Super Tuesday live blog: Trump, Clinton are big winners

Billionaire Donald Trump is projected to win the Republican presidential primary in Vermont, ending the campaign season’s most momentous day of balloting as the unrivaled favorite for the Republican presidential nomination.

We need to talk about Chris Christie. Specifically, his expression of resignation and horror as he stood behind Donald Trump tonight in Florida.

As Janell Ross writes:

The Fix — and it seems much of Twitter — could not help but notice that Chris Christie showed up in Florida at Donald Trump’s faux Versailles — er, we mean Mar-a-Lago — and had some difficulties…Once Trump took the stage, Twitter stepped in to annotate the, um, various things that Christie was doing with his face.

https://twitter.com/jimtankersley/status/704862622781349888

There is so, so, so much more where that came from. Check out Janell’s full post at The Fix for more of the meme.

Super Tuesday turnout estimates from Edison Media Research:

(This post has been updated)

Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont is projected to win the Democratic caucuses in Minnesota, according to the Associated Press.

Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida has been projected as the winner in Minnesota, his first victory of the 2016 primary season, according to the Associated Press.

Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont is projected to win the Democratic caucuses in Colorado, according to the Associated Press.

Former presidential candidate Gov. Jeb Bush posted a video to Snapchat showing him relaxing over dinner and watching a “Funny or Die” video.

ESSEX JUNCTION, VT – MARCH 1: Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, flanked by family, waves to his supporters before addressing them during a Super Tuesday rally at the Champlain Valley Exposition on March 1, 2016 in Essex Junction, VT. (Photo by Ricky Carioti/ The Washington Post)

Some takeaways from Bernie Sanders’s victory in Oklahoma:

• The Sanders win may be seen as much a rejection of Hillary Clinton and of Barack Obama’s presidency as an endorsement of Sanders himself. Only 38 percent of Oklahoma Democrats said the next president should “continue Obama’s policies” in preliminary exit polls reported by CNN, the lowest of any state before Super Tuesday. That result comes from a group Clinton has dominated (she won 66 percent of their votes in Oklahoma). About 3 in 10 said the next president should pursue more liberal policies than Obama and another 3 in 10 sought a less liberal agenda; Sanders led Clinton by more than 2 to 1 among both groups.

• Oklahomans expressed wide doubts about Clinton’s honesty: 46 percent said she is honest and trustworthy while 52 percent said she is not. Fully 66 percent of Oklahoma Democrats saw Sanders as honest and trustworthy.

• Young people came through for Sanders: He didn’t just win among young voters, he trounced Clinton by over 60 points among those under 30 and by 42 points among those 30 to 44 years old, according to preliminary exit polls reported by CNN. Meanwhile, Clinton was only able to eke past Sanders among voters 45 and older, pulling in about half of those votes. Compare that with Texas, right next door, where Sanders won voters under 30 by a smaller 34-point margin and led Clinton by a narrower 9-point margin with those in their 30s and early 40s.

• Conservatives for Bernie? A majority of Democratic primary voters in Oklahoma said their political views are moderate or conservative, a sharp break from early contests where sometimes record levels identified as liberals. This would figure to be trouble for a self-identified Democratic socialist — but Sanders won conservative Democrats by a 2 to 1 margin over Clinton preliminary exit poll data reported by CNN (51 to 22 percent). Sanders also won by modest margins among liberal voters, while narrowly trailing Clinton among moderates. In neighboring Texas, liberals made up a clear majority of the electorate (60 percent) and Clinton led Sanders among all ideological groups. Her biggest margin came among moderates, where she led Sanders by over 2 to 1.

• Sanders won roughly two-thirds of the vote both for people who think the most important quality in a candidate is that he or she cares about them and is honest according to preliminary exit poll data reported by CNN. In Texas, Sanders won the “honest” vote as well, but by a smaller margin, and Clinton won among voters who say they want a candidate who cares about them.

Also:

BALTIMORE–Ben Carson did not, by any measure, have a good night.

He appears to have finished fourth or fifth in the 11 states that voted on Super Tuesday. But Carson and his supporters weren’t deterred by the disappointing returns as they gathered in the Corinthian room of Baltimore’s Grand hotel, mentioning that he’s not quite ready to “quit untangling” the “rotten” political system.

“It’s good to be back in Baltimore again,” he said, thanking all those who have worked to keep his campaign going. He said he hears from Americans all the time, imploring him to stay in the race: “You cannot leave us,” Carson recalled them saying.

The event opened with a word of prayer. “It’s by faith that we go forward in the campaign,” a man at the microphone said.

The mostly serene room — which included Rep. Andy Harris (R-Md.), who has endorsed Carson after they worked together at John’s Hopkins — erupted with cheers as Carson took the stage. They lifted signs with words like “revive,” “heal,” and “inspire.”

Carson denounced the political powers and special interests he said have contaminated government. He echoed parts of his Fox News op-ed, saying he is resisting pressure from others to drop out.

“It is rotten, it is rotten to the core,” Carson said of the country’s political system. But “I’m not ready to quit untangling it quite yet.”

“Maybe we will have an imperfect candidate, in fact, we will… Even if it’s me,” Carson said encouraging Republicans to vote even if he is not the Republican nominee. “That’s alright, as long as we can help that candidate as long as we can work with that candidate … We can somehow get through this.”

Donald Trump is the preferred presidential candidate of moderate Republicans in New Hampshire and Massachusetts, as well as very conservative ones in Georgia and Alabama. He’s racked up enough support across the board and leveraged a splintered field to win — as of writing — every state except Iowa.

Going back to 1960, well before all of the states regularly weighed in on the nomination, no Republican nominee has won the states of Alabama, Georgia, Massachusetts, Tennessee, New Hampshire, Nevada, Virginia and South Carolina. Much of that is because of the long-standing split between Northeastern Republicans and Southern ones. You can see that in the maps below; almost always when a nominee lost only one or two of these states, he often lost it in New England.

There’s nothing necessarily significant about these eight states, beyond that they’re the ones Trump won. Trump, too, has a loss, just like the 1980 nominee, Ronald Reagan. The reason it’s worth noting, though, is simple:

All of these people ended up being the nominee.

So far tonight, John Kasich has won 13 delegates to Donald Trump’s 139 — fewer than any candidate except Ben Carson. He says he’s okay with that.

MIAMI — Florida Sen. Marco Rubio appears to be on the verge of losing every Super Tuesday contest, but no matter. He asked thousands of supporters at an equestrian center here to focus on two weeks from now.

“Two weeks from tonight, right here in Florida, we are going to send a message loud and clear. We are going to send a message that the party of Lincoln and Reagan and the presidency of the United States will never be held by a con artist,” he told thousands of cheering fans.

The Florida senator took the stage at the Ronald Reagan Equestrian Center just as news outlets declared that Texas Sen. Ted Cruz had won the Oklahoma Republican primary. And minutes after Donald Trump had sealed up a victory in Virginia — one place where the Rubio team thought they might sneak ahead.

Rubio reminded the crowd that in the past five days, “we began to unmask the true nature of the front-runner so far in this race. Five days ago we began to explain to the American people that Donald Trump is a con artist. … We are seeing in state after state — he loves to talk about polls — we are seeing in state after state, his numbers are going down and ours are going up.”

But some in the crowd wondered whether Rubio had waited too long to go after Trump.

