Marco Rubio’s super PAC casts Trump as Voldemort (and who is Harry Potter?)

Is Sen. Marco Rubio the candidate who lived?

A memo equating Rubio with Harry Potter -- and Donald Trump with evil Lord Voldemort -- was sent to donors by a super PAC supporting Rubio’s presidential candidacy, Politico reports.

The group, Conservative Solutions PAC, sent the message the day after Rubio’s second-place finish in the South Carolina primary. Rubio, who is a Republican senator from Florida, narrowly beat Sen. Ted Cruz, but lost badly to Republican front-runner Trump.

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“In Harry Potter lore, Voldemort, the Dark Lord, had a secret to his strength. His secret was his horcruxes,� the fundraising memo read. “As each horcrux was destroyed, Voldemort became increasingly vulnerable, not increasingly strong. When all of the horcruxes were gone, Voldemort lost his one-on-one battle with Harry Potter.�

In the “Harry Potter� books, “horcruxes� are objects that contain a part of an evil wizard’s soul. The wizard can’t die unless all of his horcruxes are destroyed.

“Like Voldemort’s horcruxes, the large candidate field shields Trump from harm,� the memo went on to explain. “At each step of the primary process, Trump is losing his shields, and that is making him more vulnerable.�

The horcruxes, in this analogy, would be Republican contenders who have dropped out -- first New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and, after the South Carolina primary, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush.

The memo didn’t go so far as to put Rubio in owl-eyed glasses and a boy-wizard uniform, but the Wall Street Journal writes that the super PAC made a clear implication. “Extending this analogy puts Marco Rubio in the role of Harry Potter,� they noted, probably needlessly.

Despite the somewhat tortured metaphor, the super PAC insisted they weren’t comparing Trump to Lord Voldemort: “Note: we are not calling Donald Trump evil. This is an analogy, not a direct comparison.�

Others have been more than willing to compare Trump to Voldemort, however, including J.K. Rowling, the author of the “Harry Potter� books.

Actually, Rowling took the comparison several steps further. In December, she tweeted a link to a BBC article suggesting the real estate magnate and the evil wizard had more than a few things in common.

“How horrible,� Rowling commented. “Voldemort was nowhere near as bad.�

The super PAC’s memo has brought out the inner nerd in several political observers. In Vox, journalist Libby Nelson said the message was a “poor analogy� for the presidential race.

“While it’s true Rubio needs to defeat Kasich, Sen. Ted Cruz, and Dr. Ben Carson — whom the email accused of being horcruxes — to get the nomination, it is extremely unlikely that Trump has actually embedded pieces of his soul in their bodies,� Nelson wrote.

“The good news for Rubio is that horcruxes lodged in living creatures can be destroyed by killing the host,� she explained further, “so he’d merely have to murder his rivals instead of seeking out a basilisk or the sword of Gryffindor and destroying the horcruxes — all before Trump’s lead in the delegate count becomes bulletproof.�

The next Republican nomination contest is Tuesday in Nevada. Polls show Lord Voldemort leading Harry Potter there by at least 20 points.

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