Republican leaders devise plan to thwart Trump bid
Republican leaders opposed to Donald Trump’s candidacy are preparing a campaign to deny him the presidential nomination, starting with an aggressive battle in Wisconsin’s April 5 primary and extending into the summer, with a delegate-by-delegate lobbying effort that would cast Trump as a calamitous choice for the general election.
Recognizing that Trump has seized a formidable advantage in the race, they say that an effort to block him would rely on an array of desperation measures, the political equivalent of guerrilla fighting.
But should that effort falter, leading conservatives are prepared to field an independent candidate in the general elec- tion, to defend Republican principles and offer traditional conservatives an alternative to Trump’s hard-edged populism. They described their plans in interviews after Trump’s victories Tuesday in Florida and three other states.
The names of a few wellknown conservatives have been offered in recent days as potential third-party standardbearers, and William Kristol, editor of the Weekly Standard, has circulated a memo to a small number of conservative allies detailing the process by which an independent candidate could get on generalelection ballots across the country.
Among the recruits under discussion are Tom Coburn, a former Oklahoma senator, and Rick Perry, the former Texas governor.
Coburn said Trump “needs to be stopped” and that he expected to back an independent candidate against him. He said he had little appetite for a campaign of his own but did not flatly rule one out.
Trump opponents convened a series of councils last week to pinpoint his biggest vulnerabilities and consider whether to endorse one of his two remaining opponents, Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas and Gov. John Kasich of Ohio.
David McIntosh, president of the conservative Club for Growth, which has spent millions on ads attacking Trump, said his group met Wednesday and concluded it was still possible to avert Trump’s nomination.
“It’s not a layup, but there’s a clear path to victory,” McIntosh said.
On Saturday, protesters blocked a main highway leading into the Phoenix suburb where Trump held a campaign rally alongside Arizona’s tough-talking Sheriff Joe Arpaio.
The protesters parked their cars in the middle of the road, unfurling banners reading “Dump Trump” and “Must Stop Trump.”
Several thousand miles away in New York, demonstrators also took to the streets Saturday to protest the Republican presidential hopeful. They marched to Trump Tower, the Fifth Avenue skyscraper in Manhattan where Trump lives. Then they marched to Columbus Circle, adjacent to Central Park, for a rally.