WASHINGTON — Republican Donald Trump signaled a shift toward “more meat on the bone” in his policy speeches Wednesday amid new signs of campaign discord, a day after his stinging Wisconsin defeat emboldened his critics and pushed the GOP closer to its first contested national convention in four decades.
Democrat Hillary Clinton, meanwhile, embraced a tougher approach with liberal rival Bernie Sanders, who beat her in Wisconsin. Still, Sanders’ string of recent primary victories has done little to erode the former secretary of state’s overwhelming delegate lead as the 2016 primary season lurches toward a high-stakes contest in two weeks in New York.
“The core issue in his whole campaign doesn’t seem to be rooted in an understanding of either the law or the practical ways you get something done,” an aggressive Clinton declared in an interview on MSNBC. She suggested Sanders “hadn’t done his homework” on specific prescriptions needed to address economic inequality.
Sanders, for his part, questioned whether Clinton is “qualified” to be president after she spent much of Wednesday criticizing his record and his preparedness for the job.
Sanders told a crowd of more than 10,000 people in Philadelphia that Clinton “has been saying lately that she thinks that I am quote unquote not qualified to be president.”
He said, “I don’t believe that she is qualified if she is, through her super PAC, taking tens of millions of dollars in special interest funds.” He also says Clinton is not qualified because of her vote on the war in Iraq and her support for trade agreements that he says are harmful to American workers.
Clinton spokesman Brian Fallon responded on Twitter: “Hillary Clinton did not say Bernie Sanders was ‘not qualified.’ But he has now — absurdly — said it about her. This is a new low.”
As Clinton tried to undercut Sanders’ recent momentum, Trump’s grasp on his party’s presidential nomination appeared far more tenuous. Senior Trump adviser Barry Bennett shrugged off the Wisconsin loss to Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, but he also said the billionaire businessman would soon begin to deliver a series of “presidential, substantive” speeches on his policy priorities. That list likely includes immigration, trade, defense and taxes.
“That’s coming,” Bennett said of the shift. “There will be more and more meat on the bone as we go forward.”
Leading Democrats and Republicans acknowledge a growing likelihood that Cruz could wrestle the presidential nomination away at the GOP national convention in July.
Meanwhile, attention in both parties shifted toward New York’s April 19 primary elections, where Clinton and Trump hold big leads in early polls.
