by the monetary motives therein, has brought some amazing revelations to the surface. These financial/media relationships have largely, and historically, remained hidden.  They have damned sure never been publicly, clearly, and regularly stated so the consuming audience would know the presentation was fraught with financial conflict.

b.      ♦ The Senate Conservatives Fund (PAC) purchasing massive quantities ($400,000) of Mark Levin’s books in exchange for favorable candidacy political opinion.  Conveniently Hidden by the radio host who avoids mentioning the financial conflict created.

c.        

d.      Then again, Levin never informed his audience of his family working within the Staff of Senator Ted Cruz either.  Does Levin’s endorsement, when contrast against the crony-constitutional advocacy, clarify with a little sunlight?  You decide.

e.       

f.        ♦ Or how about the Breitbart Media enterprise being run via an $11 million purchase from Billionaire Robert Mercer, who also funded Ted Cruz’s Super-PAC “Keep The Promise 1”, to the tune of $10 million.  Little overlooked facts, never openly shared for news consumers to determine source motive.   Pesky Sunlight

g.        

h.      ♦ Maybe the Ben Shapiro website “The Daily Wire“, being funded by the billionaire Wilks Brothers, Levi and Farris, in Texas.  Who also fund Ted Cruz and his Super-PAC “Keep The Promise”.  Shapiro never publicly disclosed the financial/content conflict, or the extent therein.  Could Shapiro support any other candidate other than who his content owners approved of?  Again, you decide.  (Yep, Pesky Sunlight)

i.         Glenn Beck Defamation Lawsuit???

j.        ♦ The Chairman of Glenn Beck’s Mercury One charity, David Barton, jointly running the Pro-Ted Cruz Super-PAC“Keep The Promise”; also never put into the sunlight by Glenn Beck or his various media enterprises so the consuming audience could filter presented political opinion through the filter of fiduciary connections.  More Pesky Sunlight

k.       These are just a few of the politically motivated – financially dependent – revelations we probably would never have known about were it not for Donald Trump presenting a genuinely conservative America-First platform; and as a direct consequence, the faux-constitutionalists having to reverse opinion simply to retain income.

l.          

m.    ♦ So it perhaps shouldn’t come as a surprise to find out that Erick Erickson’s media venture “The Resurgent“, is taking Super-PAC money from the (formerly Scott Walker advocates and financial backers) Ricketts family of Wisconsin who fund OUR PRINCIPLES PAC to the tune of $3,000,000 in February alone

n.      Ted Cruz Wife Heidi VP Goldman Sac and Her work on the indep. Task force that wrote “Building a North American Community” sponsored by the Conucil on Foreign Relations’ which will dissolve American Sovereignty.

2.       Obama

-          The Havana Tribune, a state-controlled Cuban newspaper,

a.        has added insult to injury following Fidel Castro’s scathing criticism of President Barack Obama upon his departure from the island. In an editorial, the title of which refers to President Obama as “negro,” an opinion columnist has accused him of “inciting rebellion.”

b.      The article is titled “Negro, ¿Tu Eres Sueco?” which roughly translates to “Black Man, Are You Dumb?” (The idiom “pretend to be a Swede” means to play dumb, hence the title is literally asking, “Are you Swedish?”) The author, who is black, goes on to condemn President Obama for meeting with Cuban pro-democracy activists and “subtly” suggesting that the Cuban Revolution needed to change. “Obama came, saw, but unfortunately, with the pretend gesture of lending a hand, tried to conquer,” Elias Argudín writes.

c.       “[Obama] chose to criticize and subtly suggest … incitations to rebellion and disorder, without caring that he was on foreign ground. Without a doubt, Obama overplayed his hand,” he continues. “The least I can say is, Virulo-style: ‘Negro, are you dumb?'”

d.      Virulo is a white pro-Revolution comedian.

-          After Taxpayer Bailout, General Motors Plans Rollout Of Chinese-Built Buicks In America

Rubio’s demise marks the last gasp of the Republican reboot

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www.washingtonpost.com

By Robert Costa and Philip Rucker,   

WEST MIAMI, Fla. — Years of carefully laid plans to repackage the Republican Party’s traditional ideas for a fast-changing country came crashing down here on Tuesday when Sen. Marco Rubio suspended his campaign for the presidency after a crippling defeat in his home-state primary.