“It’s good to see him doing it, but I don’t know if it’s too late,” said Robert Matos, who lives in Miami. “He waited too long to attack Trump directly. He just waited too long. It makes you think, all of them waited so long when they could have gone after him.”

Rubio quickly departed the venue after briefly working a rope line. He was off to explain his horrible, no good, very bad night to television anchors leading national coverage of the Super Tuesday results.

The Donald seems pleased.

Our reporter Abby Phillip came across this dynamic duo at Hillary Clinton’s Miami party.

Look at these two, setting aside their differences and attending together! The only political party they care about is the hoppin’ one they just crashed together. They’re so in sync with each other, even their wigs are coordinated.

Their friendship should set an example for all in this divided country! Gosh darn it, we don’t care what the pessimists say: there may yet be hope for our democra–

MIAMI, FL – Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton impersonators at Super Tuesday watch party for former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Miami, Florida on Tuesday March, 1, 2016. (Photo by Melina Mara/The Washington Post)

Oh. Ok then.

The real Hillary Clinton did not attack Trump quite as directly as her doppelganger, but she did take swipes at him in her speech tonight:

Video posted to social media shows Donald Trump supporters and protesters shoving and yelling at a rally in Louisville, Ky., on Mar. 1. Outside the rally, more protesters shouted, “No racism, no KKK, no fascist U.S.A.”

We may have seen the start of Hillary Clinton’s general election campaign on Tuesday night.

The former first lady sounded themes she’s likely to revisit in the coming months after clinching sweeping wins in Texas and across the South on Super Tuesday. Especially if Donald Trump, who appeared to be having an equally good night, ultimately emerges with the Republican nod.

Clinton didn’t name check The Donald in her victory speech in Miami. But she decried the tenor of the Republican contest and laid out the issues, including income inequality, that she intends to run on.

“This country belongs to all of us, not just those at the top, not just to people who look one way, worship one way or even think one way,” she said.

Clinton also played off Trump’s slogan that he will “Make America Great Again.”

“America prospers when we all prosper. America is strong when we’re all strong,” she said. “And we know we’ve got work to do, but that work is not to make America great again. America never stopped being great.”

“We have to make America whole — we have to fill in, fill in what’s been hollowed out. We have to make strong the broken places, restitch the bonds of trust and respect across our country.”

Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont has won the Democratic primary in Oklahoma over former secretary of state Hillary Clinton, according to the Associated Press.

A 55 percent majority of Virginia Republican voters said they would be dissatisfied with Donald Trump becoming the party’s standard bearer — but they couldn’t rally behind any of his challengers to block his victory. By contrast, 59 percent of Republicans said they would be satisfied with Marco Rubio becoming the nominee, while 42 percent would be satisfied with Ted Cruz.

But Trump’s detractors were splintered — 50 percent of those who were dissatisfied with Trump supported Rubio in preliminary exit poll data, but 22 percent backed Cruz and another 17 percent supported John Kasich. Looked at another way, among those who would be happy with Rubio, he won just about half. Trump locked down voters who said they would be satisfied with him leading the GOP ticket, with fully 76 percent of this group voting for him in Virginia.

The Texas senator beat businessman Donald Trump, who held a clear lead in polling going into the vote.

Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas and former secretary of state Hillary Clinton are projected to win the Republican and Democratic primaries in Texas, according to Edison Media Research.

STAFFORD, Texas — As we noted earlier, Donald Trump went for a palatial setting for his Florida presser tonight.

Ted Cruz, on the other hand, has gone in a radically different direction:

Sounds swanky. Let’s take a peek inside.

It does not disappoint.

Update at 8:34 pm: More images have emerged from inside the Redneck Country Club. We now know that it features Texas-shaped sinks:

And Uncle Sam himself is in attendance. Here he is, telling YOU to vote for Ted Cruz.

The venue features a beer bottle chandelier, a replica of the car from the “Dukes of Hazzard” parked by some fire pits, and free-flowing drinks.

The bar, which resembles a barn, owned by conservative radio host Michael Berry, a friend of Cruz’s who stumped for the senator in Iowa.

A country band is playing and supporters are munching on pulled pork and free popcorn. Video screens are playing Fox News, with cheers going up every time Cruz or Texas is mentioned.

Billionaire Donald Trump is projected to win the Republican presidential primary in Virginia, his fifth win of the night.

Bernie Sanders delivered an impassioned speech to his supporters earlier in the evening, but they didn’t seem to stick around for long after he wrapped up.

They’re going…

Going…

https://www.instagram.com/p/BCbozgSARRg/?taken-by=danroberts73

Gone.

Perhaps it’s because tonight’s primary results currently look like this (although several of the races have yet to be called.)

MIAMI, FL – Supporters cheer as they watch Super Tuesday winning results come in for former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Miami, Florida on Tuesday March, 1, 2016. (Photo by Melina Mara/The Washington Post)

Virginia’s sizable African American population boosted Hillary Clinton in Virginia as expected, but preliminary exit polls show she led Sanders across a range of groups that favored Bernie Sanders in earlier contests.

Black voters made up roughly one-quarter of the electorate, down slightly from 30 percent in 2008 and less than half their share in Saturday’s South Carolina primary. Clinton won more than 80 percent of their votes according to preliminary exit poll results.

Clinton won among white voters by 17 points, and even topped Sanders by 10 percentage points among whites identifying as “very liberal,” 55 to 45 percent. In Iowa one month ago, Sanders won very liberal white voters by 21 points.

Clinton did lose Democratic voters under 30 by vote in Virginia — though the 68 to 30 percent loss was actually a significantly smaller margin than in Nevada, New Hampshire or Iowa, where she lost by over 65 points. Also unlike those early contests, Sanders lost voters aged 30-44 by a 16-point margin and Clinton racked up a massive 56-point win among Democrats ages 45 and older. That age bloc accounted for roughly 6 in 10 primary voters.

Strikingly, Clinton broke about even among Democrats who said the most important issue was income inequality, winning 49 percent of the vote compared with 50 percent for Sanders. Sanders had won this group by wide margins in Iowa, Nevada and New Hampshire, but lost them in South Carolina’s primary Saturday.

And Clinton dominated across all regions of the state. She routed Sanders in both Richmond and the eastern part of the state as well as in the D.C. suburbs. Combined, these regions account for about half of Virginia’s voters. She also led by a wide margin in the Tidewater region, which includes Norfolk and Virginia Beach. In the Northern Virginia exurbs and the Shenandoah, Clinton led by a narrower 18 points.

Former secretary of state Hillary Clinton is the projected winner of the Democratic primary in Arkansas, according to Edison Media Research, a state where she once served as first lady.

PALM BEACH, Fla. — Forget a watch party with volunteers and supporters. Forget packing into a run-of-the-mill banquet hall or hotel ballroom. Forget the sound of numerous televisions tuned to CNN as the crowd reacts with boos or cheers.

Instead, Donald Trump will reflect on the Super Tuesday results tonight in the company of dozens reporters at Mar-a-Lago, the historic, lavish, exclusive club he owns here in tony Palm Beach. Most people have to spend $100,000 to join this club — or know someone wealthy who will invite them inside for a visit.

Reporters arrived hours before the scheduled start time and were directed to the service entrance around back. They then entered a luxurious wonderland: bright green, perfectly manicured lawns run from the Spanish-style mansion to the palm tree-lined water. Television reporters who have spent months doing stand-ups in empty convention centers or standing in snow suddenly had a plethora of lush backdrop options. Twitter, Instagram and Facebook filled with photos.

