By Brandon Moseley
Alabama Political Reporter
Tuesday, April 20, after weeks in which state after state fell to challengers: US Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and US Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) New York City businessman and billionaire Donald Trump and the former US Senator Hillary Clinton (D-New York) came home to New York and much needed victories in the Empire State’s party primaries.
Sen. Ted Cruz had chastised Trump for his “New York values.” New York Republicans made the Texan pay for the remark. The Texas Senator never caught on there finishing a distant third, well behind Ohio Governor John Kasich.
Tuesday’s much needed victory improved Trump’s delegate count to 845. Sen. Cruz has 559. Gov. Kasich has only 147 delegates, still trailing US Senator Marco Rubio with 171. 1237 delegates are needed to win the Republican nomination. Trump hopes to amass that number before the convention and is the only candidate with enough delegates where that is still mathematically possible. Sen. Cruz on the other hand hopes that Trump does not win the nomination on the first ballot. After the first or second ballot most of the delegates are no longer bound to honor their pledge and are free to change candidates. Cruz hopes that Trump and Kasich delegates will give him the nomination on the second or third ballots in Cleveland.
The win greatly improves former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s position in the race for Democratic delegates. Clinton has now won 1424 regular delegates to Sen. Sanders’ 1149. Mrs. Clinton also has 469 pledged super delegates, while Sanders only has 31. To this point Sec. Clinton has 1893 won and pledged delegates total, while Sanders has just 1180. 2383 are needed to win the Democratic Party nomination.
