Several months ago I wrote that California might be the deciding state in the Republican nomination.  At the time, Ted Cruz was leading in California.  Currently Donald Trump is leading, but it is actually a tie with Cruz surging.

The winner of the California Republican primary is likely to win the nomination.  The Republican establishment still dreams of a brokered convention where they can float in an establishment kind of candidate, like a Paul Ryan, to save the day.  That will not happen.  Donald Trump has almost zero chance of having 1,237 delegates before the convention.  Ted Cruz has a slim chance at getting 1,237 but he has a slightly better chance than Donald.  Between the two of them, they will have a vast majority of the delegates.  One of them is going to get the nomination.

California is the last primary before the convention.  It is a closed primary.  There are 172 delegates.  The person who wins the California primary is extremely likely to be the Republican nominee.  If Trump wins he may just have 1,237 delegates.  Even if he doesn’t have 1,237, he will be close and will have huge momentum because of California.

If Cruz wins, Trump won’t have 1,237 delegates and Cruz will not be far behind.  If you combine the Kasich and Rubio delegates that will easily put Cruz over the top.  If Cruz wins California he will go to the convention with almost unstoppable momentum.

Following is the remaining primary schedule:

Some people foolishly think Cruz needs to win 80% of the vote to get the nomination.  That is not true.  He just needs to win enough to stop Trump from winning.  If Cruz wins 50% of the remaining votes he is likely to win the nomination.

The bottom line is that the nominee is going to be either Ted Cruz or Donald Trump and it is very likely to be which of them wins in California.  If their campaigns don’t know this already, they will figure it out soon.  Prepare yourself for more political ads than you thought possible.

TDM