New York Daily News

‘Can’t-win’ Bernie may win again!

- BY ADAM EDELMAN

Kushner, who owns The New York Observer and is married to Trump’s daughter Ivanka, has been a top adviser on the campaign for some time and helped write Trump’s big speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in March.

Christie endorsed Trump shortly after leaving the presidenti­al race, and has been a regular surrogate for him ever since.

“I am honored by the confidence being placed in me by Mr. Trump and look forward to putting together a first-rate team to assemble an administra­tion to help best serve the Presidente­lect and the nation,” Christie said.

Meanwhile, former GOP presidenti­al hopeful Marco Rubio isn’t interested in swapping out “Little Marco” for “Running Mate.” The Florida senator Monday officially ruled out joining a ticket with Trump, the man who repeatedly mocked his height on the campaign trail. “I have never sought, will not seek and do not want to be considered for vice president,” Rubio said.

Trump’s announceme­nt of a transition team comes unusually early for a candidate.

President Obama didn’t name his transition team chairman until after he’d defeated John McCain in 2008.

President George W. Bush named his team after the November election as well, though at the time he was still fighting the Florida recount.

Mitt Romney’s decision to have former Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt as his transition chairman was made public in June. COAL COUNTRY is “berning” up for Bernie Sanders.

But with his path to the Democratic nomination now nearly impossible, the only result of another likely victory by the Vermont senator Tuesday in West Virginia’s Democratic primary would simply be giving Hillary Clinton's campaign a black lung.

The latest polls show that Democratic voters in the Mountain State — whose primary will put at stake 37 delegates — are likely to go for Sanders (inset), but even a landslide victory won’t help advance the persistent progressiv­e's path to the nomination, experts say.

Instead, it would only make Clinton’s case that she is the party’s presumptiv­e nominee — and her ability to ask her rival to leave the race — more difficult. “It leaves Sanders still standing with another victory to take into the next contest and feeds the narrative that Clinton can’t put it away,” David Birdsell, dean of the Public Affairs School at Baruch College, told the Daily News.

The Clinton camp — despite Sanders’ solid wins in the Indiana and Rhode Island primaries in recent weeks — is virtually guaranteed to face off against Donald Trump in the general election, but Sanders’ wins keep him in the race and prevent her from going full-bore against the presumptiv­e GOP nominee.

“Secretary Clinton and her supporters still have not figured out a way for Sanders to gracefully leave and to transfer support to her,” David Caputo, president emeritus and professor of political science at Pace University, told The News. “And Sanders is doing little to assist in this.”

Clinton leads Sanders in pledged delegates 1,705 to 1,415 and in total delegates 2,228 to 1,454 . To secure the nomination, a candidate must win 2,383 total delegates. Superdeleg­ates, who overwhelmi­ngly back Clinton, would be likely to switch their allegiance to Sanders only if he came within striking distance of that magic number.

But do that, Sanders would need to win about 88% of the remaining pledged delegates.

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