RUSH: Thirteen specific instances Cruz says that Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton are identical, policy-wise. We spent a lot of time talking today about Trump coming off this amazing — every county, Trump won every county in five states.
“Well, I know, Rush, but what do you expect? The Northeast are a bunch of liberal Republicans.” Yeah, yeah, but nobody ever forecast winning 60% of the vote. Remember, at this point when all these other people were out of the race other than Kasich, it was supposed to be Trump and his 35% of the vote and all the other Republican votes were gonna coalesce behind Cruz. Now, that might not manifest itself in these Northeastern states, but nobody, nobody predicted these kind of margins.
In fact, the conventional wisdom yesterday was exactly what I told you, that it was pretty much expected what was gonna happen. It wasn’t gonna change things because it was already known. Trump’s gonna win these five states, the delegates that he’s gonna get are already factored into the count, so there’s nothing new really that’s gonna come out of this, and in fact that was turned upside down. All kinds of new was learned. Five states, every county, margins of victory, huge turnout. There isn’t any evidence here in these five states — granted, they’re Northeastern liberal states where you wouldn’t expect Cruz to do well, but isn’t that in and itself a factor?
The point is that with all the other candidates out of the race, the Cruz theory was that during all these primaries Trump was getting 30, 35% of the vote, which meant 60 to 65% of the Republican primary vote was for somebody other than Trump. So if those guys would all get out and leave it just Cruz versus Trump, then Cruz would start sailing. Well, Kasich kind of got in the way by not getting out. But it hasn’t happened. And Indiana is where everybody is looking for maybe it to happen. Indiana is supposedly an ideal state for Cruz. So we’ll see.
But we spent a lot of time talking about Trump because of that, and there are some things about Cruz, we want to spread it around a little bit here, and Cruz is, as part of his message, trying to alert people, “Hey, Trump is not really one of us. He’s not even really a Republican, you know, he’s fooling everybody. He and Hillary, they practically agree on everything,” and here’s three sound bites, the first of three, last night in Indiana at the Hoosier gym at a campaign event. Here’s Cruz specifying the first of 13 instances where Trump and Hillary agree on things.
CRUZ: I’m gonna walk you through 13 policy issues where Donald and Hillary have the very same views. Donald and Hillary both agree that our taxes should be increased. Donald and Hillary both support the Obamacare individual mandates. Donald and Hillary believe that illegal immigrants who are here should be able to become US citizens. Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton both support taxpayer funding for Planned Parenthood. Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton both supported Bill Clinton’s national ban on many of the most important firearms in America. Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton both believe we should negotiate with Harry Reid and Chuck Schumer and the Democrats on Supreme Court nominations.
RUSH: Of course people in the crowd, boo, boo, boo. Now, just as an aside, Mr. Snerdley, are there other ways of saying what Cruz said here that, in your mind, might have been more effective? Or does this stuff not matter? Some of it does matter but some of it doesn’t. Well, let’s go through these. He says, “Donald and Hillary both agree that our taxes should be increased.”
Okay. Hillary definitely does, and Trump has said that he thinks that the rich aren’t paying enough, that he’s gonna raise taxes on the rich. Okay. The hedge fund guys. Yeah, he’s talking about carried interest, which if people had that explained to ’em, they’d be fit to be tied. They’d be demanding that be fixed. Why should the hedge fund guys be paying 15%, for crying out loud.
“Donald and Hillary both support the Obamacare individual mandates.” Does that matter? It’s not gonna talk you out of Trump’s support. None of this stuff is gonna. So I guess my question, does some of this stuff that make people supporting Trump question it? How much of what Cruz is saying did some Trump supporters not know? “Donald and Hillary believe that illegal immigrants who are here should be able to become US citizens.” (interruption) Ted’s not telling the truth about that? What do you mean, Lyin’ Ted?
Wait a minute, wait a wait a minute, wait a minute. Trump does say that he’s gonna deport ’em and they’re gonna come back “leeegally.” They’re gonna come back “leeegally.” Okay. So you’re not buying that. So you think Cruz is wrong in saying that? Ah, okay. “Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton both support taxpayer funding for Planned Parenthood.” One-hundred percent true. But Trump draws the line at abortion. He does think that they provide valuable services for women. He’s dead wrong about that, by the way.
I have to tell you Trumpists, Trump is dead wrong about this Planned Parenthood thing and his attitude on Planned Parenthood, I guarantee you, is the result of geography and conditioning. In the Northeast, in New York City, Planned Parenthood may as well be the Catholic Church. It’s an abortion factory. It’s all it is. That’s where they get 99% of their money. Okay.
“Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton both supported Clinton’s national ban on many of the most important firearms in America.” So Trump is for gun control. That’s what he’s saying here. Trump is in favor of gun control.