Trump plans to speak around 9 p.m. ET in the “White and Gold Ballroom,” ornately decorated with elaborate gold molding and three gigantic crystal chandeliers. The stage is lined with 10 American flags and lit in red and white. Although this room often hosts weddings, tonight it is outfitted with rows of gold-painted chairs, with the first two rows reserved for Trump’s family and special guests. A campaign staffer warned reporters — jokingly, but also rather seriously — not to damage any of the columns lining the length of the room. At least two dozen television cameras stand in the back of the ballroom. Outside, past the Secret Service check-point, there is hot coffee and plates of cookies warming under heat lamps.

For Trump, this campaign has not focused solely on connecting with the thousands of potential voters who show up to his rallies — or the dozens who happen to make their way into private meet-and-greets or random retail stops. A major focus has been on connecting with the millions who follow him on television, live feeds on the internet or social media. By holding a press conference instead of a party, he focuses on those followers at home — especially those in states who have yet to vote.

And don’t forget, this is Florida, which is not a Super Tuesday state but is home to one of Trump’s chief rivals, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) — though Trump has led in the polls here for months.

Billionaire Donald Trump has been projected as the winner of the Republican presidential primaries in Alabama, Massachusetts and Tennessee, according to Edison Media Research, on a night in which Trump hopes to seize control of the GOP race by winning races from New England to the Deep South to Alaska.

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is the projected winner of the Alabama and Tennessee Democratic primaries, according to Edison Media Research, as she looks to dramatically widen her lead in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination over Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.

Keeping it close in Virginia. EPA/ERIK S. LESSER

• The D.C. suburbs are anchoring Rubio: Pre-primary polls showed Trump a clear favorite to win Virginia, but the race is close thanks to the D.C. suburbs, which have swung hard for Marco Rubio. Preliminary exit polls show Rubio garnering roughly 40 percent of the vote in early results there, double the level of support for Trump. Kasich also peels off roughly one-quarter of the suburban D.C. vote. Yet turnout may be a challenge for Rubio — the early results also show close-in D.C. suburbs making up a smaller share of the electorate than four years ago. Trump fares best in the more rural Shenandoah and western parts of the state as well as the southeast Tidewater region

• Higher-educated and higher-income Virginians favor Rubio: He leads by about 15 percentage points among those with postgraduate degrees and by around 6 points for those with bachelor’s degrees. But Trump posts a double-digit lead with voters with some college education and a nearly 30-point edge over all other contenders among voters with a high school education or less.

• Rubio is also bringing in more votes from those with higher incomes: Nearly half of Virginia Republicans report incomes of at least $100,000, up significantly from the 2012 primary. Rubio leads with this group by double digits over Trump. Middle-income voters split about evenly between the two candidates, while Trump dominates Rubio by more than 3 to 1 among voters with incomes below $50,000

More takeaways:

• About 6 in 10 Virginia Republicans say people working in the U.S. illegally should have a legal way to stay in the country and these voters went to Rubio by an almost 2 to 1 margin. But Trump leads by an even wider margin among voters who want to deport undocumented immigrants.

• Virginia Republicans rank economy as the most important issue in the election, but these voters split in their support for Rubio and Trump. Similarly, voters who think other issues are most important (terrorism and government spending) are also split between the two leading candidates.

• Among age groups, the margins are narrow. Among the about 1 in 10 voters under 29, they split nearly evenly among Rubio and Trump with about 3 in 10 votes each. This trend continued among 30-44 year olds, who make up about 2 in 10 voters in Virginia: Trump pulls in slightly more of the 45+ vote than Rubio, but by less than 10 points.

Billionaire Donald Trump is projected to win the Republican presidential primary in Georgia – taking the first victory of Super Tuesday, on a night when he could significantly extend his lead in delegates and seize control of this chaotic GOP race.

Ted Cruz’s Republican primary strategy — appeal to Southerners, base voters, and evangelicals — was a good one for a movement conservative. It works! It’s just not working for Cruz, who’s been losing those voters to Donald Trump:

ESSEX JUNCTION, VT. — Supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders may have missed Super Tuesday’s high point, for their candidate anyway.

Thousands of Sanders’s fans crowded into the Expo Center in in his home state of Vermont, awaiting the results of his showdown with Hillary Clinton.

But instead of breaking into shouts and cheers when news organizations called Vermont for the senator right after the polls closed here, the crowd was oblivious as they listened to pop star Bob Folds still playing on stage at the time.

Sanders’s campaign quickly tried to spread its message but not in person — supporters got an email saying Sanders had won.

“The polls just closed and we have earned our first victory of the night in Vermont,” the email said. “It looks like the margin should be impressive as well. That means a lot of delegates for our campaign, which is very important. I think we are going to do quite well tonight.

MIAMI — Whether he wins big, loses everything or just survives Super Tuesday, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio is poised to celebrate here Tuesday night.

Tropical Park, a city park near his West Miami home is the scene and an equestrian arena named for Ronald Reagan is the backdrop. The campaign expects thousands to show up, and revelers were beginning to stream in at 7 p.m. ET, just as polls closed in the first Super Tuesday states.

Hours before, Rubio’s team was attempting to set expectations and assuage the doubts of top donors. Campaign chairman Terry Sullivan huddled with about 40 top fundraisers in Washington Tuesday for a hastily-arranged gathering “designed to pull in close their D.C. supporters,” as one attendee put it.

Sullivan once again laid out the campaign’s theory that the Republican nomination fight will stretch all the way to the party’s nominating convention in July.

“His theory is that you go to Cleveland and nobody has a majority of the delegates. And if that’s the case, when you get into the second, third or fourth ballot, delegates get released,” said one attendee, who asked for anonymity to speak frankly about the meeting.

“They’re trying to set expectations low. They’re trying to tell folks, don’t panic after today — they didn’t say that — but you could infer that as being their objective. And that probably was part of it,” the attendee said.

About 40 donors attended the meeting, including several long-time Rubio backers and about 10 recent recruits from former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush’s failed campaign, attendees said.

A Rubio campaign spokesman declined to elaborate on the private meeting.

Rubio aides and supporters say they believe that the senator will fare well tonight in Arkansas, Oklahoma, Virginia and Minnesota, either placing second or perhaps squeezing out a win over Trump.

Meanwhile, supporters wait on the grounds of the Ronald Reagan Equestrian Arena, a semi-outdoor venue that hosts more than 36 horse shows a year for Arabian, Western-style, Paso Finos and other breeds.

There’s a football field just to the west, where aides say Rubio used to play football as a child. On the other side is the site of Santa’s Enchanted Forest, an annual, somewhat hokey holiday tradition widely beloved yet mocked by locals.

Donald Trump’s incendiary comments labeling Mexican immigrants “rapists” and criminals, and calling for a ban on Muslims entering the U.S., appear to have clashed with a concerted effort by the Virginia Republican Party and GOP nationally to diversify its voters.

But John Whitbeck, chairman of the state GOP, said high voter turnout across the state in the presidential primary proves that the Republican frontrunner’s message has not alienated voters as many feared. Of course, high turnout in other states has signaled a win by Trump and the results are not yet clear in Virginia.

“The Republican message to new communities has been in play for four years now,” Whitbeck said in a phone interview shortly before polls closed in Virginia. “In terms of new and aggressive desire to sell platform locally and nationally, if we were at low turnout or static turnout from past years, this would be something we weren’t proud of.”

