Historic twists and turns likely ahead in runup to NH votes

A University of New Hampshire Survey Center poll last week found that former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley had drawn within single digits of former President Donald Trump here.

“We have not seen this dynamic where you have someone (Trump) so wildly popular with the base but so unpopular with swing voters,” said Andy Smith, the center’s director.

“This race really comes down to how many uninvolved voters get off the couch and decide, each for their own reasons, that they can’t afford to sit this one out.”

In 2016, Trump’s first primary win here set the record for GOP turnout, with 287,633 casting ballots.

Four years later, Democrats set the current mark, when 300,368 voted in the scramble that Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders narrowly won over now-Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar.

Joe Biden finished fifth, but got back on the path to the nomination 18 days later with a blowout win in South Carolina.Turnout could set record

Greg Moore, regional director of Americans for Prosperity, said the AFP model forecasts 330,000 to 340,000 will vote in the Republican primary on Jan. 23.

“We believe that a huge number of less and less engaged people are going to end up helping to decide this race,” said Moore, whose fiscally conservative interest group has backed Haley.

“These folks don’t follow the tick-tock of campaigns, don’t watch debates,” he said. “This is very much about meeting them where they are, and nearly all will decide very late who they will support.”

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s decision last week to drop out of the race led pollsters and analysts to conclude most of his “Never Trump” backers would go to Haley.

A Christie-Haley link is a double-edged sword, said Mike Dennehy, who helped run the late John McCain’s presidential primary campaign victories here in 2000 and 2008.

“Haley’s biggest challenge right now is holding onto that small amount of Republican votes that she has,” Dennehy said, with most polls consistently showing Trump beating Haley badly among Republicans.

Moore agrees Haley would be better off if Christie did not publicly endorse her.

“As she broadens her support, there is a risk for Haley being perceived as a moderate,” Moore said. “If that comes through, she will lose more than she gains.”

In the past two weeks, Trump’s campaign has spent millions trying to paint Haley as a faux conservative, with ads attacking her on immigration, taxes and raising the Social Security retirement age for younger workers.

At week’s end, Trump’s campaign pushed back on the narrative their candidate’s lead could slip away.

“President Trump will secure our border, protect Social Security benefits for all, and is best prepared to lead our economy, military and country back to greatness on day one,” said Karoline Leavitt, spokeswoman for MAGA Inc., a pro-Trump Super PAC.

Bruce Breton of Windham, a member of Trump’s inner circle since 2015, was even rougher in his assessment of Haley.

“She’s flat-out not ready for prime time. Look at her stumble in Berlin on what caused slavery and then the deer-in-the-headlights look she had during that CNN debate in Iowa with (Florida Gov. Ron) DeSantis,” Breton said.

Trump campaign officials also question the accuracy of close polls, such as UNH’s, which used a sample in which 45% of respondents identified themselves as independents and 55% as Republicans.

If that split actually happens, it would blow out the GOP primary record set in 2016, when 30% of independents took part in candidate Trump’s first victory here, they said.

Exiting candidates can’t control where their voters will go.

In 1996, Dennehy watched his candidate, former Texas Sen. Phil Gramm, get out after a bad showing in Iowa and endorse Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole, the eventual nominee.

Exit polls concluded virtually all Gramm voters switched to conservative speechwriter Pat Buchanan, who scored a shocking New Hampshire victory.

In 2008, the late U.N. Ambassador Bill Richardson and then-Sen. Chris Dodd, after their own bad stumbles in Iowa, both backed Barack Obama.

A little more than a week later, Hillary Clinton scored a close comeback win in New Hampshire before eventually losing the nomination to Obama.

Arnie Arnesen of Concord, a liberal talk show host and past nominee for governor and Congress, urged independents backing Christie to write in Biden’s name on the GOP ballot.

“You can move to the Democratic primary and write in Biden but that is not recognized by the DNC (Democratic National Committee), so it has no value,” Arnesen said.

“Write in Biden on the Republican ballot, and the message will be Biden equals democracy.”

Chris Galdieri, a politics professor at Saint Anselm College, said Haley could find it harder to meet growing expectations.

“She is now going to get scrutinized in a way she hasn’t in the past over this final week,” Galdieri said.

“Her big worry has to be that Trump trains all his fire on her.”

“A clear path to winning the New Hampshire primary is to grab all those available votes in the middle of either party, but in today’s polarized world, it’s easier said than done,” said Tom Rath, a former attorney general who has been advising GOP candidates and presidents in New Hampshire for six decades.

“Trump controls so much of the traditional party apparatus, which means any challenger to him has to corner the market on everyone else.”

Dennehy expects Haley’s biggest booster, New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, will seek to convince some prominent Republicans still on the fence to publicly join her bandwagon.

“This governor who has won here four times understands the way to show increased momentum for Haley is to trot out regular Republicans who defy Trump and say, ‘I’m with Nikki,’” Dennehy said.

“If I’m Haley, I follow Sununu’s advice in these final days about how to build on the massive middle, thread the needle and dare I say, even win this thing.”

Some New Hampshire analysts think DeSantis could drop out this week, especially if he does worse than expected in Monday’s Iowa caucuses.

“I think he is circling the drain,” Dennehy said. “He has absolutely nothing going for him right now.”

Arnesen, who has hosted podcasts with Iowa experts in recent weeks, believes DeSantis could stage a surprise, considering his support from evangelical Christians and Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds.

“If DeSantis is able to show some kind of rebound in Iowa, we always give people a second look in New Hampshire,” Arnesen said.

Never Back Down, the Super PAC supporting DeSantis, has current plans in the works for DeSantis to meet with reporters in Manchester and then appear at a town hall forum in Claremont Tuesday after the candidate makes a stopover in South Carolina to try and to blunt any Haley momentum.

Some wonder if Trump would depart from his current playbook and agree to debate Haley if the race here continues to tighten.

“I could see him taking that bait, which sure could scramble things,” Galdieri said. “He hasn’t been in a debate with another Republican for eight years.”

Former Democratic Party Chairman Kathy Sullivan, a lead organizer of Biden’s write-in effort, said that’s much too big a risk.

“Trump can narrowly lose New Hampshire and still recover and easily win the nomination,” Sullivan said.

“He can say, ‘Oh, I lost because all those independents and wannabe Democrats came in and voted for her, which shows she is really not a conservative.’”

UNH’s Smith said that after New Hampshire, the road gets rougher for Haley, starting Feb. 24 in her home state of South Carolina, where Trump currently leads by nearly 30 points.

In the weeks that follow, ballots get cast in eight “closed” primaries and caucuses open only to registered Republicans, Smith said.

“Sure, New Hampshire could shake up the snow globe to produce a different look to this race,” he said. “It’s New Hampshire, which means anything can and, on occasion, does happen.

“Right now, however, the worst-kept secret is Haley has nowhere to go after here.”