Krauthammer: Will Trump Be Able To Reach Out To Anti-Trump Forces And Gain Their Support?

Charles Krauthammer talks about a Donald Trump general campaign candidacy, the Cruz and the anti-Trump factions in the party and Cruz's tirade against Trump. From Tuesday's Special Report:





KRAUTHAMMER: If what looks like is going to happen, happens. If Cruz loses, and according to the polls it would be somewhere in double digits, there's no Stop Trump campaign. Trump will have the nomination. I think the further question is, will Trump be able to bring in some of those people? Remember, Cruz has had, has now a not-insubstantial following. He doesn't have enough to win the nomination. but when you have 550 delegates, you represent quite a large segment, a minority segment of course, of the electorate.



And the question is, will Trump reach out, and that's why I think what he did today is so puzzling. He's way ahead. He's got the nomination in his pocket. And yet, he floats or repeats the story from National Inquirer, which is weird twilight zone stuff. About Ted Cruz's dad. Being associated with Lee Harvey Oswald, who was the Kennedy assassin. That's what set Ted Cruz off. I'm not sure he planned any of the vitriol he launched at trump today. But it was like his reaction after the attack on his wife. Attack on his wife, attack on his dad.



If you want to reconcile with somebody, if you want to stand on the stage at the end of the convention, raising his hand. That's not what you do. But I think what Trump said, I think it was yesterday, or the day before, is important. I want party unity, but I don't need it. I can win without it. And that part of the Stop Trump segment, that was behind Cruz, may find itself in a position where they will follow him. I can't imagine him holding up Trump's hand on the last day of the convention...



KRAUTHAMMER: It doesn't play. And it doesn't play for two reasons. One is it's completely unmodulated. Whatever the substance of his charges, launching them like that, particularly, at the 11th hour when you look to be on the edge of political extinction, looks like desperation, second, where was he for the first three, four, six, seven months of this campaign? He was the one candidate of the 16 that began to dwindle. Who spoke most favorably of Donald Trump. Called him my friend. After the episode I think it was the episode where Trump hesitated to disavow David Duke. Cruz refused to criticize him. As with a lot of other -- when Trump attacked John McCain. When you do that after all that time praising him, it looks to be insincere, and desperate.