WASHINGTON — With the general election in his sights, Republican Donald Trump delivered a sober foreign policy address Wednesday aimed at easing fears about his temperament and readiness to be commander in chief.
And rival Ted Cruz made a desperate attempt to jolt the GOP race by tapping Carly Fiorina as his running mate.
Both moves underscored Trump’s commanding position in the GOP race. Though the businessman needs to keep winning primaries to clinch the nomination before this summer’s national convention, he has breathing room to start making overtures to general election voters. All Cruz can do is throw obstacles in his path.
Cruz announced Fiorina as his vice presidential pick during a rally in Indiana, a state he must win next week to keep his White House hopes alive. He cast the unusual announcement as a way to give voters confidence in their choice if they vote for him.
“You deserve to know exactly where a candidate stands,” he said.
Fiorina immediately went after Trump and Hillary Clinton, embracing the aggressive role of a No. 2 on the White House ticket. She cast Trump and Clinton as a pair of liberals who would do little to shake up Washington.
“They’re not going to challenge the system; they are the system,” Fiorina said.
Cruz's announcement could further solidify his support in Utah. A Republican caucus vote last month gave him all of Utah's 40 delegates after the GOP's 2012 nominee Mitt Romney said backing Cruz was the best way to stop Trump.
"It could capture some of those people who were voting but not loving their vote. It may make them feel better," said Jason Perry, head of the University of Utah's Hinckley Institute of Politics.
Trump is so unpopular in Utah that polls have shown the state would vote for a Democrat for president for the first time since 1964 over him. That has the state's GOP majority worried about the impact on other races on the ballot.
"Concern is the word I'm hearing mostly. People are watching this very closely," Perry said.
Fiorina, he said, will be seen as someone who has "defended herself very well against attacks that came from Donald Trump. She can stand her ground."
Fiorina endorsed GOP Utah Sen. Mike Lee and appeared with Lee and Cruz at a rally in Draper before the caucus vote. Lee called her an "outstanding choice" Wednesday.
"She understands the proper role of government. She will fight for a conservative agenda that will push power out of Washington and back into the hands of American citizens. She has, throughout her life, always challenged the status quo," Lee said.
Cruz and Ohio Gov. John Kasich are trying to keep Trump from securing the 1,237 delegates he needs to clinch, thereby pushing the Republican race toward a contested convention. But Trump strengthened his standing this week with a sweep of five Northeast primaries, giving him 80 percent of the delegates he needs.
Trump headed to Indiana on Wednesday as well, following his address in Washington.
Before an audience of foreign policy experts in Washington, Trump outlined a doctrine that he said would put American interests first, leaving allies to fend for themselves if they don’t contribute financially to back up security agreements. He vowed to send U.S. troops into combat only as a last resort, a break from years of hawkish Republican foreign policy.
“Our goal is peace and prosperity, not war and destruction,” he declared in the 38-minute address that was heavy on broad statements and light on specific policy details. Unlike his rambunctious, free-wheeling rallies, Trump read prepared remarks in a measured tone off a teleprompter.
He also used the address to target Clinton, his expected opponent in a general election. He assailed her handling of the deadly 2012 attack on Americans in Benghazi, Libya, and said that during her tenure as secretary of state, the U.S. had a “reckless, rudderless and aimless foreign policy.”
Clinton’s campaign sees foreign policy as an area ripe for a sharp general election contrast with Trump, given her years at the State Department and his lack of experience. In a campaign conference call Wednesday, Clinton supporter and former secretary of state Madeline Albright called Trump’s views “incoherent.”
“I’ve never seen such a combo of simplistic slogans and contradictions and misstatements in one speech,” Albright said.
Like Trump, Clinton emerged from this week’s Northeastern primaries with a stronger claim on her party’s nomination. With four victories Tuesday, she now has 91 percent of the delegates needed to clinch the Democratic nomination.
Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, campaigning in Indiana as well Wednesday, conceded that the delegate math was not in his favor. He said his campaign still aims to win the nomination but will also seek to assemble as many delegates as possible to influence the party’s platform and message.
“Our job whether we win or whether we do not win is to transform not only our country but the Democratic Party, to open the doors of the Democratic Party to working people and young people and senior citizens in a way that does not exist today,” Sanders said.
Cruz hoped that adding Fiorina to his potential ticket would be a draw for Republicans desperate to keep Clinton out of the White House. Fiorina, the former Hewlett-Packard chief executive, was frequently praised for her tough criticism of Clinton during her own presidential campaign and also irritated Trump with her sharp retorts during GOP debates.
Since dropping out, she has become Cruz’s most active surrogate, making frequent campaign appearances alongside him and on her own.
Candidates typically wait until they’ve secured their party’s nomination before picking a running mate, in part to avoid appearing to be getting ahead of the will of the voters.
But in Cruz’s case, the announcement seemed aimed at keeping up the idea that he has a claim to the nomination and potentially attracting more voters in Indiana and other remaining states — including Fiorina’s home state of California.
Asked on Fox & Friends about Cruz naming a running mate, Trump said, “To me it looks ridiculous. He’s not going to get the nomination.”
Trump emerged with more than 50 percent of the Republican votes in Pennsylvania, Connecticut and Maryland, and scored over 60 percent in Delaware and Rhode Island. Similarly, Clinton won convincingly in four of the five contests, scoring 56 percent in Pennsylvania and 63 percent in Maryland — the two biggest contests of the night. Sanders won the Rhode Island primary with 55 percent of the vote.
Contributing: Lisa Riley Roche
Email: lisa@deseretnews.com
Twitter: DNewsPolitics