Republican Bayou/Cauci Saturday election results thread (first results @3pm ET?)

[Maxwell]

wow Cruz-mentum - If he wins Maine he blows up the argument that he's just a regional candidate.

[Maxwell]

I'm not going to say Cruz is strong in Maine until actual results come in, but if he is, what would be the explanation? He was weak in MA, NH, VT, etc.

Caucus + past Paul strength

Which is super odd, considering most of the results that have come in so far have had no correlation between areas where Ron Paul was strong and areas where Ted Cruz is strong.

[Maxwell]

The delegate threshold in Kansas is 10% - Keep that in mind while looking at Rubio and Kasich's totals.

[Maxwell]

Man Cruz is just swamping Kansas. I did not expect this level of performance.

Maybe Vosem might be right on the whole Romney speech swaying a certain segment of Rubio voters. The question is whether Cruz voters give a damn elsewhere.

[Maxwell]

If Cruz wins Kansas by a landslide, how boned is Trump from here on out?

Probably not that much - Kansas is definitely a state that would hate Trump and embrace Cruz.

And I think, beyond anything else, Cruz comes out ahead or at least strongly competing with Trump in the delegate county from today's contests.

[Maxwell]

The areas where Kasich and Rubio would do better are still out, so I think both will come out with delegates, but yeah, I think with the areas out I think it's safe to say Cruz got it.

Looks like Cruz will probably heavily overperform his numbers in Kansas.

And pollsters have to answer again, why they were so dead wrong. Especially about the Trumpster. Looks like he loses all states with a lead below 10% in the polls.

That Kansas poll had decimals. Who really thought that was a reliable poll?

[Maxwell]

Cruzmentum?

And Kasich at 10% right now is good for him - he needs to continue to get that number because that's the delegate threshold for Kansas. If he does just that, it's a solid performance.

[Maxwell]

How is Kasich doing so poorly in Maine?

[Maxwell]

I don't even understand Maine.

WHAT ARE YOU???

[Maxwell]

Holy hell, Rubio should drop out if results stay the same.

What do you mean? Rubio is the real winner tonight. He wins by coming in third and being the anti-Trump/Cruz. From there, it's just a few short steps to the nomination. I can't wait to hear his victory speech tonight.

WHAT AN HONOR IT IS TO GET THIRD IN KANSAS. THEY SAID WE COULDN'T DO IT.

[Maxwell]

Finally! Some results out of district 3 - looks like they should call it for Cruz now.

[Maxwell]

Rubio is not going to win any states after losing Florida. I would be massively surprised if he did.

[Maxwell]

Let's be real - who expected Trump to do well in KANSAS?

[Maxwell]

Let's be real - who expected Trump to do well in KANSAS?

Well if Cruz internal polling had them close...then yeah, this shouldnt have been a 2:1 win for Eduardo Rafa Cruz.

Polling is pretty bad for caucuses in general, and I do believe that Trump has anti-appeal in this state while Cruz is good at getting people out for these kind of things.

[Maxwell]

I'll venture a far off guess as to why Cruz did so well -

Kobach endorsed Trump
Roberts and Brownback endorsed Rubio

Those officials are all EXTREMELY unpopular in Kansas, and largely won re-election on the back of a wave election. Perhaps Cruz is the F you choice of Kansas voters?

[Maxwell]

For me it says the Maine results are (on DDHQ)

44% Cruz
34% Trump
11% Kasich
10% Rubio

WHere are these results for 27% of Maine coming from? CNN, NYT and Politco all have 4.5%/5% counted.

I presume via twitter.  It's actually pretty unprofessional to release results before all voting in the state has been completed.  Or so I believe.

The reason they took so long in Kansas was because parts of the state were still voting. It's fine to release results, as long as you don't make a definitive call.

[Maxwell]

New DDHQ numbers

44% Cruz
34% Trump
12% Kasich
9% Rubio

32% In, only changes are Kasich is a point up and Rubio a point down.

[Maxwell]

Watch those delegate thresholds - Rubio missed in Maine, his campaign has to be watching the results in Louisiana with clenched teeth to see if he gets the delegates there. If you're going to be fighting with TRUMP you need all the delegates you can get.

And really, I'm not sure why we expected TRUMP to not do well in Louisiana - it seems like exactly his place to rock it.

The South is not conservative, it is populist and TRUMP fulfills that populist role rather than Cruz, whose whole evangelical conservative thing doesn't really gel.

[Maxwell]

Weirdest map ever.

I have to give the Cruz camp credit for navigating Maine so well - Cruz will continue to be a worthy adversary of TRUMP.

Despite missing the mark in Maine, I think these results bode well for Kasich - he got delegates in Kansas after all, made the threshold in Maine, and getting a decent percentage (12-13%) in Kentucky. He was never going to get that 20% in Louisiana and didn't really put the effort forward for it. He continues strongly.

[Maxwell]

Shock poll: Cruz within 10 in Louisiana.

He'll probably end up within 5 in Kentucky, and not sure where he lands in Louisiana, but if your name is Ted Cruz this is a solid night.

[Maxwell]

Cruzmentum!

Rubio and Kasich are pretty much no-shows today. They will no likely drop out just yet, though. However it should soon be down to a two candidate race for the republican nomination.

The difference is Rubio was supposed to do better than this - I'm not sure anyone expected Kasich to do well anywhere besides perhaps Maine, and Maine blindsided us all.

[Maxwell]

It's looking like one of Rubio or Kasich need to drop instead of splitting the vote (maine and LA)

At this point, probably Rubio - he's increasingly looking like a lost cause, while Kasich without Rubio there could win Michigan and then Ohio, big delegate hauls.

[Maxwell]

Trump has got to watch out for Mississippi if momentum keeps moving against him. I'm sure Mississippi will vote along the lines of Alabama but if Cruz keeps getting all of Rubio's votes...

Also whether it's Trump or Cruz on the ticket, Republicans are more likely to lose than win. With Trump they get the option of scoring a surprise win. With Cruz they lose every single time.

[Maxwell]

I think an under-reported story is Trump significantly underperforming the polls in nearly every state so far.

Trump always loses with voters who made their decision in the last minute. I think it's obvious why that is.

[Maxwell]

I think an under-reported story is Trump significantly underperforming the polls in nearly every state so far.

_trump just can't perform, in any context at all. Sad.

Yeah, it's clear Drumpf has won LA and KY.

Still, he underperformed and if he stays at this level he won't get to a majority of delegates.

But if Trump underperformed, how can Cruz not winning Kentucky or Lousiana be considered anything other than under-performing. These should be his strong states. If he can't win there how is he going to get the delegates he needs from Ohio or Michigan or New York or Pennsylvania?

Uh? KY and LA were always considered to be Drumpf territory. Pretty sure he was expected to beat Cruz by 10+ in each.

Well if Cruz can't win in southern states, whats he doing in the race? and as it now looks like a two-horse contest, how can these results indicate anything other than a Drumpf win overall?

Because _trump loses if he fails to get 50%, which is possible even if (hypothetically; this won't take place) he wins 40+ states if he gets sufficiently low vote percentages and doesn't win a few key winner-take-alls. Cruz is the likeliest nominee in the event of a contested convention. Simple as that.

Nah. The establishment would knee cap Cruz in a brokered convention if they had the chance.