He added, “Donald Trump, because he has 100 percent name ID and 100 percent of America knows him, he’s getting a good amount of support across the board.”

In fact, Whitbeck said he’s heard anecdotal evidence of overwhelming turnout. Arlington ran out of Republican ballots. Roanoke turnout was a 96 percent of 2008 levels by 4 p.m., and first-time voters are common in Virginia Beach and Loudoun, he said.

“We’ve had eight years of the worst possible agenda for the American people. People are fed up. We’re seeing it on both sides,” he said.

Whitbeck rejected the theory that Democrats are voting in the Republican nominating contest to undermine the primary process, noting the lengths Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D) has gone to to help Hillary Clinton run up the tally against Bernie Sanders

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump spent the day looking beyond the 11 “Super Tuesday” primary contests, holding rallies in Kentucky and Ohio, which respectively vote on March 8 and March 15.

The flamboyant showman stepping off his private airplane at the Port Columbus International Airport in Ohio, where he addressed a crowd of supporters with the plane sitting dramatically in the background. Trump seemed confident that he would pull out major wins Tuesday, even saying he can believe sitting Ohio Gov. John Kasich, one of Trump’s rivals for the GOP nomination, in his home state.

“Did you ever hear of a guy named Kasich? We’ll save that for after tonight,” Trump said as the crowd booed. “We really want to win Ohio.”

Later Tuesday afternoon Trump addressed thousands of supporters here in Louisville, where they packed into the Kentucky International Convention Center. Voters in the state  cast their ballots on Saturday. Trump was accompanied by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who endorsed him last week, at both campaign events

“I think we’re going to have a good night tonight,” Trump said. “And Saturday, I’m going to be keeping an eye on Kentucky.”

Hillary Clinton is the projected winner of two key Super Tuesday states in the race for the Democratic nomination, as exit polls show her outpacing upstart rival Sen. Bernie Sanders in Georgia and Virginia. Projections show that Sanders has blunted her early lead with a win in his home state of Vermont, which he has represented in Congress for the last 25 years.

The sun rises over the Herndon Community Center in Herndon, Va., as voters cast their ballots in the presidential primary on Super Tuesday. (Allison Shelley for The Washington Post)

Welcome to Super Tuesday! For those unaware, Super Tuesday is a day in the 2016 presidential campaign on which voters in about a dozen states will cast their ballots in presidential primaries and caucuses. Both Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Hillary Clinton, who have led in both national polls and polls of Super Tuesday states, are expected to grow their leads in their respective parties’ nominating contests substantially.

But just how substantially depends on a lot of things. And the arcane delegate rules of each state — especially on the Republican side — make following 11 states on either side difficult (even for us!). So we thought we’d simplify it. Below is a small summary of the main subplot in each Super Tuesday state, listed helpfully in chronological order by poll closing time.

GEORGIA

Republicans (76 delegates): A possible Rubio/Cruz upset?

Unlike in most states on this list, the polling in Georgia has been somewhat competitive. Trump could win almost all of the delegates by breaking 50 percent of the vote — the threshold for triggering a “winner-take-all” situation — but with that looking less likely here, the big question is whether Marco Rubio or Ted Cruz can pull an upset or keep it close. At the very least, each will want to get to 20 percent — the threshold for winning some delegates both statewide and in each congressional district.

Democrats (102 delegates): Can Sanders win a few delegates?

Bernie Sanders won’t win many, given he trails by 30 to 40 points in polls, but given that states award at least four and as many as seven delegates in each congressional district, Sanders should be able to pick off a few here or there — provided he meets the 15 percent threshold, which it looks like he will.

VERMONT

Republicans (16): Can Trump get 50 percent?

The only poll we have here showed Trump leading Rubio by 15 points, 32 to 17, last month, but it was a two-week-long survey. In other words, who knows? It is a mortheastern state, which should favor Trump, but it’s also Vermont, which is … unique. The state is a small delegate prize, but just like in Georgia , if Trump can reach 50 percent, he will get all the delegates.

Democrats (16): How massive is Sanders’s home-state win?

Sanders will win and will take all the delegates here; he led Clinton 86 to 10 and 83 to 9 in the only polls we have. Again, Vermont is unique.

VIRGINIA

Republicans (49): A delegate prize for all

Trump leads by 13 to 23 points here, depending on the poll. There is no winner-take-all provision and no threshold, so getting to 50 percent or 20 percent doesn’t matter. That means Rubio and Cruz could both gain a significant amount of the state’s 49 delegates, without worrying about not getting any.

Democrats (95): A somewhat competitive (relatively speaking) Southern state

Polling here shows Clinton up between 17 and 27 points. She’ll win the lion’s share of delegates, but Sanders will get some. And Northern Virginia is likely to be of some help to him.

Get the rest of the list here

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump signs autographs for fans at a rally at the Fort Worth Convention Center on February 26, 2016. (Tom Pennington/Getty Images)

There’s a weird insecurity that lingers around state parties in primary season, a political thirst for recognition and attention. Iowa and New Hampshire overdose on the stuff. South Carolina and Nevada this year hit the sweet spot of a lot of attention over a short period of time. States like California and New York, confident in themselves, are happy to go later on. Smaller states, though, are in something of a bind if they don’t get in at the front end. How do you get candidates to pay attention to you if you’re an Arkansas or a Minnesota?

Taking inspiration from the strategy employed by the Food Network and VH1, such states have a perennial solution: bundling, a.k.a. Super Tuesday — a day where so many votes are at stake that it becomes important in and of itself, regardless of whether an individual state has much to offer.

This year, Arkansas and Minnesota are the remoras on the shark that is Texas, the hangers-on as the attention goes to the big state. This is a bit unfair — Texas is five times the size of Minnesota but has only four times as many delegates — but it’s to be expected.

Texas also dwarfs Minnesota this year for another reason: What happens in the state on Tuesday could provide a great deal of insight into what happens next in the Republican nomination contest.

It seems likely that Ted Cruz will win his home state. A few polls showed Donald Trump close to him or ahead of him last week, but the average of a slew of recent polls shows Cruz with a pretty big lead. He’s also spent a lot of time in the state over the past few days, in the way that losing armies entrench within their borders for one last stand.

A nine-point lead should be more than enough to feel secure as polls close. But the scale of that lead is important.

What counts in the nomination contest isn’t winning states, it’s winning delegates — and Texas’s delegate math means that a closer race will result in fewer delegates for Cruz, who needs them desperately.

Cruz won in Iowa on the strength of his turnout efforts in the state, something we can assume he’s got locked down in Texas as well. (After all, he won a statewide election there three and a half years ago.) We can also assume that Trump — who’s surging nationally — could overperform in the state based on the enthusiasm of his supporters. So let’s assume that the nine-point gap between the two could move five points in either direction.

If Cruz gets 37.2 percent and Trump 28.2 percent — where they are in the polling average — Cruz would get 26 at-large delegates to Trump’s 18.

If Cruz gets 39.7 percent to Trump’s 25.7 (a 14-point gap), Cruz would get 27 to Trump’s 17.

If Cruz gets 34.7 to Trump’s 30.7 (a four-point gap), Cruz gets 24 to Trump’s 20.

Context is important. Trump had a net gain of 50 delegates in South Carolina, and because it was winner-take-all, Cruz got zero. He can lose by 14 points in the vote and only be down 10 in the Texas at-large delegate count.