Since Mitt Romney’s devastating loss in the 2012 presidential election, the Republican National Committee and leading voices at think tanks, editorial boards and Capitol Hill symposiums have charted a path back to the White House based on inclusive rhetoric and a focus on middle-class issues.

Nobody embodied that vision better than Rubio, a charismatic standard-bearer for conservative orthodoxy who readily embraced the proposals of the right’s elite thinkers. The senator from Florida spoke urgently and eloquently about raising stagnant wages and eradicating poverty. He had an immigrant’s tale to match the rhetoric. And on foreign affairs, he was a passionate defender of the GOP’s hawkish tilt.

But Rubio’s once-promising candidacy, as well as the conservative reform movement’s playbook, was spectacularly undone by Donald Trump and his defiant politics of economic and ethnic grievance. The drift toward visceral populism became an all-consuming rush, leaving Rubio and others unable to adjust.

“The party finds itself catching up to its base. Those very elegant papers it published and conferences it held may have been good and smart, but they didn’t really matter,” said William J. Bennett, a conservative talk-show host and former education secretary in Ronald Reagan’s administration. “Instead, everyone who’s been prominent for the last 15 to 20 years finds themselves getting pushed out.”

Rubio’s fall comes weeks after others who advocated for conservative reforms, such as former Florida governor Jeb Bush and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, have dropped out of the race, and as the donors and institutions who have long supported hawkish policies on fiscal and foreign policies find themselves scrambling to hold onto the consensus that has shaped the GOP for decades.

For many of them, Trump represents a threat to the traditional order of the party and its platform. He does not support overhauling Social Security — a key plank for Romney and GOP congressional leaders — and he was a vocal critic of the 2003 invasion of Iraq in its aftermath, setting him apart from much of the party’s high command.

Rubio, whose ascent was propelled by a network of powerful players for years, was supposed to be the candidate best positioned to stop Trump and prevent a Republican rupture.

“Rubio was ready and briefed on policy, that’s for sure, but I just think he never connected,” said former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, who is friendly with Trump. “He sounded like someone who was trying to be a lot for a lot of people. That’s hard to do.”

Following Romney’s defeat in an election many Republicans thought they should have won, party leaders concluded that the only way to regain the presidency would be to engage the growing and diverse electorate that President Obama had won over twice. The RNC drafted an “autopsy” that recommended bolstering appeals to women and minority voters, while reform conservatives drafted their own manifesto.

Rubio had been building his base among these Republicans since January 2011, when he began his Senate term. He joined the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and began to speak at think tanks and meet with scholars, most of them former staffers from George W. Bush’s administration. He hired a number of them for his own staff.

During his breaks in the Senate, Rubio would often tell colleagues how he was reading papers sent to him from former Republican officials or how he was about to have lunch with another bold-faced name from the Bush years. On his computer, he kept a “drop box” of related policy files compiled by his advisers.

Meanwhile, a group of writers and intellectuals on the right were frustrated and stewing about the GOP’s lack of outreach to working-class voters during Romney’s campaign. By 2013, they began to call themselves “reform conservatives” and sought to turn the party policy discussion away from its emphasis on small business and toward working men and women, as well as families, who were struggling.

As Rubio took the lead on immigration reform that year — a move that riled the hard right — he continued to bolster his relationships with reform conservatives who were unveiling plans for new child tax credits and revamped federal subsidies. He put out a book,“American Dreams: Restoring Economic Opportunity for Everyone.”

Rubio followed a similar path with foreign-policy hawks as they began to look for a favorite ahead of the 2016 contest: a flurry of meetings and op-ed articles and, most critically, solidarity on the issues as they bubbled up.

Although Rubio entered 2015 hobbled with parts of the GOP base because of immigration, he carried goodwill among those two constituencies that were driving the Republican establishment: the reformers and the hawks.

“The critique was there: The Republican Party was out of touch,” said Peter Wehner, a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and former George W. Bush speechwriter. “But the breakdown occurred because we got into a cycle where policy didn’t matter at all. Policy was not just secondary, but it was almost not even in the conversation. And when people tried to interject policy — whether it was Rubio or Bush or others — there was just no appetite for it. It didn’t catch on.”

