US presidential candidates gear up for ‘Super Tuesday’

“We have a movement going on this isn’t normal”, said Trump. Orrin Hatch said. His Republican colleague from Arizona, Jeff Flake, said he was “still holding out hope” that he wouldn’t have to make the choice about supporting Trump. Trump supporters, Sasse told MSNBC, “need to recognize that there are a whole bunch of other people who say, if this becomes the David Duke/Donald Trump party, there are a lot of us who are out”.

“Trump seems to be in the driver’s seat”, said Chris Galdieri, a political science professor at Saint Anselm College. More than 1.7 million voters have already cast early ballots there, representing about 7 percent of registered Republicans.

For the Republicans there are five candidates participating including businessman Donald Trump, Florida Senator Marco Rubio, Texas Senator Ted Cruz, Ohio Governor John Kasich and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson.

Trump failed to pick up a single vote in solidarity with the Mexicans he would exclude (the abrasive billionaire might be asking himself where he went wrong if he had, given his scorn for the media).

A tipping point may have come Friday morning when New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie endorsed Trump, setting off a flood of other nods, including from Maine Gov. Paul LePage, former Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer and Alabama Sen. Trump blamed the kerfuffle on a faulty earpiece during the interview, but his rivals pounced on that response as well.

But all signs show 2016 is far from normal, with a fiercely angry electorate keen to back an outsider who scornfully attacks the establishment. Trump had disavowed them and did so again after facing criticism for wobbling.

Clinton was supported by at least 80 percent of black voters in the Deep South and Texas.

Rain that was falling in Little Rock and throughout the midsection of Arkansas is moving out and election officials say that could boost turnout. “His coddling of repugnant bigotry is not in the character of America”, Romney tweeted.

“Trump sought to put the issue behind him, blaming it on a “very bad ear piece” that prevented him from accurately hearing the question about Duke, and repeating his prior disavowal of the white supremacist”.

For Clinton, the best case Super Tuesday is a simple one: turning her decisive win in SC on Saturday into a sweep across the South and beyond that will cement the perception that she’s on an all-but-unstoppable march to her party’s nomination.

Bernie Sanders, however, tops all three Republicans by a wide margin: beating Mr Cruz by 17 per cent, Mr Trump by 12 per cent and Mr Rubio by 8 per cent. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, wait in their seats before a campaign appearance by Cruz, Monday, Feb. 29, 2016, in San Antonio. The Texas senator, a favourite of the region’s social conservatives and evangelical Christians, expected the South to be his strength, but now is simply hoping for a victory in his home state.

The rain was moving eastward out of the state Tuesday afternoon. Almost 600 Republican delegates are up for grabs Tuesday, nearly half the 1,237 needed to secure the nomination.

Donald Trump looked poised to strengthen his lead in the Republican presidential race when 11 states vote on Tuesday, an outcome likely to intensify concerns among party leaders who consider him a usurper of the Republican throne.