Most of Texas’s delegates, though, are divvied up at the congressional district level. There are 36 congressional districts, each of which gives out three delegates. But here, the margins don’t matter. If Cruz comes in first and Trump comes in second in all of them, Cruz gets two delegates in each of them to Trump’s one. That’s 72 delegates for Cruz and 36 for Trump, even if Cruz wins by 14 points. So the net gain for Cruz in his giant home state would be plus 46 delegates — fewer than Trump won in South Carolina.

That’s assuming Trump and Cruz are over the 20 percent threshold, which is a fair assumption. They need more than 20 percent statewide and/or in congressional districts to get any delegates. Which is the big question for Marco Rubio, as the graph above makes clear. If he doesn’t get to 20 percent support, he doesn’t get delegates. The end. If he barely gets across the 20 percent threshold and Trump and Cruz hit their polling average marks, Rubio would pick up nine at-large delegates to Trump’s 15 and Cruz’s 20 — and no others, if the same margins play out at the congressional level.

The math is complicated, but the implications are pretty clear: Cruz probably isn’t coming out of Texas with a massive delegate advantage, thanks to the way the rules are articulated.

What Texas reveals, more than tweaks to the delegate math, is how Cruz and Trump compete on the most favorable possible ground for Cruz. That the race is as close as it is is a problem for Cruz; if the enthusiasm for Trump’s campaign makes the race much closer — or if Trump were to win — it’s hard to see how Cruz could win anywhere else. Trump has already devoured Cruz’s base of support nationally. A CNN/ORC poll released Monday showed Trump gaining ground with evangelical and tea party voters since a month ago.

Full story here

We talk about Super Tuesday as though it is a solid thing, a day on the electoral calendar in which there is one result.

The truth on the Republican side is that it is deeply messy, a combination of a dozen races with a dozen set of rules with another dozen set of exceptions. In nearly every state, the proportional distribution of delegates to candidates is proportional in the sense that “more” is bigger than “less.” Whether a candidate gets any delegates at all requires hitting different marks in different states: 20 percent in some, zero percent in others. Each state sets its own rules under loose guidelines from the Republican National Committee.

To make this obvious, we created a tool that applies the delegate distribution plans (as articulated at Frontloading HQ and the Green Papers) to generic election results. The complexity of the math on this is no joke, which I can assure you as the person who endeavored to figure out all of the possible contingencies. So to make it a bit easier, we decided to apply some blanket assumptions to the numbers.

The assumptions:

1. The same percentages hold for each candidate in each state.
2. They also hold for independent congressional districts.
3. There is no home-field advantage.
4. Since rounding rules vary — what happens if too many or too few delegates are assigned — we’re just skipping them. This is a handful of delegates, anyway.
5. In the event of a tie, the win goes to the person who is currently polling better nationally.

The numbers in red are the total delegates earned by each candidate on Super Tuesday if the rules above apply. Change them around and see what happens. (You can use the sliders or type in numbers directly.) Below, the change in each state’s allocation with each change in the percentages is explained. Tiny shifts, tripping over invisible thresholds, can make a big difference.

This is what Super Tuesday really looks like.

Sen. Ted Cruz appears at a rally at the Shrine auditorium in San Antonio with Texas Gov. Gregg Abbott and the former governor Rick Perry. (Photo by Lucian Perkins /for The Washington Post)

HOUSTON — Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) said Tuesday it would be an “enormous mistake” for Republicans to nominate Donald Trump as their presidential nominee.

Cruz voted at a community center here, presenting his identification and spelling his name to an election worker. Flanked by his wife and two young daughters, Cruz told reporters that he believes he will do well here in his home state. While Cruz’s candidacy has floundered recently, he is favored to win Texas and haul in many of its delegates. In a shot at rival Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, Cruz said any candidate who doesn’t win his home state is in trouble.

“But there is no doubt that any candidate who cannot win his home state has real problems. I believe we will do well here in Texas,” he said.

[Overshadowed by Trump and Rubio, Cruz looks to Texas for his last stand]

Cruz’s campaign has played a game of numbers since its inception, attempting to amass as many delegates as possible. Tuesday is key to that strategy, and Cruz believes it will pay off.

“For any candidate that wakes up tomorrow morning who has not won any states, for any candidate who makes up tomorrow morning who has a negligible number of delegates, I think it’s time to start thinking about coming together and unifying and presenting a clear choice,” he said. “I believe it would be an enormous mistake to nominate Donald Trump, so I speak to unity for Republicans.”

Cruz’s campaign has long banked on Super Tuesday as making — or potentially breaking — Cruz’s candidacy. He had expected to do well in the South, with its large concentration of conservative and evangelical Christian voters that Cruz sees as his base. But he suffered a stinging defeat in South Carolina and now must deal with the ascendancy of Trump. Cruz blitzed across the South and Texas this weekend, reminding voters of his win in the Iowa caucuses over Trump.

“The only campaign that is in a position to beat Donald Trump on Super Tuesday is our campaign, and if you don’t want to see Donald Trump as the nominee, if you don’t want us to give this election to Hillary Clinton, then I ask you to stand with us today. Super Tuesday is the single best opportunity to beat Donald Trump,” he said in Houston.

Francisco Valle, 74, of Houston stood at the polling place holding a sign depicting Trump with a Hitler-style mustache and his right hand raised. It read, “absolutely no Mexicans.” Valle also hung a sign with the letter T and word “Trump” in the shape of a swastika with “STOP” written beneath.

“I am here because I want to make awareness of a movement that is very dangerous to all the minorities because Hitler started the same way,” said Valle, 74, who said he is Mexican-American. “He blamed the Jews for all the problems, and now Trump is blaming the Mexicans for the problems.”

Valle, speaking in Spanish to reporters, was confronted by voter William Bruso.

“Since most of us here speak English, can you repeat what you just said in English for everyone to understand sir? This is America, you know,” said Bruso, who was wearing a Cruz sticker and said he is half Hispanic. “What I mean is, most everyone here is speaking English right now, so why don’t we just go ahead and speak in English?”

At a Super Tuesday rally for Gov. John Kasich (R-Ohio) in Arlington, Va., supporters are anxious about the day’s results but also looking ahead, hoping for a win in their candidate’s home state.

Via Fenit Nirappil:

Army Major Peter Johnson cast his presidential primary ballot at the Chrysler Art Museum in Norfolk, Va. wearing his full camouflage uniform and boots. He believes Ohio Gov. John Kasich is the most pragmatic and level-headed candidate.

In the Hampton Roads region with multiple bases and military facilities, Johnson is among those doubting GOP favorite Donald Trump’s ability to lead the military in a world with constantly evolving and complex threats.

“He’s not ready to be commander-in-chief. He has no experience,” said Johnson, who is 48 and is stationed at Ft. Eustis 30 miles away. “The issues are going to overwhelm him because they’re so complex.”

His wife Anne-Marie was less diplomatic. “He acts like a child, always throwing temper tantrums,” the 46-year-old woman said.

Trump has won over many veterans with his promises to make America’s military win again and crush terrorists, and people with military connections were among the thousands who showed up at his Sunday rally at Radford University in southwest Virginia.

Others have their doubts, including a former CIA director who recently suggested the U.S. military would defy orders from Trump.

Perry Baller, who was a Navy musician on an aircraft carrier in the Vietnam War, says he’s confident the military will fall in line behind a President Trump.

