A Test for Trump and His Rivals

A little more than six weeks before the Iowa caucuses, the race for the Republican presidential nomination looks like it’s over before it’s begun. But one question critical to the GOP’s chances next year is still open, and the primaries will help answer it: Can Republicans get out the vote?

Polls testify to Donald Trump’s popularity with the base. What they don’t show is whether he has the campaign organization to turn his lead on paper into an equally conclusive result when the ballots are counted. His rivals, chief among them Ron DeSantis and Nikki Haley, need two things to be true to have a shot at overcoming him.

First, the polls will have to be wrong about who actually shows up for the caucuses and primaries. It’s tricky enough to predict who votes in general elections. In primaries and caucuses the electorate is much smaller—and in open primaries, independents, and Democrats can cast ballots in the Republican contest.

In 2016, Trump was often the beneficiary of crossover voting in primaries, while caucuses—where only the most ideologically orthodox conservative Republicans tend to vote—rewarded candidates like Ted Cruz, who beat Trump in Iowa that year. DeSantis has pitched his campaign to conservatives, both those who like Trump but question his electability or performance as president and those who think Trump was insufficiently principled. The Florida governor’s strategy rests on the hope that voters will be more ideological than pollsters expect. Haley, on the other hand, stands to benefit if the primary electorate is less Republican and ideologically conservative; she does well with independents and has crossover appeal with Democrats.

The second thing Trump’s rivals need to be true involves skill, not luck: They need their voter mobilization operations to be better than his. If the electorate doesn’t reflect the mix of voters that pollsters assume; if some Trump supporters, overconfident of victory, don’t show up; and if his campaign doesn’t work to make sure its turnout matches or exceeds his lead in the polls, the outcome will be an upset win for a rival or a dispiriting victory for Trump.

The latter would be a grave warning about GOP readiness for next November.

This primary season will probably not be a long one, however. For DeSantis, everything depends on Iowa; if he can’t beat Trump, he must at least finish closer to Trump than to Haley, to give him momentum going into New Hampshire. The Florida governor ranks a dismal fourth in recent New Hampshire polls, trailing Trump, Haley, and also Chris Christie. If he places fourth, or even third, in the Granite State primary on Jan. 23, DeSantis’ campaign will be sunk, since the next major battle, on Feb. 24, is on Haley’s home turf in South Carolina.

Haley has more leeway; if she avoids embarrassment in Iowa, she can look forward to ascending prospects in New Hampshire and then South Carolina. But after that?

Haley’s profile—hawkish on foreign policy, critical of government spending, circumspect about abortion and attractive to independents—is reminiscent of John McCain’s. The late Arizona Republican won the nomination in 2008, but today’s party is very different from that of 15 years ago, and even in 2000 Republicans preferred George W. Bush to McCain.

On the issues, it’s hard to imagine DeSantis voters opting for Haley over Trump as their second choice—unless, in the end, Trump himself is the issue.

Trump has declined to have his mettle tested by taking part in the GOP candidate debates, which has kept him above the fray but has done nothing to reassure Republicans with doubts about his electability. DeSantis, as Trump’s top rival early on, only lost ground by appearing alongside lesser challengers, even as his presence drew more eyes to the spectacle. Now DeSantis is set to debate the Democratic governor of California, Gavin Newsom, on Nov. 30—but less than a week later he will again be just one contender among many at the Dec. 6 GOP debate in Tuscaloosa.

Haley, meanwhile, must wonder when Christie will give up the ghost. He polls in double-digits in New Hampshire, but whatever Haley stands to gain from the possibility that Christie will humiliate DeSantis there, she loses by the fact that Christie’s support clearly comes at the expense of her own.

The path to the nomination for anyone other than Trump is exceedingly narrow.

Yet if Trump is annoyed that he has to fight for the nomination at all, and others are dismayed that voters won’t give them a chance, Republicans are still better off than the Democrats. The GOP will test Trump before it nominates him again—but no one dares test Joe Biden, because Democrats know he would fail.

Comments (2)

“A little more than six weeks before the Iowa caucuses, the race for the Republican presidential nomination looks like it’s over before it’s begun.”

No, actually is began around the time many Republicans, even somewhat like Daniel McCarthy, and countless others turned on Trump, frankly for most of those types about midway through 2016 if you really want to go back to where it began. Regardless, once Trump was elected, and unquestionably around the 2020 election, his voters saw what was happening to him, again in many respects by his own party, and decided that without question Trump should be the choice again, if just to stick it to the McCarthy types. Funny thing is that if the Republican never-Trumpers and Republican establishment, in many respects obviously one in the same, had just come to Trump’s defense over the years, if just for temporary party unity, rather than trying to sabotage him repeatedly Republican voters would have said, “Trump had his chance and now it is someone else’s turn.” Instead, most Republican voters feel Trump got screwed, again in large part by his own party, and now the party is stuck with Trump for at least another election cycle. Nothing could be more just from at least a certain angle. Those who hated Trump in his own party could not have been more stupid. They could have sat back and let Trump both simply run his mouth and generally sabotage himself with his, at times, stupidity and ignorance. Instead . . . .

Also, I disagree that “Haley has more leeway; if she avoids embarrassment in Iowa, she can look forward to ascending prospects in New Hampshire and then South Carolina. But after that?” While, interestingly, Haley indeed may by some arguments at present be more electable in a general election, although I think once the surface gets scratched a bit more people will see her for what she is–generally shallow, not very bright, unaccomplished, and not even a pleasant personality–she is essentially already at her ceiling with regard to the Republican primary electorate regardless of how the first three or four primaries look. DeSantis actually has legs, as evidenced by the fact that regardless of what happens in 2024, he almost certainly already has to be looked at as one of the, if not the, favorite at present for 2028. Haley also has no presidential future post 2024. Her brand of whatever is already a generation past its sell date, and that is without what I mention above as what I see to be her more specific personal deficiencies. McCarthy and Rove, in the latter case per usual these days, are wrong with regard to DeSantis needing Iowa, etc. DeSantis can even stick around to the end just to see if Trump gets knocked out legally somehow. DeSantis would then be the pick. Haley under no circumstances will be the presidential nominee. Personally, I will vote for Biden first. Really.

November 27, 2023 Michael Kaiser Reply

Yeah, there’s not much going on with this primary. We’re all just waiting to vote for Trump and move on to the general. If anything, most Republican voters are angry that the big donors and the RNC are throwing away money on these bogus candidacies. Just think of what those millions could do for putting together a ground game? We could actually have sizable operations to counter what the Dems are sure to do for yet another election.

I’m not sure about DeSantis’s prospects in 2028. He just reminds me of some other good governors, like Scott Walker or Rick Perry, who did well in their own states but couldn’t really do much on the national level. He proves that really is no Trump-lite. It’s all or nothing. If Trump goes, I think most of us will vote for Ramaswamy, if we vote at all.

Your description of Haley is apt: “generally shallow, not very bright, unaccomplished, and not even a pleasant personality.” I can’t see the appeal of her at all. She simply shills for the defense companies, pushes idiotic policies, and schmoozes about being a daughter of immigrants (yawn). She’s a testament to just how out-of-touch the GOP is. No one (besides Lockheed Martin and co.) wants this anymore.

November 29, 2023 Everyman Reply

A Test for Trump and His Rivals

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