A campaign worker moves signs in front of Drake Diner in Des Moines, Iowa, on Jan. 15, before Republican presidential candidate former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley arrives for a campaign event.Carolyn Kaster/The Associated Press
So it’s on to New Hampshire, with Donald Trump’s resounding triumph in Iowa changing the dynamics of the Republican presidential race. He has campaigned for more than a year as the inevitable GOP nominee. Now that seems less a predication pleasing to his base and more a bracing reality for those who want to deny him a chance to return to the White House.
Still, history shows that inevitability is a fragile concept, sometimes shattered in the Granite State. The Iowa results, and the landscape in New Hampshire, prompt five vital questions:
Did former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley, who came in third Monday, have a point when she told a Milford, N.H., audience, “You know how to do this. You know Iowa starts it. You know that you correct it.”
The “you” are the voters of New Hampshire, more moderate than those in Iowa, more suburban and more exposed to media from the urban, out-of-state entrepôt of Boston.
Time after time, New Hampshire has toppled Iowa winners, a trend especially prevalent among Republican candidates.
But it hasn’t upended the campaigns of incumbent presidents, which is the profile Mr. Trump has assumed with great skill and to great success. Incumbency matters.
Does a Haley win in New Hampshire, or even a close second-place finish, mean that Mr. Trump is vulnerable?
Yes, it does. But the architecture of the Republican race undercuts that vulnerability. If Mr. Trump defeats Ms. Haley in her home state of South Carolina next month, which is not unlikely, that would be not only a deadly symbol but also a sign that her campaign will forfeit any momentum that a strong New Hampshire performance might provide – and, almost certainly, that she will forfeit her chances to win the nomination.
Trump’s dominance in Iowa raises question about whether Haley vs. DeSantis even matters
Will barely coming in second produce a surge of contributions for Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida, whose campaign treasury is in desperate straits? Or does finishing about 30 points behind Mr. Trump mean that the smart money won’t go with Mr. DeSantis, who vowed he would win Iowa but didn’t, and whose campaign has been in the kind of constant turmoil that the smart money deplores?
Raising money will be a big challenge for Mr. DeSantis, who is going to be spending more time on the telephone with prospective donors in coming days than on the stump. Buying campaign advertising time in Manchester and Boston won’t be easy either; Mr. Trump and Ms. Haley have scarfed up many of the prime slots.
Does Vivek Ramaswamy’s endorsement of Mr. Trump negate the power of the withdrawal of former governor Chris Christie and blunt the implicit advantage that that provided to Ms. Haley?
The big, unanswerable question. Also the big, important question.
The big hope in the Haley campaign – New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu, a strong Haley supporter, has voiced this repeatedly – was for Mr. Christie to get out of the way, endorse Ms. Haley and add his backers to the growing number of Haley backers. That might have worked, had Ms. Haley done even one of the three things Mr. Christie dearly desired: make a full-throated denunciation of Mr. Trump, pronounce him unfit for office and vow not to endorse him. She did none of them. She may have preserved her viability in future GOP politics, but she also might have sunk her chances in 2024.
The lion’s share of Mr. Ramaswamy’s supporters will drift to Mr. Trump, with a small number floating to Mr. DeSantis. Mr. Ramaswamy was clearly an admirer of Mr. Trump, and his endorsement of the former president surprised no one.
The depth of voter commitment to Mr. Ramaswamy, however, is unclear. He conducted far more New Hampshire campaign appearances than any other candidate. He was everywhere, with a frantic campaign schedule that had no precedent.
One factor to conjure: Entrance polls showed that Ms. Haley benefited from late deciders. It is pretty late for New Hampshire voters, including independents who can vote in the GOP primary, to decide. If their decisions are shaped by the remarkable Trump performance Tuesday they could flood to Ms. Haley in a last-ditch effort to stop the Trump momentum. Or they could abandon illusions and go with the apparent nomination winner.
What does all this mean for November?
This far out – 10 months away! – it is of course very difficult to project.
Mr. Trump’s strong performance in an AP VoteCast survey showed him doing surprisingly well among those with four-year college degrees, a group that has resisted his entreaties for years. He took 32 per cent of them, compared with 30 per cent for Ms. Haley. But what is most astonishing is that he prevailed among moderates, taking 45 per cent of them, compared with 33 per cent for Ms. Haley, whose entire campaign is based on her moderate profile.
There are signs of weakness for Mr. Trump, for sure – especially the reluctance of about one in five Republicans, according to the respected Iowa Poll, to support him if he is convicted of a crime. Presidential candidates cannot afford to lose 20 per cent of their own party. But there are also signs of great strength.
Democrats apparently want the chance to run Joe Biden against Mr. Trump once again. After Monday night, they might be more careful about what they are wishing for.