Getty 2016 Trump gets Kasich attack ad amnesia The real estate mogul claims Kasich 'never had one negative ad against him.' Except Trump aired one in Ohio.

BERLIN, Md. — There’s one problem with Donald Trump’s Wednesday night claim that John Kasich has never had a negative attack ad run against him. And it’s the attack ad Donald Trump ran against John Kasich.

At a rally here, Trump used some faulty evidence to go after the central rationale for the Ohio governor’s candidacy: Kasich’s electability.


“He will get slaughtered by Hillary. He’s never had one negative ad against him. I’ve had 55,000,” Trump said. “As soon as he’s had the first 10 ads against him, he’ll drop like a rock.”

But Trump, who often personally writes the scripts for his ads, must’ve forgotten the one he aired in Ohio last month attacking Kasich over his work for Lehman Brothers and for being an “absentee governor.” Some Ohio stations pulled the ads — part of a nearly $1 million buy Trump made in the state — following complaints that it did not contain a proper disclaimer.

Kasich is mathematically eliminated from the winning nomination on the first ballot but vows to remain in the race until the July convention, where he plans to make the case to delegates that he is the only candidate who can beat Hillary Clinton. Kasich enjoys a higher favorability than Trump with the general election electorate and polls show he fares better than Trump in head-to-head matchups with Clinton.

Earlier in the rally, Trump remarked at length on the high number of attack ads run against him, not all of which bothered the businessman. “A couple of them were pretty good, actually,” Trump said. “Pretty good.”

Trump also pointed to the fact that deep into the primary calendar Kasich has still won only his home state. “How can you vote for someone who’s gone 1 for 38?” Trump asked, rhetorically. “Can’t do it.”

Trump went after Cruz’s viability as well. “There is no path for lyin’ Ted Cruz to get the nomination,” Trump said.

After forgoing “Lyin’ Ted” for the more dignified “Sen. Cruz” in his remarks after his win in the New York primary on Tuesday, Trump brought the nickname back repeatedly on Wednesday, here and at an afternoon rally in Indianapolis.

Trump also said that job creation is a matter of instinct — an instinct that he said he has. “I happen to be born with that ability to create jobs,” Trump said.

To illustrate the point, the businessman compared himself to baseball legend Babe Ruth.

“He had more home runs than, like, four teams in the league put together,” Trump said of Ruth. “They said, ‘Babe how do you hit the home runs?’ He said, ‘I don’t know, man. I just swing at it.’”

“It’s an instinct,” Trump said. “And if you don’t have the instinct, you’ll never ever be able to do it.”

The rally here was held in the gymnasium of a high school alma mater of Trump advance staffer Kevin Chmielewski. Early in the rally, Trump brought Chmielewski up on stage and led the crowd in chants of “Kevin! Kevin! Kevin!”

