After multiple references to “Senator Cruz” in a victory speech Tuesday in New York, GOP presidential front-runner Donald Trump was back to deriding his top 2016 GOP rival as “Lyin’ Ted” Wednesday as Mr. Trump rallied supporters in Indianapolis.
“Lyin’ Ted — lies. Oh, he lies,” Mr. Trump said. “You know Ted — he brings the Bible, holds it high, puts it down, lies.”
After Mr. Trump’s blowout win in New York, Sen. Ted Cruz said Wednesday that no candidate will reach the 1,237 delegates needed to clinch the nomination before July and that he and Mr. Trump are headed toward an open GOP convention.
“I’m millions of votes ahead — millions — millions of votes ahead of Lyin’ Ted Cruz,” Mr. Trump said. “I’m about 300 delegates ahead of Lyin’ Ted.”
Mr. Trump has been leading in recent polls on Pennsylvania, Maryland, Connecticut, and Delaware, which vote on April 26 along with Rhode Island. He was scheduled to campaign Wednesday in Maryland and stop in Pennsylvania and Delaware later in the week.
But he chose Indiana, where there are 57 delegates up for grabs on May 3, as his first public campaign stop after his victory in New York.
“This was a stop that was unexpected,” Mr. Trump said. “But I told my people I want to go to Indiana. Indiana’s going to be very important.”
Mr. Trump also continued to hammer the GOP delegate process as “rigged.”
“You know, even my enemies up there in the media agree with me, in almost all cases: it’s a rigged, crooked system that’s designed so that the bosses can pick whoever they want, and that people like me can’t run and can’t defend you against foreign nonsense and can’t defend you against China, and Japan, and Mexico, and Vietnam, and India, and every single country you can name,” he said.
“We lose, believe me, with every deal we do,” he said. “So it’s a rigged system.”
Speaking to reporters Wednesday, Mr. Cruz acknowledged that Mr. Trump could pick up additional wins next week, but said the terrain would get more difficult for the billionaire businessman after that.
“This race goes to states like Indiana and Nebraska and South Dakota and Montana, which are a real problem for Donald,” Mr. Cruz said in Florida, where the Republican National Committee is holding its spring meeting this week.
“Donald has had great difficulty winning west of the Mississippi River,” he said. “Indeed, if you look at North Dakota and Colorado and Wyoming, Donald skipped those races altogether — he refused to show up and he lost in crushing, landslide defeats.
“That is an ominous storm cloud for the Trump campaign when the race moves West again,” Mr. Cruz said.
• David Sherfinski can be reached at dsherfinski@washingtontimes.com.
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