Former House speaker Newt Gingrich said that Rubio campaigned in a way that quickly became obsolete.

“Rubio was prepared, much like Jeb Bush, for a reasonable dialogue in Washington policy language, offering positions that reflect 40 years of national security and foreign-policy experts. All of that disappeared. The market didn’t care,” Gingrich said.

Rubio’s hawkish foreign-policy footing, thought to be an asset, was challenged. Trump’s claims of being “militaristic” even though he was inclined against intervention muddled how voters perceived the candidates, disassociating American power with the hawkish ideology of Rubio and the Bush orbit. Trump’s denunciations of George W. Bush’s decision to go into Iraq did not make the hawkish cause any easier.

“Trump has sounded hawkish without sounding graceful, and he’s expressed admiration for authoritarians. So it was a weird mix for all of the candidates,” said Kori Schake, a research fellow at the Hoover Institution who has advised Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.). “At the same time, Republicans are still wrestling with the legacies from the Bush administration . . . and I don’t think we’ve made peace on that.”

Ohio Gov. John Kasich, having won his home-state primary on Tuesday, could be someone whom Rubio’s coalition turns to next, although his maverick style has turned off some in the establishment. Still, he, too, holds hawkish views and has a compassionate pitch on domestic policy with a call to help people “living in the shadows.”

Stuart Stevens, who served as chief strategist to Romney’s 2012 campaign, chalked up Rubio’s troubles as a sign of a first-time presidential candidate still learning how to run nationally and inspire voters, rather than as a sign of the Republican Party cracking apart. In a year infused with anger, he said, Rubio failed to meet the moment with the policies he had spent years studying.

“Rubio had been told that he’s the future of the party. But it’s not enough to say, ‘I have a great future, vote for me,’ ” Stevens said. “You have to do more than use your biography. You’ve got to connect your ideas in a real way to the economy. . . . People ended up walking out of Rubio rallies misty-eyed and out of Trump rallies with blood in their eyes.”

Whit Ayres, Rubio’s pollster, spent the last several years compiling data and published a book showing that Republicans could not afford to alienate minority voters, especially Hispanics, if they ever hope to retake the White House. Watching Rubio’s concession speech on Tuesday night, Ayres was despondent.

“After 2012,” he said, “you thought we’d learned our lesson.”

Ed O’Keefe in Miami contributed to this report.

COMMENTS

Former NSA Director Hayden admitts his GOP hate back fires hits Cruz

***Horse Race LiveWire*** Super Tuesday: Part Deux

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by BREITBART NEWS8 Mar 20161038

Welcome to Breitbart News’s daily live updates of the 2016 horse race. 

—

10:36 – Former NSA Director Michael Hayden: Trump is making us unsafe!

10:33 – Erick Erickson: #NeverTrump is becoming #NeverTed which is bad so Rubio needs to drop out.

I helped launch the #NeverTrump movement with my piece written late two Friday’s ago. That night it got over 60,000 hits and the #NeverTrump hashtag became a worldwide trend. Credit for the hashtag goes to my friend Aaron Gardner. I’d used #AgainstTrump, the title of the National Reviewcover, but Aaron suggested I change it.

What I am seeing at this point, however, is that #NeverTrump is guaranteeing Trump’s nomination because #NeverTrump is really #NeverTed. Many of the most vocal supporters of the #NeverTrump movement are Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) supporters and they are handing the nomination to Trump because they cannot face the reality of this election.

…

The only way to stop Trump now is to ally with Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX). But too many of the #NeverTrump brigade are really #NeverTed. They don’t want to look at the math, they don’t want to look at the road ahead, they don’t want Ted Cruz. They’d rather lose with Rubio and stay home in November than ally with Ted Cruz and even have a shot in November.

That is genuinely unfortunate and will either guarantee Trump is the nominee or guarantee the Republican Party is destroyed. Marco Rubio, a great man with a struggling campaign, has a cult of personality every bit as committed as Trump’s. The difference is that Rubio’s cult will give us Trump where Trump’s cult alone never could.

10:29 – Bret Baier: Republicans in DC are saying privately that they’ll vote for Hillary just to keep their power over the party.