“He’ll get a lot done, and he’ll also get the best people to work for him so it’s not going to be the good old boys,” said Baller, 68 and who voted for Trump at a Norfolk precinct close to the naval station.

Donna Van Keuren, whose husband is a civilian Navy employee after serving in the meteorology command, says Trump is too unpredictable to be president.

“Next thing we know we could have a big war or are blown away. I’m frightened sometimes,” said the 70-year-old retired oceanographer. She voted for Hillary Clinton at a Norfolk elementary school.

Ron Sledge, who was an Air Force radar technician for four year and whose wife also served in the military, also said he doubted Trump had the experience to lead the country. He voted for Bernie Sanders with his 18-year-old daughter because he thought the Vermont senator offered the best vision for her economic future and educational opportunities.

“If we are sending our kids off to war, we have to think for what cause,” said Sledge, 56.

Marco Rubio, one of Trump’s leading challengers, tore into the real estate mogul and promised a massive military buildup at a Sunday campaign stop in nearby Virginia Beach.

Mike Huckabee is rushing to Donald Trump’s defense after the Republican front-runner was criticized for equivocating before he disavowed white supremacist David Duke.

On Facebook Tuesday, Huckabee said Trump is “taking a lot of flak for … not disavowing [Duke] fast enough, as if there were any possibility that Donald Trump was actually sympathetic to the KKK.”

“It’s a well-worn tactic to tar a candidate. Just because someone unsavory endorses you, that doesn’t mean you endorse them,” Huckabee wrote. “Even Ronald Reagan had to repudiate a Klan endorsement, and he did so forcefully and eloquently. The attacks on Trump over this mostly came from fellow Republicans. Before Democrats try to tie the KKK to Republicans, they might want to remember all the things they named after Robert Byrd…”

In case you missed it, Trump was asked on CNN Sunday whether he disavowed the Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacist groups. He said he needed to research the groups before doing so, our colleague Jenna Johnson reported.

Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan addresses the audience at the metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal Church in Washington on June 24, 2015. (Reuters/Carlos Barria)

Louis Farrahkhan, the leader of the Nation of Islam, praised Donald Trump over the weekend for not accepting money from the Jewish community.

This came just before Trump appeared on CNN and refused to disavow white supremacist David Duke without doing “research.”

As our colleague Niraj Chokshi reports:

Both Duke and Farrakhan are outspoken in their view that the Jewish community wields disproportionate — and nefarious — control over world affairs. Both advocate against interracial relations. And both have issued at least some limited kudos for Trump.

“Not that I’m for Mr. Trump, but I like what I’m looking at,” Farrakhan said in Chicago on Saturday, according to Nation of Islam video of his speech first highlighted by the Anti-Defamation League …

Farrakhan’s comments mirror those of Duke, a former member of the Ku Klux Klan who was also once associated with neo-Nazi ideology. Duke has alternately accused Jewish men and women of controlling the media, Hollywood, the banking industry, America and the world.

The Super Tuesday primaries are different from the early contests in states like Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina — and that difference is one reason Donald Trump has an advantage today. As our colleagues Matea Gold and Anu Narayanswamy report:

Super Tuesday voters were not inundated with TV ads, mailers and robo-calls.

The vast swath of terrain in play Tuesday — with contests from Alaska to Virginia — meant that super PACs and other independent groups supporting the candidates could not afford to saturate the airwaves. Instead, they had to carefully select their targets, hoping to reach the slice of the electorate most beneficial to their side.

As a result, many voters likely gleaned most of their information from media reports rather than campaign ads — news coverage that has been intensely focused on Republican front-runner Donald Trump.

Here’s a look at Super Tuesday spending by outside groups, broken down by state:

And by top-spending groups:

Via Clinton’s Twitter feed, as well as Hillary Clinton campaign aide Ian Sams:

Check this out, via The Townsend Austin:

Ann Coulter vs. Sean Hannity.  Tucker Carlson vs. Jonah Goldberg. Laura Ingraham vs. Rick Wilson. Larry Kudlow vs. John Podhoretz.

In case you missed it, all of these pairs fought on Twitter in the last two days over issues related to the rise of Donald Trump. Here’s an excerpt from our story, which includes all the relevant tweets:

Two examples began with this tweet from Mitt Romney, who emerged from relative Twitter silence this week to slam Trump for several issues, including his refusal to disavow the Ku Klux Klan in an interview with CNN:

Over the course of 24 hours, Romney’s tweet become a lightning rod on the right, separating figures like the Daily Caller’s Tucker Carlson from National Review’s Jonah Goldberg:

And radio host Laura Ingraham from Republican strategist Rick Wilson, a leading critic of Trump within the GOP:

To read more — and see the long back-and-forth between Coulter and Hannity — visit our story here.

It’s not easy to be a Republican congressional leader, especially now that Donald Trump seems on his way to cementing his status as the party’s front-runner.

Our colleague Amber Phillips wrote about some of the approaches lawmakers are using to deal with Trump. Here are the first two:

1. Donald Trump’s my man

The folks in this camp have decided to jump wholeheartedly into Trump’s pitch for voters. Not only is he the GOP front-runner; he is the best candidate for the job, they say. “This isn’t a campaign; this is a movement,” said Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), who on Saturday became the first sitting U.S. senator to endorse Trump.

Before Sessions, Rep. Chris Collins (R-N.Y.) became the first sitting member of Congress to endorse Trump. Collins told The Fix he simply thinks Trump is the strongest in the field on national security and job creation. “He’s the man to do it,” Collins said.

2. If you can’t beat him, join him

In this group, we have the pragmatists. As early as mid-February, at least one member of Congress, Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.), saw the writing on the wall that Trump is the most likely Republican candidate to win the nomination and decided it’d be more prudent to join forces with him rather than against him.

Hunter’s chief of staff, Joe Kasper, explained it like this to The Fix: “You have to stop talking nonsense and saying disparaging things about the guy who ultimately is more likely than not to be the Republican nominee” …

 Hat tip to Killer Mike, another Bernie supporter:

SOCIAL STUDIES | Via The Post’s Jose DelReal:

To catch up on this part of the — uh — campaign conversation, read this piece from our colleagues Ed O’Keefe and Dave Weigel:

The name-calling has long been the province of Trump, who has elevated the insult-tweet to an art form and who spent months tormenting now-departed candidate Jeb Bush as “low energy” and worse. But now Trump’s two main rivals — particularly Rubio — have suddenly joined in, personally attacking the billionaire GOP front-runner, as Trump is poised for big wins in this week’s Super Tuesday primaries …

At rallies in recent days, Trump also has repeatedly called Rubio “Little Marco” or “Little Rubio.” Rubio hit back Sunday night by mocking Trump at a rally at Roanoke College in Salem, Va., saying the businessman has tiny hands. “You know what they say about men with small hands,” Rubio said, pausing for laughter. “You can’t trust them.”

In case you missed it, a Donald Trump rally in Radford, Va. turned nasty on Monday night. Our colleague Fenit Nirappil has the story:

Trump was describing how he would react to companies such as Carrier moving air conditioner production to Mexico when he was interrupted by commotion in nearby bleachers. The crowd was jeering at an apparent protester.

“Are you from Mexico?” he repeatedly shouted at the woman as she stepped down from the bleachers.

