On Saturday, Donald Trump made the rounds in Arizona, rallying supporters with his trademark, off-the-cuff stump speech.
At this juncture, the billionaire has become something of a master when it comes to feeling out crowds. He shows up, takes the stage, and proceeds to deliver various riffs on the same set of amorphous themes depending on what he thinks any one particular set of supporters wants to hear. There’s the customary mention of protesters (“Bernie people”), the obligatory jabs at GOP rivals (“lyin’, lyin’ Ted"), an insult or three for the media (“crazy Megyn”), a poke at the establishment bear (“Mitt’s a chokin' dog”), a brief mention of trade (“we make terrible deals”), a promise on immigration (“we’re gonna build a big beautiful wall”), and of course, a thundering reiteration of a promise that, at its heart, has absolutely no meaning whatsoever (“make America great again").
And it works. Like a damn charm.
In fact, it works so well that you wouldn’t know anyone else was even running - Republican or Democrat. If you watched CNN on Saturday there were a couple of brief moments where a Bernie Sanders rally appeared on screen and other than that... nothing. It was a Trumpfest from morning to night.
But even as it appears increasingly likely that the billionaire will get to 1,237 delegates by July thus obviating the need for a contentious convention in Cleveland, the GOP is holding out hope that the establishment can still steal the nomination from the frontrunner.
Trump has threatened warned of “riots” if he’s robbed, but the party probably doesn’t care. Keeping Trump from getting the nomination is the only thing that matters at this point. For those interested in more granular detail on how the establishment may still be able to stop the Trump juggernaut, see here and here. For those interested in a simpler, visual explanation, see the following three helpful flowcharts from Reuters and The New York Times, respectively.