How does Cruz beat Clinton in the general?

[I Will Not Be Wrong]

With his chances going up, how would he beat Clinton in the general?

This is my map of him winning, 281 to 257. Only way he wins in my opinion is if a bunch of Hillary scandals emerge.

[EliteLX]

I can't see PA being a reasonable path for Ted, but it's more likely than VA.

There is a near zero way that Ted Cruz wins the majority of statewide cast votes in a presidential election against Hillary in Virginia. It's pretty much the roadblock to any possible win in a GE for him.

[The Other Castro]

He doesn't.

[psychprofessor]

Cruz 2016 will be seen as more extreme than Romney 2012. It's hard to see Cruz winning important suburbs in VA and PA to make those states competitive. New England is out of the question. He would have to pursue Florida and Ohio like Bush in 2004 - but the demographics of those states make a win for him barely possible. I actually think Trump puts more states in play and makes Hillary play offense in some traditionally DEM leaning states.

[Maxwell]

Cruz is pretty much destined to lose in a general election unless turnout tanks.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

Cruz is pretty much destined to lose in a general election unless turnout tanks.

And yet some people hails him as a savior of the Republican Party.

[Dr. Arch]

Cruz is pretty much destined to lose in a general election unless turnout tanks.

[HilLarry]

he doesn't

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Even assuming no wild card Trump card entry Hillary will sweep. Even if she'd indicted, she could make a decent go - "Vote for the Crook and not the Canuck" etc.

[Lyin' Steve]

Cruz has to pick apart the holes in Hillary's armor with the surgical precision of an Ivy League lawyer, while presenting himself as stable, honest, everything-outside nothing-inside guy.  Basically, he has to do exactly what he's failed to do in the primary.

[Crumpets]

He's got it in the bag. Just stay home and get some much-needed rest.

[Young Conservative]

Yes. He will beat her quite easily, but it'll still be fairly close

[Nyvin]

There is no realistic way Cruz can win.

[Fuzzy Bear]

With his chances going up, how would he beat Clinton in the general?

This is my map of him winning, 281 to 257. Only way he wins in my opinion is if a bunch of Hillary scandals emerge.

This map could well happen for Cruz.  How it would happen depends on a number of things.

One of those things would be Cruz somehow tapping into the kind of working class support Trump has.  The problem there is that Cruz, while anti-establishment, comes from the most anti-worker faction of the GOP.  Cruz is more of a Club for Growth Republican (although he's not their poster boy) and that is going to be a problem when some of the new Trump voters.  These voters are also the sort who will be relying on entitlements, or will have family relying on them.  I'm sure there are statements Cruz has made that could be used against him with this crowd.

The advantage Cruz has is the hatred the working class Trump voters have for Hillary.  They don't always know why they hate her; they just do.  And they resent any kind of perceived favoritism for women and/or minorities, so Hillary doesn't really have their attention.  More importantly, Hillary has placed the environment over workers, at least in their eyes; that's what you do when you advocate not building the Keystone Pipeline or boosting standards for all sorts of fossil fuel industries that mean jobs for them but a dirty environment.  They need to feed and house their families TODAY; mesothelioma and rising sea levels are in a future they can't see now.  Cruz will be able to get the attention of these folks before Hillary will.  

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

Not be Ted Cruz.

[Ljube]

Cruz is pretty much destined to lose in a general election unless turnout tanks.

[RI]

Uhh... hope a bunch of states change to caucuses for the general?

But no, Cruz does not have a plausible path to beating Hillary. He's easily the least electable of the four GOP candidates left (and the only one I would never, ever, ever vote for under any possible circumstance).

[Virginiá]

Cruz is unelectable. Period. The absolute very best he could hope to accomplish is to lose by a 2012 map/numbers, and not a 2008 wave that would threaten GOP control across the country and in Congress.

The only scenario where he pulls a win out of butt is if Hillary somehow massively imploded on her own for some reason, but that could be said for any candidate matchups, so it doesn't really count.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

Cruz is unelectable. Period. The absolute very best he could hope to accomplish is to lose by a 2012 map/numbers, and not a 2008 wave that would threaten GOP control across the country and in Congress.

The only scenario where he pulls a win out of butt is if Hillary somehow massively imploded on her own for some reason, but that could be said for any candidate matchups, so it doesn't really count.

I think Hillary is likely to be slightly more implosion-prone than either J. Random Democrat, or Sanders. Thanks to her position at State, she's uniquely vulnerable to foreign policy disasters, like Libya getting worse or some thing else blowing up where the finger can (rightly or wrongly) believably pointed at her. Since she's a little older than the typical presidential candidate, Clinton is also likely a little more vulnerable to health scares (again, imagined or real). And as a former member of the Obama administration who has associated herself closely with him, if the economy crashes before December, her presidential chances are likely tanking right along with it. (Bernie, by contrast, might actually be strengthened by such an event.)

I don't think the Republicans should count on a Hillary-implosion, but one happening isn't exactly implausible. (And given the apparent prevalence of both Hillary-haters and willful reality deniers in Republican ranks, they're probably even more likely to expect her to implode.)