On the other side of the room, three rows of young people, mostly African Americans, stood up, holding hands and shouting, “No more hate.” It took nearly 10 minutes to escort them out of the room as supporters jeered, and Trump shouted to get the protesters out.

“All lives matter,” Trump shouted as they left to loud cheers, mirroring similar comments made Sunday in Alabama.

Shortly after, Christopher Morris, a photographer for Time magazine, was attempting to leave the press section to photograph the Black Lives Matter protesters when he was “thrown to the ground in a choke hold” by a Secret Service agent, Time said.

Here’s a clip of the moment:

Via our colleague Pamela Constable:

At the Herndon Community Center, where a mix of Hispanic and Asian immigrants joined the growing stream of voters all morning, several Hispanics said they had chosen Hillary Clinton and were offended by the negative comments Donald Trump had made about Mexicans and illegal immigrants.

“Hillary has a good heart, and the Democrats have a more human feeling than the Republicans for immigrants, whether they have (legal) papers or not,” said Maria Cardona, 57, a day care worker from El Salvador.

Among voters from India, China and the Philippines, including high tech professionals and medical workers, opinion was far more diverse, and more focused on economic issues than on the candidates’ views about foreign-born Americans like themselves.

One group of four Filipina women, all close friends and several related to each other, drove together to cast their ballots but split them among two parties and three candidates; two chose Clinton, one Trump and one Marco Rubio.

“I don’t like all of Trump’s ideas, but he speaks from the heart, plus he makes millions of dollars so he can probably do that for all Americans,” said Marivic Barasona, 56, a hospital nursing assistant.

Her niece, a nurse and mother of two named Karen Gonzaga, 37, laughed and shook her head in disagreement. “I like Trump but I’m not ready for him. He’s too extreme,” she said. She described herself as an “independent with conservative leanings” and said that while she sympathized with the striving of illegal immigrants, they should “follow the legal process like we did.”

After wrestling with indecision, Gonzaga voted for Rubio, in part because she thought he would try to restore political peace in Washington. “Everything is so chaotic now,” she said. “We have to be a democracy and talk to each other.”

The two other women, retired sisters in law, said they were firmly supporting Clinton — in part for the same reason.

“I want things to go back to normal, though I”m not sure what normal is any more,” Natividad Villanueva, 78, a former day care administrator, said with a giggle. “I like her principles, and it would be nice to have a woman president.”

Gonzaga gestured toward the close-knit group and noted, “We all want a strong president but we are diverse. We are what America is about.”

Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) speaks on Capitol Hill on May 24, 2012. (AP/J. Scott Applewhite)

Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) is bracing for the Trump effect to hit his reelection bid and may have spend “millions to keep his job,” as our colleague Amber Phillips reports:

Shelby is hoping he has put up a big and expensive enough barricade in his Tuesday primary against four little-known challengers to protect himself from the anti-establishment wave Trump is expected to bring to Alabama on Super Tuesday.

And there are two likely outcomes for Shelby: He could get more than 50 percent of the vote and avoid a runoff, sailing to a sixth term. But even if that happens, it will be impossible to overlook the fact that Shelby has spent more than $5 million since January in the primary. He has shelled out for attack ads against his most viable opponent, 33-year-old Iraq War veteran Jonathan McConnell, and racked up endorsements from the National Rifle Association and his hard-line anti-immigration colleague in the Senate, Jeff Sessions, who also recently became the first senator to endorse Trump.

So the narrative of a Shelby win in the Year of Trump will likely be this: One of the Senate’s most senior and conservative members — he’s tied for sixth in seniority and has taken less than 63 percent of the vote just once in nine Senate and House races — just had to work his tail off to keep his seat against nominal competition.

From our colleague Pamela Constable:

Gazal Modhera, 42, a Muslim American lawyer voting in Ashburn, said her two adolescent sons were fearful of encountering hostile Trump supporters if they accompanied her to the polls. Mohammed Khan, 49, a transport service worker, said he was afraid Trump would “shut down all the mosques in America” if he became president.

At polls across parts of Fairfax and Loudoun counties in Virginia on Tuesday, Muslim American voters expressed strong and often emotional opposition to Trump, calling him rude, prejudiced and dangerous for them and the country. Most said they were voting for Clinton, in some cases despite reservations about some of her views.

“There may be terrorists in Syria and Afghanistan, but Muslims in America are good people who have done nothing. Why Trump is against us, I don’t know, but he is not going to get a single one of our votes,” said Khan, who arrived to vote at a high school in Ashburn.

Hassan Huruse, 42, a language instructor in Herndon who immigrated from Somalia, said he was worried that Trump’s negative rhetoric about Muslims and other immigrants might unleash a wave of violence among his supporters if he becomes president.

“The radical views of a leader can have a powerful effect on people who are already angry. We have seen it in history,” Huruse said while stopping at a coffee shop en route to the polls.  He said he planned to vote Democratic but was still undecided between Clinton and Sanders.

Officials at several mosques in the region, especially the All Dulles Area Muslim Society (ADAMS) in Sterling, said they had set up phone banks last weekend and spoken at community forums, urging Muslims to vote and emphasizing that even this primary contest could be decisive.

“People are very excited now. This is the first time many will vote in a primary, including me,” Sayed Ashraf, a community engagement volunteer at ADAMS.

Modhera, who voted for Clinton, said she was concerned about the “undercurrent in this election that people can speak their mind, even if it abhorrent and racist.” On the other hand, she added, “I am excited that I got to vote for the first female candidate for president, so we still have hope.”

… For the first time in about three months. The subject? Donald Trump, of course:

As NBC’s Andrea Mitchell tweeted, it had been 87 days since Clinton addressed her press pool:

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks to supporters during a rally in Fort Worth, Texas on Feb. 26, 2016. (AP Photo/LM Otero)

Here’s James Hohmann’s take on how Donald Trump’s support keeps growing:

Elites bemoan The Donald at cocktail parties and take comfort in calling Trump supporters uneducated. But, while the Republican Party plunges into civil war, Trump keeps expanding his base.

Many readers would probably be stunned by some of the people who are secretly supporting Trump and don’t want to admit it on the record. His coalition includes not just rock-ribbed conservatives and God-fearing evangelicals but Ivy-League-educated professionals. Some realize he’s not actually that authentically conservative and look the other way. Some, who fancy themselves moderates, admire the businessman’s malleability. Yesterday, as an example of someone in that vein, former Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert (who lost to Ted Cruz in the 2012 Texas Senate primary) endorsed Trump. Others just like to jump on bandwagons and back winners.

The more that Republican elites express alarm, the more a swath of these folks think that Trump might be just the change agent that’s needed to nuke Washington. Remember, most grass-roots activists believe these D.C. politicians and talking heads are part of the problem. When I was in Alabama on my five-day road trip through the SEC Primary states, a local official came up to me, asked me to turn off my tape recorder and whispered that he was supporting Trump. Over the past few days, I’ve spoken with Republicans in the same boat from Minnesota and Massachusetts to Texas and Tennessee.

[Get all your campaign news delivered directly to your email inbox with The Daily 202]

At Derbyshire Baptist Church in suburban Richmond, great-grandmother Elizabeth Tootelian leaned on a cane and nine decades of life experience to guide her at the polls. The former helped her come and go, but the latter did nothing to allow her to grasp the appeal of front-runner Donald Trump.

“I don’t understand why people would vote for him,” said Tootelian, a retired real estate agent. “As far as I’m concerned, he does not have a plus sign – one plus sign. He does have a mouth.”