Fox News Channel anchor Bret Baier said it’s possible that some Republicans will vote for Hillary Clinton just to stop Donald Trump from taking over the party.

“Listen, there are Republicans in Washington who are privately saying that already,” Baier told TheWrap on Monday. “Maybe some don’t publicly say it, but I think there are some who are that adamant about it who would.”

10:17 – Purported Cruz campaign email monopolizes on CNN’s Rubio report:

10:15 – Romney robocall for Kasich in Michigan–seems he’s all about the brokered convention rather than an anti-Trump candidate winning a majority of delegates:

“Hello, this is Mitt Romney calling, and I’m calling on behalf Kasich for America,” the former Massachusetts governor and 2012 Republican presidential nominee, says at the beginning of the call, audio of which was shared by the Kasich campaign.

“Today you have the opportunity in Michigan to vote for a Republican nominee for president,” Romney continues. “These are critical times that demand a serious, thoughtful commander-in-chief. If we Republicans were to choose Donald Trump as our nominee, the prospects for a safe and prosperous future would be greatly diminished — and I’m convinced Donald Trump would lose to Hillary Clinton. Please vote today for a candidate who can defeat HC and who can make us proud.”

10:09 – Kasich throws some shade on Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT)’ campaign during a Morning Joe appearance (Bernie has won eight more states that Kasich):

10:04 – Another finding from the Morning Consult poll: Mitt Romney’s speech was anet positive for Trump.

A new Morning Consult poll finds that Mitt Romney’s speech last weekcondemning Donald Trump apparently had very little effect on the GOP front-runner.

Thirty-one percent of GOP voters said they were more likely to vote for Trump, while 20 percent said less likely, and 43 percent said it had no impact either way.

9:57 – Morning Consult national poll: Trump 40, Cruz 23, Rubio 14, Kasich 10. Big gains for Cruz & Kasich:

In the latest survey, taken March 4 through March 6, Cruz picked up 8 percentage points to pull within 17 points of Trump. It’s a 12-point swing from our previous poll after the New Yorker dropped four percentage points.

9:54 – NYT op-ed: “Donald Trump Doesn’t Understand Common Core (and Neither Do His Rivals)”

9:46 – Mitt Romney does a GOTV robocall for Rubio:

9:40 – From the “You Have to Go Back” file:

An Egyptian Muslim man who threatened to kill Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump will leave the US of his own accord this week, his lawyers say.

23-year-old aviation student Emadeldin Elsayed was arrested in February by US Customs and Immigration Enforcement (ICE) agents, after posting an article about Trump on Facebook, along with the comment: “I literally don’t mind taking a lifetime sentence in jail for killing this guy, I would actually be doing the whole world a favor.”

One day after posting the status on February 3, Secret Service agents called him in for questioning and searched his property and phone. They then arrested him less than two weeks later.

9:23 – On Rubio’s “half-empty conference room” in Tampa: “No, I’m here to see the trainwreck.”

The man was standing alone, leaning against the wall in the still half-empty conference room that the Marco Rubio campaign had rented for the senator’s “big” Tampa rally. It was only 15 minutes before start time, and people were only trickling in.

“Are you a Rubio supporter?” I asked the 60-something gentleman.

“No. I’m just here to see the train wreck.”

9:16 – WaPo poll: 53% of Republicans oppose brokered convention.  

9:10 – WaPo poll: Trump’s unfavorables among Republicans in the fifties and sixties.

9:08 – Trump: Contested convention would be ‘pretty unfair’

“Yeah, I sort of do,” Trump said on “Fox and Friends” when asked if he thought it was wrong to have the contested convention if he’s leading in the delegate count but fails to reach the required 1,237 delegates.

“I think that whoever is leading at the end should sort of get it. That’s the way that democracy works,” Trump said on the program.

 

8:51 – Wapo poll: Trump loses to Cruz and Rubio in one-on-one race.

In hypothetical two-way matchups, Cruz leads Trump by 54-41 percent and Rubio leads Trump by 51-45 percent in this poll, produced for ABC by Langer Research Associates. While the latter lead isn’t statistically significant, both are further signs of the apparent limits to Trump’s popularity within his party. Indeed, among non-Trump supporters, seven in 10 say they’d prefer Cruz, and as many say they’d pick Rubio, in head-to-head contests.