“Donald Trump and Hillary both believe we should negotiate with Harry Reid and Chuck Schumer and the Democrats on Supreme Court nominations.” Now, what does he mean? He’s talking about this current nominee, Garland. Of course you negotiate with them, but what Cruz actually means here is that this guy ought to get a vote. Trump thinks this guy ought to get a vote, we ought to talk to him, the president nominated him.
And the Republicans, the hell with that, this guy’s dead, he dies in the water, the nomination goes nowhere, and it’s the Biden rule. In a presidential election year, outgoing presidents don’t get to name somebody to the court, especially like this, Cruz says that Trump thinks that we should talk to the guy. Okay, so you’ve only pointed out one instance of Lyin’ Ted here. All right. Here’s the next set.
CRUZ: Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton both agree that grown men should be allowed to use the little girls’ restroom. Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton both believe the US government should be neutral between Israel and the Palestinians. Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton have both said they would keep this catastrophic Iranian nuclear deal in place. Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton both believe that Hillary Clinton was one of the greatest secretaries of state of all time.
RUSH: Okay. “Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton both agreed that grown men should be allowed to use the little girls’ restroom.” Trump walked that back, didn’t he? Trump, he sort of walked it back said, “Let the states decide.” “Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton both believe US government should be neutral.” Well, yeah. Trump has said that, but we’ll hear what he says latest in his speech that we have sound bites coming up on. You can decide then.
“Trump and Hillary both have said they would keep the Iranian nuclear deal in place.” Trump calls it the worst deal ever made and he was saying he would not — I don’t know where — I have to look into that. And, “Donald and Hillary both believe that Hillary’s one of the greatest secretaries of state of all time.” Lyin’ Ted? I’ve not heard Trump say that, but here’s the last one. We gotta take a break. We’ll come back with Trump’s sound bites from his foreign policy speech today.
CRUZ: Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton’s campaigns are both run by Washington lobbyists. Washington lobbyists run their entire campaigns for both of them. Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton both supported Obama’s failed stimulus plan. And Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton both supported Obama’s TARP bailout of Wall Street.
RUSH: Okay. Ted lying about any of that? I don’t think so. Manafort is a lobbyist. Trump’s guy. Now, Manafort has been pulled back. This is another thing, another subject for maybe tomorrow. There are gonna be efforts, you know, despite this great memo that we shared excerpts with you from, there are gonna be efforts within the Trump campaign to change him. These consultants and advisors cannot help themselves.
It’s the natural inclination to not let the candidate be who he is. It’s just written in politics. Trump is gonna have to fight that, and he’s so far winning it. Manafort was trying to turn the campaign into Manafort’s campaign. And Trump pulled him back and put Lewandowski back in there.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: People have been holding patiently. Newark, Delaware, Stevie. Thank you for waiting.
CALLER: How you doing, sir?
RUSH: Yeah, hi.
CALLER: Hi. First-time caller. I just want to say thank you for everything you do. Fantastic to have somebody actually stand up for us. But earlier when you were playing the Cruz sound bites, there is a part where he talked about the Iran deal, Iran deal with Trump and how Trump said he was going to get rid of it and it was a terrible deal. I recall in one of the debates, not sure which one, but one of the debates Cruz actually confronted him on this, and Trump’s answer was that he was going to change the deal, not get rid of it, but that it was a terrible deal and he needed to change it. I think that’s what Cruz was implying to when he said he’s not gonna get rid of the Iran deal.
RUSH: Okay, that’s a good point. And there’s one other thing that Cruz said that he got wrong, I think, about Trump. That that may have been it. I can’t think of it off the top of my head. I was thinking about it a half hour ago before the recent sound bites started. When I was going through those sound bites with the 13 things that Cruz says Trump and Hillary are identical on, there’s one more. I can’t think of it. I’ll trying to come up with it during the break
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Okay. The thing that I couldn’t remember that I think Cruz got wrong is Trump… This is from the TheHill.com back to March the 16th. “President Barack Obama plans to announce his Supreme Court nominee on Wednesday, but Donald Trump thinks the Senate shouldn’t give the pick a hearing.” Cruz said that Trump agrees with Harry Reid and Schumer that Garland should be given a hearing. We should have negotiations with them. But TheHill.com back in March said Trump steadfastly opposed that.
On this Iran deal, I think what happened this Iran deal is there was an embargoed version of the Trump speech. The text of the speech was sent out yesterday, and in that version of the speech — which I, of course, folks, as a powerful, influential, member of the media had, that version. But we were all embargoed on it. We couldn’t use it. And in that version, Trump was going to say that he was gonna hold Iran strictly to the letter of the deal, the deal that he has been agreed to. But he didn’t do that. He varied from what was embargoed.
In the speech he delivered earlier today, Trump basically said again and again that Iran would never get a nuclear weapon if he is president. He didn’t get into how he’s gonna stop it, he didn’t get what he’s gonna do vis-a-vis the deal, and that’s why I think this the confusion because Cruz would have had access to the embargoed version of Trump’s speech yesterday in order to make the comparisons that he was making to Hillary. So those are just two little minor conflicting things.