“The Party needs to decide how to live in a Trump-nominee world”

Grant Reeher, Professor of Political Science at Maxwell School at Syracuse University, Director of the Alan K. Campbell Public Affairs Institute, and Host of the Campbell Conversations on WRVO, said while Hillary Clinton has shored up the necessary votes, unifying the Democratic party may be a difficult job. On the Republican side, “the Party needs to decide how to live in a Trump-nominee world. Blood on the floor is very slippery.”

“Hillary Clinton has put the final stamp on her inevitability proposition–that debate is over. It’s time now for political analysts to consider what the movement that Bernie Sanders catalyzed–all the more remarkable in retrospect–will mean for the future of the Democratic Party and American politics. To discount it as the familiar rumblings or grumblings of the Left wing of the Party, as some observers have done–and to assume that Mini Super Tuesday marks the beginning of the great reunification–is to underestimate its significance.

After the original Super Tuesday, Donald Trump and the Republican Party establishment had opportunities to make the better, if not the best, of things–Trump by becoming more politically appropriate and presidential, the Party by trying to make some peace. Neither chose to do so. That window opens slightly after Mini Super Tuesday. The Cruz-Kasich pact is not likely to work, and the Party needs to decide how to live in a Trump-nominee world. Blood on the floor is very slippery.”

Reeher is available to speak to media and can be reached via email at gdreeher@maxwell.syr.edu or by contacting Ellen James Mbuqe, Director of News and Public Relations at Syracuse University at ejmbuqe@syr.edu, 315.443.1897, or 412.496.0551.