 

8:44 – Wapo poll: National race tightens. Trump 34%, Cruz 25%.

Trump continues to lead in a new ABC News/Washington Post poll, with 34 percent of Republicans and Republican-leaning Independents who are registered to vote saying they’d like to see him win the nomination. But he trails both Cruz and Rubio one-on-one. And preferences for Cruz, Rubio and John Kasich have grown as others have left the race, while Trump’s support has essentially remained unchanged for months.

In the current multi-candidate race, 25 percent say they’d like to see Cruz win the nomination, with 18 percent for Rubio and 13 percent for Kasich; those are +4, +7 and +11 points compared with January, respectively, to new highs for each. Trump, by contrast, peaked at 38 percent in December.

 

8:33 – Is Trump Truly Losing Momentum? We’ll Find Out Tonight

Tonight’s primaries in Michigan and Mississippi — as well as the contests in Idaho (primary) and Hawaii (caucus) — are important for Donald Trump to regain his momentum heading into next week’s winner-take-all primaries and increase his narrow delegate lead over Ted Cruz.

Is Trump losing ground? Or were last weekend’s results due more to the fact that they were closed contests (not open to non-Republicans)? We’ll find out tonight. Both Michigan and Mississippi are open primaries, and Trump SHOULD win them by double digits; Trump is way ahead in the Michigan polls.

 

8:22 – Mickey Kaus sees through the Establishment Matrix

—

8:02 – Trump releases Trump University video that purports to show glowing report cards from two of the three students currently starring in attack ads against him.

Using what might be the most dishonest headline of all time, the Huffington Post accuses Trump of threatening students.

—

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Mitt Romney won’t rule out accepting GOP nomination at contested convention

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By S.A. Miller - The Washington Times
Sunday, March 6, 2016

Mitt Romney, the 2012 Republican presidential nominee, refused Sunday to rule out becoming the nominee again this year at a brokered convention, though he insisted he couldn’t imagine that happening.

“I don’t think anyone in our party should say, ‘Oh no, even if the people of the party wanted me to be president, I would say no to it.’ No one is going to say that,” Mr. Romney said on NBC’s “Meet the Press

Speculation abounded that Mr. Romney was setting himself up for a surprise nomination last week when he unleashed a brutal denouncement of front-runner Donald Trump, urging voters to support anyone but the billionaire real estate mogul in upcoming primaries to force a contested convention this summer in Cleveland, Ohio.

Mr. Romney lambasted Mr. Trump as “a fraud, a phony” in a speech Thursday. “He gets a free ride to the White House, and all we get is a lousy hat.”

On the Sunday talk show, Mr. Romney said he isn’t running and plans to endorse one of Mr. Trump’s three rivals — either Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, Ohio Gov. John Kasich or Florida Sen. Marco Rubio.

“I can tell you this: I’m not a candidate. I’m not going to be a candidate. I am going to be endorsing one of the people who is running for president,” he said. “One of the four is going to be the Republican Party nominee. Three of the four are people I would endorse. But I’m not running and I’m not going to be running

Romney calling Trump 'phony,' urging Republicans to shun him

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bigstory.ap.org

WASHINGTON (AP) — Former Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney charged into the increasingly divisive 2016 GOP White House sweepstakes Thursday with a harsh takedown of front-runner Donald Trump, calling him a "phony" and exhorting fellow Republicans to shun him for the good of the country and party.

"His promises are as worthless as a degree from Trump University," Romney said in a speech readied for delivery to a University of Utah audience.

In turning up the rhetoric, Romney cast his lot with a growing chorus of anxious Republican leaders — people many Trump supporters view as establishment figures — in trying to slow the New York real estate mogul's momentum.

"Here's what I know: Donald Trump is a phony, a fraud," Romney said in his talk, set for delivery later Thursday.

Trump, in turn, disparaged Romney in a series of tweets: "I am not a Mitt Romney, who doesn't know how to win," ''Romney, who ran one of the worst races in presidential history, is working with the establishment to bury a big 'R' win!" and Romney is "not a good messenger" to be telling Republicans how to get elected.

