Thread: Cruz Using 'Gestapo Tactics' to Get Delegates

Trump Aide Manafort: Cruz Using 'Gestapo Tactics' to Get Delegates

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz is using "Gestapo tactics" to get delegates at state conventions, and the Donald Trump campaign plans to put a stop to it, says Trump's newly hired convention manager Paul Manafort.

In an appearance Sunday on "Meet the Press," Manafort was asked about his longtime friend Roger Stone's quote last week that if Cruz tries to sway Trump delegates on a second vote at the GOP convention this summer he was prepared to "disclose the hotels and the room numbers of those delegates who are directly involved."

But Manafort told "Meet the Press" it is Cruz's campaign that is using dirty tricks.

"It's not my style. It's not Donald Trump's style," Manfort said. "But it is Ted Cruz's style."

He wasn't specific on the tactics he was alleging, but did repeat moderator Chuck Todd's word "threatening," before adding, "You go to his county conventions and you see the Gastapo tactics."

He said the Trump campaign is filing several protests because the Cruz campaign is "not playing by the rules."


His real focus, though, is getting to the 1,237 delegates needed to avoid a second vote, he said. He predicted Trump will be the "presumptive nominee" by May, though he expects the race to go all the way into June.

Manafort, a veteran GOP strategist, was brought in last week in an effort to shore up Trump's efforts. He told "Meet the Press" he was not brought in by Stone, who no longer is officially a member of the campaign, but came in "a totally different way."

Despite reports of Trump team infighting for leadership, it is Donald Trump who is running the campaign, "and I'm working directly for Donald Trump," Manafort said. "But I'm working with the whole team as well.

"Yes, there's a transition. It's a natural transition," he said. "Trump was doing very well on a model that made sense. But now that the campaign has gotten to the end stages, a more traditional campaign has to take place."

http://www.newsmax.com/Politics/paul.../10/id/723131/

I just watched a replay of this interview and I like him. He's a cool, smart, well-spoken person. Great choice to run the Convention element of the campaign. I loved it when Todd asked him if he was running the campaign now, and Manafort quipped back "Donald Trump is running the campaign." Yes, he is, and no doubt about it.