Ted Cruz says he won more votes in Wisconsin than Donald Trump did in New York

Ted Cruz got whomped by Donald Trump in the New York primary. But in remarks in Borden, Ind., Cruz tried to take some solace by looking at the numbers a different way.

"I earned more votes in the state of Wisconsin than Donald Trump did in New York," Cruz said.

Is that right? We took a closer look.

Here’s the final results of the April 5, 2016, Wisconsin Republican primary, according to the Associated Press:

And here are the final results of the April 19 New York Republican primary:

Candidate

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N.Y. votes

Percentage

Delegates

Donald Trump

524,932

60.4 percent

89

John Kasich

217,904

25.1 percent

4

Ted Cruz

126,151

14.5 percent

0

So Cruz did win more raw votes in Wisconsin (531,129) than Trump did in New York (524,932). It’s a modest edge -- Cruz won about 1.1 percent more votes in Wisconsin than Trump did in New York -- but an edge nonetheless.

The discrepancy owes much to two factors: Wisconsin’s turnout rate, which was two and a half times higher than New York’s, and the Republicans’ greater strength in purplish Wisconsin than in solidly blue New York.

In Wisconsin, about 24 percent of the voting-age population cast a Republican primary ballot. In New York, it was just 5.6 percent.

That helps explain why Cruz eked out more raw votes than Trump even though Trump won the much bigger state and almost three times as many delegates.

Our ruling

Cruz said, "I earned more votes in the state of Wisconsin than Donald Trump did in New York." This is certainly a glass-half-full way of looking at the results, but factually, Cruz is on target.

We rate his statement True.