Romney has been chipping away at Trump in recent days, but the speech Thursday was certain to be his most forceful statement yet. Trump has responded to Romney by saying the former Massachusetts governor was a failed candidate in his own right.

Panicked GOP leaders say they still have options for preventing the billionaire from winning the GOP nomination — just not many good ones.

Romney also declares that a Trump nomination at the party's convention in Cleveland in July would enable Democrat Hillary Clinton to win the presidency, according to excerpts of his speech obtained by The Associated Press.

He charged that Trump "has neither the temperament nor the judgment to be president."

In a phone-in interview Thursday with "Good Morning America," Trump scoffed at Romney's charges and declared that "I've brought millions and millions of people ..into the Republican Party."

"The Republican establishment is going to give it all back," he added.

Romney's involvement comes as party elites pore over complicated delegate math, outlining hazy scenarios for a contested convention and even flirting with the long-shot prospect of a third party option.

The 2012 Republican nominee's speech marks his most aggressive step into the 2016 contest to date, but it was unclear what impact his words would have with voters deeply frustrated by their party's leaders.

Trump, meanwhile, was setting his sights on the general election. His campaign reached out to House Speaker Paul Ryan's office to arrange a conversation between the two men, and urged Republican leaders to view his candidacy as a chance to expand the party.

Trump padded his lead with victories in seven Super Tuesday contests, with Texas Sen. Ted Cruz claiming three states and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio picking up his first victory of the 2016 race.

Despite Trump's strong night, he was not yet on track to claim the nomination before the party's national gathering in July, according to an Associated Press delegate count. He has won 46 percent of the delegates awarded so far, and he would have to increase that to 51 percent in the remaining primaries.

GOP strategists cast March 15 as the last opportunity to stop Trump through the normal path of winning states and collecting delegates. A win for Rubio in his home state of Florida would raise questions about Trump's strength, as could a win for Kasich, Ohio's governor, on his home turf.

The candidates have a high-profile opportunity to make their case to voters in Thursday night's prime-time debate. Retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson all but ended his bid Wednesday, saying he would skip the debate and declaring he did "not see a political path forward."

The GOP mayhem contrasted sharply with a clearer picture on the Democratic side, where Hillary Clinton was drawing broad support from voters and her party's leaders. Rival Sen. Bernie Sanders vowed to keep up the fight, though his path to the nomination has become exceedingly narrow.

Romney argues that Trump's "domestic policies would lead to recession. His foreign policies would make America and the world less safe," Romney says. "And his personal qualities would mean that America would cease to be a shining city on a hill."

The Associated Press has asked Republican governors and senators if they would support Trump if he becomes the party's nominee. Of the 59 respondents, slightly fewer than half could not commit to backing him in November.

One long-shot idea rumbling through power corridors in Washington was the prospect of a late third-party candidate to represent more mainstream conservatives. Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry has been approached by "a mixture of people" about being part of a third-party bid, according to Jeff Miller, who managed Perry's failed GOP presidential campaign. But Miller said Perry found the idea "ludicrous."

A more likely, though still extraordinarily unusual, scenario being discussed is a contested convention.

___

Associated Press writers Andrew Taylor, Julie Bykowicz, Stephen Ohlemacher and Donna Cassata contributed to this report.

COMMENTS

Pandemonium in the GOP: Some embrace Trump while others rush to stop him

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Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump were the big winners on Super Tuesday. Get caught up with the race.

Super Tuesday

The Post's Dan Balz says ...

The window for stopping Donald Trump closed almost completely Tuesday night, leaving the demoralized anti-Trump forces with two weeks and no agreed-upon strategy for denying him the GOP nomination. For months, the party elite dismissed him, but now that they finally see his inevitability seem powerless to stop him.

The GOP has two weeks to take down Donald Trump 

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March 5

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March 6

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March 8

Both parties vote in Michigan and Mississippi, and Republicans vote in Hawaii and Idaho.

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Campaign 2016

Catch up after Super Tuesday

Trump captures the nation’s attention on the campaign trail

The Republican presidential candidate dominated the Super Tuesday contests.

