Hillary Clinton well prepared to win ugly against Donald Trump

Republican Senator retracts Trump’s endorsement

Washington, June 8: If Hillary Clinton’s best argument for unifying Democrats and winning the White House is Donald Trump, then she picked a good week to clinch the nomination.

Clinton’s victory-night speech celebrated her historic accomplishment—becoming the first woman nominated for president by a major US party—with sepiatoned images of feminist pioneers past.

But the campaign has made clear it’s ready to win ugly too, with appeals to fear and not just the heart. Enter Trump, who had by far the worst week of his campaign at the very moment the nation saw Clinton reach her milestone.

In the general election, one of Clinton’s biggest challenges may be following one of the oldest rules in politics: when your opponent is selfdestructing, just stay out of the way. Clinton’s camp also believes fear of Trump can also push Bernie Sanders, and his swath of loyal supporters, into Clinton’s camp, even though they’re not going quietly yet.

“The differences between us and Trump are so much greater than the differences

Washington, June 8: Donald Trump lost his first Republican endorsement on Tuesday after Republican Senator Mark Kirk said he could no longer support his party’s nominee given his remarks about a judge’s Mexican heritage. “While I oppose the Democratic nominee, Donald Trump’s statement, in context with past attacks on Hispanics, women and the disabled like me, make it certain that I cannot and will not support my party’s nominee for president,” said Kirk, who is in a tough re-election battle in Illinois. Trump issued a statement on Thursday afternoon that his remarks had been “misconstrued,” and that he was questioning “whether I am receiving a fair trial” based on the judge’s rulings, not his heritage. “I am friends with and employ thousands of people of Mexican and Hispanic descent,” he said. But Trump’s response is unlikely to tamp down the firestorm that has erupted inside the Republican Party over his attacks on US District Judge Gonzalo Curiel, who is overseeing a lawsuit against Trump University. Kirk had told CNN last month that he’d support Trump if he were the Republican Party’s nominee. But on Tuesday, after Speaker Paul Ryan blasted Trump’s statements as “racist,” Kirk issued a statement saying that Trump “has not demonstrated the temperament necessary to assume the greatest office in the world.” Kirk is running far behind in his race with the Democratic challenger, Representative Tammy Duckworth, and is considered the most vulnerable Republican senator in the 2016 election cycle. In his statement, Kirk made reference to an episode where Trump publicly mocked the mannerisms of a disabled reporter. Kirk himself suffered a severe stroke in 2012.” Bloomberg between Senator Sanders and Secretary Clinton,” Clinton campaign chair man John Podesta said on MSNBC.

The choreography now is critical, and the Clinton campaign is eager to move on quickly to solidify her status as the presumptive nominee.

President Barack Obama’s endorsement may be imminent, and he called both Clinton and Sanders on Tuesday night, the White House said in a press release. Obama will also meet with Sanders in Washington on Thursday “to continue their conversation about the significant issues at stake in this election that matter most to America’s working families.”

A wave of the key outstanding endorsements including vice-president Joe Biden, Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, and Bernie Sanders himself could soon follow—but that depends on the Vermont senator.

Even as he was losing California in early returns on Tuesday night, and as the New York Times reported Sanders’ campaign plans to lay off some staff, Sanders said he will campaign through the June 14 contest in the District of Columbia, including holding a rally on Thursday.

Sanders has not rescinded a plan to fight Hillary Clinton all the way to the party convention in late July. Bloomberg