Haley and Trump get a poll bounce before New Hampshire

Momentum for Trump could seal Haley and DeSantis' fate

People love a horse race, but the reality of the Republican presidential primary today is much less exciting. I’ll put things plainly: Although most states haven’t voted, if the polls hold, Donald Trump is already almost certain to be the party’s nominee.

On Monday, Trump won the Republican presidential caucus in Iowa handily (as expected), beating his closest competitor, Ron DeSantis, by 30 points. DeSantis had an opportunity to turn his surprisingly healthy second-place finish into some momentum heading into next month’s primaries, but nothing has materialized for him yet.

Meanwhile, the candidates will compete next in New Hampshire — in what’s likely to be Nikki Haley’s last stand. New Hampshire is really the only state where any of the candidates are within striking distance of Trump. As of Monday, Haley had the momentum in the Granite State — at least if you trust the polls. But, oh, the difference a week can make. Trump has gained eight points in 538’s average over the last 4 days alone, expanding his margin over Haley relative to the pre-Iowa polling.

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Whether Haley can catch Trump will likely come down to the turnout of crossover independents and moderate, anti-Trump, college-educated Republicans. Ultimately rather few voters have probably yet to make up their minds; In Iowa on Monday the caucus entrance polls showed about 80% of voters made up their minds weeks to months before voting. So any velocity Haley may have will come among a shrinking group of persuadable New Hampshirites.

But Haley has to do well. Not just well, in fact, but amazingly well. My modeling shows that because of Haley’s comparatively lower support in other, later-voting states, she needs to win a healthy majority (or all!) of the delegates available in the state to be on track to win the nomination. The editorial interpretation of this is that the primary is basically over, save for the technicality of Trump actually winning a majority of delegates. As always, unpredictable things can happen, but historically we are on safe ground with this assessment.

At the risk of jumping the gun, this all looked relatively predictable in hindsight. The odds were incredibly favorable to Trump anywhere from a month to nearly six months ago, depending on how you analyzed the polls. For a short stretch it was fashionable to say the former president was “not inevitable” in the nomination race — but, frankly, if the most hopeful narrative for his challengers was that Trump was not already at a 100% win probability, that tells you all you really need to know about the state of the race.

So, what’s next? On Tuesday, granite staters could deliver the final blow to Haley by depriving her of even a moral victory. Ron DeSantis looks likely to hang on until South Carolina, where he traveled directly after the Iowa Caucuses wrapped Monday night. Yet the latest polls have him under 10% there, so I don’t expect that will rescue his campaign.

If you buy the odds, frankly, all anyone is really waiting on now is for Trump’s challengers to come to their senses. If you want to read something while we wait, 538 is keeping track of the delegate math until they do.