By Matea Gold, Philip Rucker and Tom Hamburger March 2 at 11:26 PM    

The Republican Party was in a state of pandemonium Wednesday as a clutch of independent groups scrambled to throw together a last-ditch effort to deny Donald Trump the presidential nomination, even as some party figures concluded it was now too late to stop the billionaire mogul.

The decentralized and desperate stop-Trump campaign found a possible new leader in Mitt Romney, the party’s 2012 presidential nominee, who is expected to deliver a forceful, top-to-bottom indictment of Trump in a speech on Thursday.

In a flurry of conference calls and meetings, top Republican donors and strategists laid plans for a multimillion-dollar assault on the front-runner in a series of states holding contests on March 15. Ground zero is Florida, where home-state Sen. Marco Rubio, the leading establishment candidate, is going all in to defeat Trump, who leads in the polls there.

But other Republicans yielded to Trump after he swept seven out of 11 states on Tuesday, the biggest day of balloting yet. Alex Castellanos, a veteran media consultant who earlier in the season had tried unsuccessfully to organize an anti-Trump campaign, said, “A fantasy effort to stop Trump . . . exists only as the denial stage of grief.”

“Trump has earned the nomination,” 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.”

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How a fractured field just might block Trump and force a brokered convention

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. “We’ve been trying to get white working-class people into the party for a long time. Now they’re here in huge numbers because of Trump and we’re going to alienate them? I don’t get it. Too many people are on their high horse.”

[The Take: The GOP has two weeks to take down Donald Trump]

The deepening split in the party came as the field appeared poised to narrow further. Though stopping short of formally suspending his campaign, retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson told supporters Wednesday that he does not see a “path forward.” He scrapped plans to attend Thursday’s Fox News Channel debate in Detroit, a high-stakes opportunity for Rubio, Sen. Ted Cruz (Tex.) and Ohio Gov. John Kasich to take shots at Trump.

The non-Trump candidates hope to prevent him from acquiring the 1,237 delegates needed to secure the nomination. That would push an ultimate decision to the Republican National Convention in July, potentially turning the Cleveland showcase into a hothouse of intrigue, mischief-making and chaos.

The emergence of Romney as a leading Trump antagonist stoked speculation that he might offer himself as a consensus candidate at the convention. But loyalists were adamant that he has no plans to run.

“Over time, there’s been a lot of speculation about that,” said former Utah governor Michael Leavitt, a Romney confidant. “He’s heard from many people about that idea, and he continues to be skeptical about the prospect of success.”

Rubio, Cruz and Trump all vow to unify GOP on Super Tuesday

Play Video2:42

As results showed Donald Trump leading in at least six states on Super Tuesday, Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) argued that nominating him would be bad for the Republican party. Here are key moments from their speeches following the March 1 races. (Sarah Parnass/The Washington Post)

Romney’s associates said he is not planning to offer an endorsement when he speaks Thursday at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, where he has a home.

On Wednesday night, a group of more than 50 conservative foreign policy experts, including former homeland security secretary Michael Chertoff and former deputy secretary of state Robert Zoellick, issued an open letter calling Trump unfit for the office of president.

Even with fewer people in the race, some GOP figures declared that Trump was nearly unstoppable. Eric Fehrnstrom, a former senior adviser to Romney, said it has become almost “impossible for his opponents to catch up to him.”

Mike Murphy, who ran a pro-Jeb Bush super PAC, said the Trump “train may have left the station. I don’t want to be a critic of what’s being tried, but after millions of dollars in ads, it’s more important to narrow the field than to air more ads against him.”

Still, other operatives worked behind the scenes Wednesday on plans for a ruthless ad blitz to discredit Trump by attacking his business career and character. It marks a dramatic escalation of an anti-Trump campaign that until recently had little firepower.

[The GOP’s implosion over Donald Trump’s candidacy has arrived]

The air assault is largely being funded by Conservative Solutions PAC, a super PAC allied with Rubio; Our Principles PAC, a new anti-Trump outfit; American Future Fund, an Iowa-based nonprofit; and the conservative Club for Growth. Some of the groups are working in collaboration.

Conservative Solutions dropped nearly $3 million worth of new anti-Trump ads this week, largely in Florida, Michigan and Illinois, according to Federal Election Commission filings. Our Principles is also launching a new ad in those states, part of a seven-figure buy that will also air on national cable.

