Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks to a crowd in Kansas City, Mo., on March 12.Nati Harnik/The Associated Press
Donald Trump has taken a stranglehold on the Republican presidential nomination, knocking Florida Sen. Marco Rubio out of the race with a crucial victory in the latter's home state.
But Mr. Trump lost Ohio to Gov. John Kasich – breathing new life into Kasich's low-polling campaign and giving him the dim hope he might consolidate the anti-Trump forces of the Republican establishment behind him.
Mr. Trump, who is tearing the GOP apart with an insurgent campaign based on a series of xenophobic pledges, crushed Mr. Rubio 46 per cent to 27 per cent in Florida, winning his largest state so far. He also won Illinois and North Carolina. Missouri was a virtual draw between Mr. Trump and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz.
Florida and Ohio were particularly crucial as they award all their delegates to the winner.
Mr. Rubio, the telegenic standard-bearer of the Republican establishment, took aim at Mr. Trump's presidential run as he announced he would suspend his campaign.
"It is not God's plan that I be president in 2016, or maybe ever," he told supporters in Miami, appearing to fight back tears. "I ask the American people: Do not give into fear. Do not give into frustration."
Mr. Rubio's withdrawal sets up a three-horse race, with Mr. Trump facing Mr. Kasich – a mainline Republican who has largely failed to electrify in the last year – and Mr. Cruz, a hard-right ideological purist almost as disliked by the Republican establishment as Mr. Trump.
A triumphant Mr. Trump took the stage in the opulent, Versailles-inspired ballroom of his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach. In a meandering 15-minute speech, he repeated pledges to renegotiate trade deals and strengthen the military.
"There is great anger, believe me, there is great anger," he told a few hundred well-heeled supporters. "As a country, we don't win any more. … We're going to start winning again, this country is going to start winning again."
There is apoplexy from both sides of the political spectrum over Mr. Trump's authoritarian agenda. He is promising to round up and deport 11 million illegal immigrants, build a wall along the border with Mexico, ban all Muslims from entering the country and tear up free-trade deals.
Mr. Kasich, speaking at his victory party in suburban Cleveland, vowed to take the GOP nod at the convention in the same Ohio city in July.
"We are going to go all the way to Cleveland and secure the Republican nomination," he said.
Mr. Rubio was popular in his home state – and had much of the GOP organization at his disposal – but was no match for the wave of cynicism with the political establishment that has carried Mr. Trump's campaign.
"The establishment is just corrupt," said Amy Schramek, a 66-year-old retired bank teller volunteering for Mr. Trump in Tampa. A former Democrat who voted for Barack Obama, Ms. Schramek said she was drawn to Mr. Trump because of his stance on immigration – she contends illegal immigrants are using resources that should be given to Americans – and trusts only him to get the job done.
"Ted Cruz and Rubio and Kasich – they've all been in government, in politics, and we haven't seen any major changes. We need somebody totally different in there," she said.
Cheech Maria, 62, a retired firefighter and former marine, turned up for Mr. Trump's final Florida campaign stop, a rally in Tampa on Sunday, in a T-shirt emblazoned with "I will not vote for Monica Lewinsky's ex-boyfriend's wife." He made no secret of his Islamophobic reasons for supporting Mr. Trump.
"They just want to instill their law, their Koran, their sharia law, take over, do whatever they want to," he said. "We have to limit their numbers because once their numbers get big … it changes. ISIS [Islamic State] tells you that we're going to infiltrate through your refugee program."
Ohio Republican chairman Matt Borges, a Kasich supporter, said the governor had the party apparatus behind him and did a good job getting out early voters. Mr. Borges said there was "zero" ground organization on the Trump side.
Sources in the local GOP said Mr. Kasich craftily ditched his prickly personality for a nice-guy schtick to set himself apart from the other contenders – a move that appears to have paid off. One senior Ohio Republican, who spoke on condition of anonymity, pointed to Mr. Rubio's gaffe – attacking Mr. Trump for his hand size – as a contrast with Mr. Kasich's more disciplined persona.
"He's not a great one-liner guy, but he's genuinely tough. … He's wily. … He's smarter than to get caught in the whole hand-size thing," the source said.
Mr. Trump's rallies have seen escalating violence over the last week: In one case, a supporter sucker-punched a protester in North Carolina; in another, a reporter accused Mr. Trump's campaign manager of trying to pull her to the ground during a news conference. A rally in Chicago was cancelled after clashes between supporters and demonstrators.
Mr. Trump's campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, stood directly to his right at his victory speech Tuesday, indicating Mr. Trump is sticking with his embattled aide.
At the Tampa rally, his supporters faced off with protesters in a scene that frequently turned ugly.
"There are two words for you: perverts and parasites!" Trump supporter Cliff, 67, a Vietnam veteran in a camouflage baseball cap who would not give his last name, hollered at a group of young demonstrators chanting "Fascist, racist, anti-gay, Donald Trump go away!" outside the Tampa Convention Center.
"I'll be packing my bags and going somewhere else if Trump becomes president, because I can't be here any more," protester Liz Acevedo, 20, said. "He's taking away hundreds of years of our progress."
Trump supporters also taunted a woman holding a Mexican flag, shouting: "Your flag represents one, our flag represents everyone."
Kelly Benjamin, a thirtysomething in hipster glasses and a tie, pulled out a pinata shaped like Mr. Trump and encouraged the crowd to take swings at it.
"Raise your hand if you think that he's a racist!" he said as protesters lined up to pulverize the effigy with a long wooden stick. "He's filled with Dum Dums!"
Mr. Trump's campaign is just as divisive among Republicans as it is with Democrats. Some GOP members see Mr. Trump as a false prophet, an opportunist who conveniently jettisoned former liberal positions on universal health care and abortion in order to run as a populist right-winger. Others are aghast at his authoritarian and xenophobic rhetoric.
"Trump's fear-mongering and fascism is not the party I stand for. He just does not stand up for the principles of a constitution that protects the rights of every single American," Catherine Tinker, a 22-year-old college student, said on the sidelines of a Rubio campaign event at a Tampa coffee shop on Saturday.
Said Tom Chastain, 53, as he leaned against the coffee-shop counter. "We need to get a lot more people voting for Republicans, and we don't need somebody screaming all the time."
With a report from Adam Radwanski in Cleveland
Editor's Note: An earlier version of this story had an incorrect date for the upcoming Republican convention. This is a corrected story.
Adrian Morrow