Donald J. Trump easily dispatched his Republican rivals in the Michigan and Mississippi presidential primaries Tuesday, regaining momentum in the face of intensifying resistance to his campaign among party leaders.
Sen. Bernie Sanders scored an upset win in the Michigan Democratic primary, threatening to prolong a Democratic campaign that Hillary Clinton appeared to have all but locked up last week.
Clinton lost badly in Michigan among independents, showed continued weakness with working-class white Democrats, and was unable to count on as much of an advantage with black voters as she has in the South.
Addressing reporters at a hastily arranged event in Miami while the votes in Michigan were still being counted, Sanders said his strong showing indicated that “the political revolution that we’re talking about is strong in every part of the country.”
“And frankly,” he added, “we believe that our strongest areas are yet to happen.”
While strengthening Sanders’ hand as the race turns to a series of large states next week, his victory in Michigan did not dent Clinton’s delegate lead as she won overwhelmingly in Mississippi, crushing Sanders among African-American voters, and netted more delegates overall.
After losing to Sen. Ted Cruz on Saturday in Kansas and Maine, Trump needed one of his best performances of the campaign to tamp down doubts about his candidacy after a week of gaffes, missteps and questions about the strength of his political organization.
And he got one, demonstrating his appeal with working-class white voters in Michigan, a state Trump has claimed he could win in the general election, while beating back especially stiff challenges from Gov. John Kasich of Ohio there and from Cruz in Mississippi.
Trump, plugging several of his business interests in a victory speech that seemed straight out of QVC, crowed about having prevailed despite what he called millions of dollars’ worth of “horrible lies” in negative ads from his rivals.
“There’s only one person who did well tonight: Donald Trump,” he said in Jupiter, Florida, at one of his golf resorts. He also mocked Cruz. “He’s always saying, ‘I’m the only one that can beat Trump,’” Trump said, imitating his rival, but adding: “He rarely beats me.”