Bloomberg.com<\/p>\n
Fresh\u00a0off three more primary victories, Donald Trump said Wednesday he\u2019ll blow off the next Republican presidential debate and warned of\u00a0\u201criots\u201d if power-brokers deny him the nomination at the convention even if he’s leading in the delegate count.<\/p>\n
The billionaire New York developer, who\u00a0held a narrow lead in Missouri and lost Ohio on Tuesday, is faced with the prospect\u00a0of a floor fight at the party\u00a0convention in July if he’s leading in delegates but falls short of a majority,\u00a01,237.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think we\u2019ll win before getting to the convention, but I can tell you, if we didn\u2019t and if we\u2019re 20 votes short or if we\u2019re 100 short and we\u2019re at 1,100 and somebody else is at 500 or 400 cause we\u2019re way ahead of everybody, I don\u2019t think you can say that we don\u2019t get it automatically,\u201d Trump said on CNN on Wednesday. \u201cI think you\u2019d have riots.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI wouldn\u2019t lead it, but I think bad things would happen,\u201d Trump said,\u00a0adding the\u00a0outcome would \u201cdisenfranchise\u201d his supporters.<\/p>\n
Trump claimed to have been caught off guard by the next televised debate, set for Monday in Salt Lake City hosted by Fox News. \u201cWe\u2019ve had enough debates,\u201d\u00a0he said on the network Wednesday.\u00a0\u201cNobody told me about it and I won\u2019t be there.\u201d He\u00a0said skipping the debate would allow him to speak at\u00a0the\u00a0American Israel Public Affairs Committee policy conference running from Sunday to Tuesday in Washington.<\/p>\n
Trump has skipped a debate before\u2014the one held days before the Iowa caucuses on Feb. 1 that Texas Senator Ted Cruz won. Trump had complained about Fox News\u2019 treatment of him at the time, and instead held an event that he said raised money for veterans\u2019 charities.<\/p>\n
Fox spokeswomen didn\u2019t immediately respond to a request for comment, nor did\u00a0Kasich spokesman Rob Nichols or\u00a0Cruz spokeswoman Alice Stewart about whether their candidates would participate in the debate.<\/p>\n
Ohio\u00a0Governor John Kasich deprived Trump of a sweep on Tuesday by winning the Buckeye State, saying, \u201cWe are going go all the way to Cleveland and secure the Republican nomination.\u201d Senator Marco Rubio was beaten badly by Trump in Florida\u00a0and suspended his campaign.<\/p>\n
On the Democratic side, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton defeated Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders in\u00a0four of five contests and held a narrow lead in Missouri, a race\u00a0the Associated Press said was too close to call. Her victory speech made clear<\/a> she is increasingly focusing on a general-election race against Trump in the fall.<\/p>\n Cruz, who says\u00a0he intends to win 1,237 delegates before the convention, noted in a CNN interview that if he falls short, delegates will have discretion on whom they vote for.<\/p>\n Cruz strategists have been gaming scenarios in which they pick off delegates to keep Trump from clinching the nomination in Cleveland. If no candidate gets to the convention\u00a0with a majority, Cruz could\u00a0try to flip delegates pledged to Rubio, Kasich, and other candidates on the second ballot. Forty-four states allow a state party convention or executive committee to assign delegates to their preferred candidates.<\/p>\n Kasich is banking on the possibility of convention rules being rewritten when the delegates arrive,\u00a0allowing him to compete there. (He’s not expected to win the number of states required to appear on a convention ballot under current rules.) But with the majority of delegates already claimed by Trump and Cruz, they may be unwilling to give Kasich a chance.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Cruz folks would never allow the rules to be changed and of course we wouldn’t either,\u201d said Barry Bennett, a\u00a0Trump\u00a0convention strategist, according to Politico<\/a>.<\/p>\n The possibility of a chaotic convention even led former House Speaker John Boehner on Wednesday to say he’d hypothetically support his successor, Paul Ryan, as nominee, despite voting for Kasich in the Ohio primary.<\/p>\n