It’s Over. (A Kind Of Hampshire Primary Preview)

I almost didn’t write this. I’ve been at a conference at Yale with my students for the last three days, and whenever I have down time I open my computer and say, “You have to write about New Hampshire. Just do it.” But I’ve really struggled. Why bother with all the nouns and verbs? Why search for the right adjectives and give thought to the best punctuation? What’s the point of any of this?

My most accurate stretch of writing this cycle is probably my analogy to Kurt Vonnegut’s Timequake. For the duration of the 2024 Republican Primary, we’ve been going through the motions — we monitor polling, watch the debates, search for precedents — all while knowing where we’ll end up. With two lame parties giving us two boring primaries that will culminate in two ancient and unpopular nominees whose best hope for victory is convincing us that the other guy is at best senile and at worst actively a mortal threat to the country, is it time for PPFA to return to hibernation? Because I’m feeling very sleepy.

I guess what I’m saying is that I’m done manufacturing drama. We’re getting the sequel no one wants — no one, that is, except the most rabid partisans who think the other party’s guy is weak, doddering, and easily beatable, without recognizing those same flaws in their own candidate. And yet, like last time, these two candidates will probably get a record number of votes, because so much of the country will be so motivated to vote against the clearly unacceptable candidate. If anything can convince us to reform the primary process, it’s a rematch between the two most disliked politicians in the country.

Anyway, I guess I need to write about New Hampshire, if only to offer closure on this primary cycle. Donald Trump is going to win on Tuesday, and he’ll run away with the Republican nomination after that. My top Scenario from last Sunday is already coming to fruition: “No one comes close to Trump anywhere besides New Hampshire. He wins 70%+ of the vote and 80%+ of the delegates.” It turns out that Chris Christie, who was right about a lot this primary cycle, even told the truth during his biggest gaffe; in a hot mic moment, he threw shade at a candidate everyone wanted him to drop out in favor of, saying of Nikki Haley, “She’s going to get smoked — you and I both know it.”‘

He was right. After Haley finished third in Iowa while Trump carried a majority of the state, I sensed months of Haley’s slow-building momentum come to an abrupt halt. And then when she dropped out of the debates this week, I didn’t just sense it. I knew it. In my last post I predicted, “She’s about to fall flat.”

The polls of the last few days have supported these conclusions. Here’s New Hampshire:

At first glance, someone might interpret these numbers as a positive sign for Haley. After all, she didn’t break 20% in Iowa, yet here she is averaging 34 in the second state. Further, her numbers up from the high 20s/low 30s she was pulling at the turn of the year; Haley is now consistently polling in the mid-30s, the strongest number of any other non-Trump candidate in this or any state.

And yet, this same data tells me she has no chance to win New Hampshire. St. Anselm shows Trump moving from 44 to 45 to now 52 after Iowa. The Boston Globe has him growing from 46 to 50 to 52 to 53. The CNN/UNH poll that got many people excited has proven to be an outlier. (Don’t get me started on shady American Research Group polling, which had Haley even with Trump in New Hampshire but wasn’t a poll good enough to qualify for the otherwise pretty accepting Real Clear Politics average.)

Since Trump is consistently over 50% and strengthening, we pretty much know he’ll notch another win, even in the unlikely event that Haley consolidates everyone else. In fact, I expect him to beat these polling numbers as holdouts give in to the inevitable and rally around his flag. I think he’ll score in the mid-to-high 50s, Haley in the low-to-mid 30s, and Ron DeSantis at like 6.

Do Haley and DeSantis even stay in the race at that point? Consider what’s happened to the national numbers since Iowa. Trump scoring a majority in the opening state sent a clear signal that his nomination was in the bag, and late-deciding voters have flocked to him:

Trump hadn’t hit 70 points nationally for the entire primary cycle dating back to the closing weeks of 2020, and now he’s hit 70 in the three polls taken since Iowa. We’re seeing a creeping capitulation from the Trump skeptics that sit in the middle of MAGA and Never Trump. They considered resisting the inevitable, of hoping for a better nominee, someone who could fight for Republican values while at the same time not embarrassing the party and undermining the country’s values. They may have even flirted with DeSantis or Haley, but those flirtations, not unlike mine in high school, led to nothing. They’re now hopping on the Trump bandwagon.

After Trump beats Haley by 15-20 points on Tuesday, she may have hope that South Carolina will save her. It won’t. It’ll be Trump’s biggest win yet. It may be Haley’s home state, but South Carolina is Trump country. After his big win on her home turf, Super Tuesday will just be a formality.

Haley may then hold out in the hopes of my Scenarios 4 or 5 playing out — that Father Time or Johnny Law catch up with Trump and leave whoever’s in second place poised for a comeback — but it seems more likely to me that they won’t want to draw the ire of MAGA in the meantime, which would permanently end their political career. They’ll do what former candidates Doug Burgum, Tim Scott, and so many other establishment Republicans recently did: they’ll endorse Trump by describing him as the only remaining way to stop four more years of Biden. Reportedly many prominent Republicans privately despise the man for all the obvious reasons, but if he’s going to win anyway they might as well take advantage of his popularity with the base and help themselves win more elections. Supporting him is the fast-track to popularity among Republicans. Crossing him is political death. Never forget that Congresswoman Liz Cheney stood up for conservative principles, voted with Trump 93% of the time, and won wipeouts in House primaries and generals, but once she voted to impeach Trump after his role in January 6, the establishment bumped her from party leadership and then when two-thirds of Wyoming Republican voters denied her re-nomination.

DeSantis and Haley are still young and want a future that Liz Cheney can never have again. I don’t think they hang on for too long. Perhaps just like Christie dropped out a day after PPFA said he should, DeSantis will read today’s assessment, realize it’s over, and do the same. As for Haley, if she surprises me in New Hampshire, I’d be pleasantly surprised and eager to write about it.

But if I’m right, it’s over.