“We have a very target-rich environment,” said Katie Packer, who runs Our Principles. “He has left quite a wake of victims in his path.”

Packer said the increased focus on Trump is taking a toll on the front-runner, pointing to Cruz’s victories Tuesday in Texas, Oklahoma and Alaska.

People with knowledge of the group’s activities said a substantial number of new donors have come aboard since January, when Our Principles launched with an initial $3 million donation from Marlene Ricketts, the matriarch of the family that owns the Chicago Cubs. Among the new contributors are billionaire investor Paul Singer, who serves as the Rubio campaign’s national finance chairman.

New contributions are also bolstering the efforts of American Future Fund, a politically active nonprofit that launched a trio of anti-Trump ads online last week centered on the now-defunct Trump University. The organization is spending $1.75 million to put the spots on the air in Florida cities such as Tampa, Orlando, Fort Myers and West Palm Beach. The group also plans to run ads during the next two Republican debates.

“The people who are donating are very concerned not just about what Trump does to the Republican Party, but to conservatives in general,” spokesman Stuart Roy said.

As of Tuesday, super PACs and other independent groups had plowed $16 million into commercials and mailers explicitly going after Trump and an additional $9.4 million into ads that refer to the brash billionaire. In all, that amounts to just 11 percent of the nearly $238 million spent by outside groups on the presidential race, according to FEC filings.

Some of the operatives have been poring over polling data showing that only a small portion of the electorate was aware of negative aspects of Trump’s career.

“Small percentages of those surveyed knew about Trump University, the failure of Trump Mortgage, the KKK controversy,” said Rick Hohlt, a longtime GOP donor involved in the efforts.

That has convinced some activists that they can gain traction against Trump. But even some involved in the new efforts are uncertain whether the coming assault will have an impact.

“You’re going to see a massive ad spend to the tune of tens of millions of dollars,” said one Republican involved in the planning, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to speak candidly. “Fundraising is not a problem. There may be other problems. Trump may be Teflon — this may not stick to him. On March 15, we will have an experiment: What happens when millions and millions of dollars go after Trump?”

Some party strategists said none of the attempts to trip up Trump will work unless Rubio, Cruz and Kasich step up their campaigns.

“People sitting around here talking, it’s just a parlor game,” said Charlie Black, a longtime Republican strategist. “There’s nothing you can do behind the scenes. It’s all got to happen out there on the playing field. You’ve got to go beat the guy.”

What Rubio, Cruz and Kasich now are counting on most is depriving Trump of enough delegates that they could force a convention showdown. The prospect of a brokered convention probably overstates what would unfold, in part because there is no sign of the ability of a few power brokers to have their way.

“This is a political marketplace with a set of structured rules,” Leavitt said. “Whoever can get 1,237 delegates will be the nominee. There is a lot of maneuvering within those rules that can occur. But there is no smoke-filled room.”

The convention rules will not be finalized until just before the event opens in Cleveland. About two-thirds or more of the delegates will be bound on the first ballot to back the candidate who won in their state or district. After that, however, they become free agents.

But the possibility of the convention delegates going against the candidate who had amassed the most delegates, even if not a majority, could leave the party even more divided and demoralized heading to the general election.

The convention rules may be moot if the tide keeps lifting Trump. New examples emerged Wednesday of party elites gravitating toward the former reality television star.

Stephen Moore, a conservative economist and former member of the Wall Street Journal editorial board, said he is considering an endorsement. “For me, Trump potentially represents a big expansion of the Republican Party, a way to bring in those blue-collar Reagan Democrats,” Moore said. “That’s necessary if the party is going to win again.”

Scott Reed, who managed Bob Dole’s 1996 campaign, said “the fear is as high as it’s ever been” in the establishment.

“But I’m amazed that people are acting surprised,” he said. “Trump has been building for months, and the voters are speaking.”

Watching Trump talk on Tuesday night about unifying the party, Reed said: “I was struck that he was doing smart things, saying the right things. . . . He has to keep that sort of thing up. Look presidential. Don’t go back into the gutter.”

Dan Balz, Robert Costa, Thomas Gibbons-Neff and Anu Narayanswamy contributed to this report.