Billionaire Donald Trump grabbed headlines again yesterday by rubbishing the "rigged" way in which Republicans pick a presidential nominee and criticising the CIA director for ruling out waterboarding.
Lashing out at the Republican presidential race he leads after his chief rival Ted Cruz won all nominee-picking delegates in Colorado, the businessman condemned the rules that could leave him short of winning the 1,237 majority of delegates that he requires to clinch the nomination.
Mr Trump declared that “the system is rigged – it’s cooked,” dismissing how Colorado selected delegates for the Republican national convention in Ohio in July who will pick the nominee for the election in November.
"The people out there are going crazy, in the Denver area and Colorado itself, and they're going absolutely crazy because they weren't given a vote. This was given by politicians – it's a crooked deal," he told Fox News.
Challenge
Mr Trump also challenged CIA director John Brennan over his promise in an interview televised over the weekend not to allow waterboarding – a simulated form of drowning – or other brutal interrogation tactics on detainees, even if a future president ordered it.
The property mogul and former reality TV star said the use of waterboarding and other methods are justified given the brutal killings by the Islamic State militants.
“His comments are ridiculous,” Mr Trump said. “I mean, they chop off heads and they drown people in cages with 50 in a cage, in big, steely heavy cages, drop them right into the water, drop people, and we can’t waterboard.”
The businessman’s aggressive anti-immigrant rhetoric along with his campaign rally chants of “build a wall” along the border with Mexico to keep illegal immigrants out has spread to the soccer pitches of US schools.
A Wisconsin school district is investigating racist taunts about the wall directed at Hispanic players that stopped a game last week.
Floor fight
Brian Denu, the coach of Beloit Memorial girls, told local media that Elkhorn students at the game jeered black and Latina girls soccer players with chants of “Donald Trump, build that wall”.
Mr Trump leads the Republican primary with 743 delegates to Mr Cruz on 545, though the chances of either reaching enough delegates at the end of the primaries on June 7th for a first-ballot victory has reduced, increasing the odds of a “floor fight” at the national convention.
Most states pick their presidential nominees through state-wide primaries or caucuses where delegates are elected for each candidate.
Colorado picked its delegates differently through a state convention. Mr Cruz, a senator from Texas, won all 13 delegates at stake at the Colorado state convention on Saturday adding to the 21 delegates he won at meetings of the state's congressional districts over the previous week.
Tactics
Political strategist
Paul Manafort
, who was headhunted by Mr Trump to manage his efforts to recruit delegates, accused Mr Cruz’s campaign of using “Gestapo tactics” to sweep up delegates at local meetings in states.
Two voters who won't be voting for Trump in the all-important New York primary on April 19th are his children, Eric Trump (32), and Ivanka Trump (34). Mr Trump revealed they didn't register in time to vote. "They feel very, very guilty," he said.
