after he refused to be felled by his racist comments, incoherent policies, childish insults, a bizarre fixation on his hand size, and the vague threat of nuclear war, is it possible that republican voters are finally beginning to think twice about donald trump?









all past attempts to predict the imminent collapse of trump<u+2019>s presidential campaign have failed. that being said, there are at least a few reasons to think the billionaire has finally reached a tipping point. several new polls show trump tanking nationally (though still in first place), while his negatives continue to rise. amid 36 hours of nonstop gaffes and terrifying pronouncements, trump suddenly looks poised to lose wisconsin next week, a delegate-rich, winner-take-all state that would have virtually ensured that he would win the nomination, but where he now trails ted cruz by as much as 10 points.









perhaps most important, trump appears to be losing the so-called <u+201c>shadow primary<u+201d> to secure the state delegates who would decide the outcome of a potential contested convention. politico reports that while cruz and john kasich have been making inroads with critical party insiders, more than 100 delegates won by trump are prepared to ditch him after the first ballot in cleveland. if he can<u+2019>t win the republican nomination outright, it<u+2019>s looking more and more like trump will be forced to put up or shut up about his threats to run a third-party spoiler campaign.









a lull in the g.o.p. primary calendar may have helped voters clarify their thoughts on the punchy billionaire. with no primary contests in the last week, national media outlets have focused relentlessly on trump<u+2019>s spate of truly awful statements in recent days, including a sustained barrage of unseemly insults aimed at cruz<u+2019>s wife, heidi, and his misogynistic defense of his campaign manager, who was charged tuesday for roughly grabbing a reporter. the following day, during a town hall event with msnbc<u+2019>s chris matthews, trump mused that he wouldn<u+2019>t rule out using nuclear weapons in europe. minutes later, under heated questioning, the republican front-runner suggested that there <u+201c>has to be some form of punishment<u+201d> for women who get illegal abortions<u+2014>a line that panicked party elites desperate to avoid another todd akin moment.









but never let it be said that trump cannot learn from his mistakes. after losing in iowa to cruz and his disciplined ground game, trump managed to pull his operation together in new hampshire a week later, despite reports that the campaign was hopelessly disorganized. (<u+201c>we learned a lot about ground games in one week,<u+201d> trump boasted in his victory speech.) he has already launched an organized effort to sway delegates to his side, and might up the ante by offering things that cruz and kasich cannot: <u+201c>there are a lot of delegates who<u+2019>d like to ride on trump<u+2019>s plane,<u+201d> former trump operative roger stone told the new york times. <u+201c>there are a lot of delegates who<u+2019>d like to have a phone call from ivanka trump. we<u+2019>ll get to that phase.<u+201d>
is donald trump really, finally falling apart?
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