Tootelian voted for Ohio Gov. John Kasich.

“When he was governor of Ohio, he took a state that had a lot of debt and he turned it into a plus,” she said.

At the same polling station, Nancy Bruni was also shaking her head at Trump but casting her ballot for Hillary Clinton.

She praised the former secretary of state as “smart,” with a resume full of “relevant experience.” But she reserved her most passionate commentary for the man leading in Republican polls.

“Trump – I think he’s on his own reality TV show,” she said. “I’m very mystified by it. … I don’t think he really, seriously believes what he says, but that’s troublesome, too. You want a grown-up. People in Europe think we’ve lost our minds.”

Bruni said she finds Kasich the most attractive Republican candidate.  She likes the fact that he has had executive experience as Ohio governor. But she did not think he had much chance.

“He seems like a pretty reasonable guy,” she said. “I’m a moderate. But that’s pretty hard to find these days.”

Nine-year-old Ella Hubert of San Antonio sits with her family and show her support for Ted Cruz at a rally at the Shrine auditorium in San Antonio. (Photo by Lucian Perkins /for The Washington Post)

Winning his home state of Texas on Tuesday has become a do-or-die task for Ted Cruz.

As our colleague Katie Zezima reports, Cruz’s campaign has even called today an inflection point as the Texas senator grapples with the rise of Donald Trump:

Cruz has blitzed across the region, hoping to shore up grass-roots support he has worked to build over the past 11 months and lock down as many delegates as possible to winnow the field to a numeric battle between Cruz and Trump.

The campaign has been battered in recent weeks with accusations that it engaged in unsavory campaign tactics; last week Cruz fired his communications director, Rick Tyler, after Tyler disseminated a video purporting to show Rubio disparaging the Bible. Rubio and Trump have repeatedly branded Cruz a “liar,” an accusation that has stuck with some voters. In the wake of it all, some of Cruz’s most prominent surrogates were publicly calling for the campaign to rethink its strategy and focus on knocking Trump rather than Rubio.

Despite the turmoil, Cruz continues to press on. In recent days he has sharpened his attacks and devoted much of his stump speech to Trump, accusing him of refusing to release his tax returns because of possible ties to organized crime. Here in San Antonio, he called on Trump to release a purported tape of him telling the New York Times off the record that he wouldn’t follow his own rhetoric on immigration if elected president.

Supporters reach for signatures, handshakes, and photos as republican presidential candidate Donald Trump greets the crowd after speaking at a campaign event at the Valdosta State University in Valdosta, GA on Monday Feb. 29, 2016. (Photo by Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)

Virginia has been the “most-predictive state in the nation when it comes to the general election in recent years,” our colleagues Rachel Weiner and Antonio Olivo report. So how are things shaking out this year?

The latest surveys of voters suggest that Clinton will win Virginia comfortably, but Sanders has made an aggressive push, especially among college students.

Clinton is taking no chance, appearing in Fairfax and Norfolk on Monday and deploying an army of surrogates across the state in recent weeks, including Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D), a close friend, and her husband, former president Bill Clinton.

But if the Democratic establishment is on top in Virginia, the Republican establishment is in tatters. Trump appears poised to win easily, as he is elsewhere in the country.

Rubio is fighting hard, though. He’s the only candidate with advertising support in the expensive Northern Virginia media market, where a super PAC supporting his campaign is on the air, and he made several stops in Virginia on Sunday.

House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) speaks in Washington on Feb. 2, 2016. (AP/J. Scott Applewhite)

Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) went after Donald Trump on Super Tuesday after the Republican front-runner equivocated about receiving support from white supremacists.

As our colleague Paul Kane reports:

“This party does not prey on people’s prejudices,” Ryan told reporters at the weekly House GOP leadership news conference.

Without addressing Trump by name, Ryan noted that the Republican presidential campaign had veered into topics such as views on “white supremacists” that should prompt “no evasion” of the topic other than repudiation of those values.

It was a clear reference to Trump’s recent comments and actions in which he has said that he needs to further study the views of David Duke, a former Ku Klux Klan leader from Louisiana who has encouraged listeners of his talk show to back Trump, as well as to social media comments and tweets that seem to endorse the views of known racists.

“When I see something that runs counter to who we are as a party and as a country, I will speak up, so today I want to be very clear about something,” Ryan said. “If a person wants to be the nominee of the Republican Party, there can be no evasion and no games. They must reject any group or cause that is built on bigotry. This party does not prey on people’s prejudices. We appeal to their highest ideals. This is the party of Lincoln.”

At the same time, Ryan is still pledging to support the Republican nominee:

As one reporter put it on Twitter, Super Tuesday is like Christmas morning for political nerds (and reporters). But it can also be confusing for the uninitiated. As our colleague Chris Cillizza writes:

The name of the game today isn’t just winning — it’s winning delegates even if you don’t come in first everywhere (or anywhere). (Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, I am looking at you.) The rules for claiming delegates on the Republican side are a state-by-state affair — and quite complex.

Luckily, Cillizza and the Fix team have a handy chart breaking down what percentage of the vote each of the Republican candidates needs to qualify for delegates:

Here’s more on the confusing delegate math from Philip Bump, including a neat tool for the Republican side of the race:

The truth on the Republican side is that it is deeply messy, a combination of a dozen races with a dozen set of rules with another dozen set of exceptions. In nearly every state, the proportional distribution of delegates to candidates is proportional in the sense that “more” is bigger than “less.” Whether a candidate gets any delegates at all requires hitting different marks in different states: 20 percent in some, zero percent in others. Each state sets its own rules under loose guidelines from the Republican National Committee.

Check out the tool here.

Today could be the day Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump cement themselves as the front-runners of the presidential race. For everyone else, it’s a chance to make a crucial dent in Clinton and Trump’s support.

Marco Rubio, who made the greatest effort over the last week to topple Trump, is hoping to rally suburban voters to capture momentum. Ted Cruz is hoping to reverse his fade in the headlines. And Bernie Sanders is hoping for wins in Colorado, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Oklahoma and, of course, Vermont.

In spite of the choices, voters did not seem excited when they went to the polls this morning. As our colleagues Philip Rucker, John Wagner and Juliet Eilperin report:

Many voters — including in Virginia, where voting began at 6 a.m. — were noticeably unenthusiastic about their choices on the presidential primary ballot, even as they felt obligated to turn out.

In Arlington, Va., one defense contractor, Nick Bryant, said Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) is the only one on the GOP ballot looking for middle ground.

“Out of the options, he’s the better one, but I wish he had more experience,” said Bryant, 54. “If both parties dig in their heels and stick to their guns, how do we govern? I really like Kasich, I like his calm and even tone, his demeanor. But you have to get ratings now, and he hasn’t.”

Bob Green, 68, a lawyer, voted for Clinton based on the expertise she has developed over the course of her career. “Politics is the only profession in America where experience is devalued,” he said. “I think she’ll destroy Trump. If they put the bloodhounds on him that they put on her, you’ll be surprised at what they find.”

Others, however, were less inspired by Clinton. Barbara Kennedy, 51, a freelance writer who cast her ballot at the same polling station as Green, said she considered Clinton safe but uninspiring. “I was just thinking about all the hope we had eight years ago,” she said. “Now you’ve got to choose the best of the worst.”

And Claudia Mackintosh, a 61-year old real estate agent voting in Norfolk. Va., said she was opting for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) instead.