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Photo-Illustration: Intelligencer; Photo: Getty Images
Since late last year, Republicans (and Americans generally) who were unhappy with the prospect of a Donald Trump comeback have been focused on the New Hampshire primary as the first and perhaps the last real chance for any rival to trip him up on the path to a third consecutive presidential nomination. That’s because the Granite State is uniquely ill-suited for Trump, thanks to its low number of evangelicals, relatively high number of college-educated Republicans, and a primary system that allows independents to fully participate. Plus, Nikki Haley, backed by popular lame-duck governor Chris Sununu, was slowly gaining strength in the polls there.
As the January 23 primary grows nigh, however, the former South Carolina governor’s momentum has clearly stalled, though she is in a head-to-head contest with Trump now that Ron DeSantis has exited the race. That means the 45th president in a strong position to supplement his landslide win in the Iowa Caucuses with a potentially decisive (if less overwhelming) victory in New Hampshire.
As in Iowa, observers will closely watch whether the front-runner wins a majority of the vote as a way of assessing whether there is some theoretical anti-Trump majority in the primary electorate somewhere in America. In the RealClearPolitics polling averages for New Hampshire right now, Trump has 54.3 percent of the vote as compared to 36.8 percent for Haley. His 17.5 percent lead in the averages is up from 13.2 percent the day after Iowa, indicating that the cumulative effect of his win in the caucuses and the withdrawal of Chris Christie on January 11 and Vivek Ramaswamy on January 15 has been to modestly increase his support. Most of the polls were taken before DeSantis dropped out and endorsed Trump on January 21, but second-choice preferences suggest that will help the former president a bit (DeSantis was mired in the mid–single digits in New Hampshire before withdrawing) as well. One data source helpful in assessing the trends is the Boston Globe-Suffolk daily tracking poll, which has shown Trump’s lead steady at 17 to 19 percent for the last four days.
The internal dynamics of the Trump-Haley race are clear from multiple surveys: He’s winning overwhelmingly among registered Republicans, particularly the more conservative among them, while Haley is actually winning the independent vote, which is expected (unless all the talk of Trump’s lead discourages some of them from voting) to represent nearly half of the primary turnout. For example, a St. Anselm College survey on January 16 showed Trump winning 65 percent of registered Republicans while Haley had 52 percent of registered independents. Similarly, a January 20 Washington Post-Monmouth poll gave Trump 64 percent of registered Republicans and Haley 48 percent (a ten-point plurality) among registered independents. Trump was drawing 77 percent of “very conservative” voters in the St. Anselm poll and 78 percent in the WaPo-Monmouth survey.
Polls have also consistently shown Trump with more committed and enthusiastic New Hampshire reporters than Haley, though there are some signs Haley’s support is firming up: the WaPo-Monmouth survey showed 85 percent of Trump voters “definitely” supporting the former president as compared to 69 percent of Haley voters with minds made up. There just aren’t any real signs of late momentum for Haley of a dimension that would signify a big upset (for which New Hampshire is famous) is in the offing. Indeed, there’s a lot of talk of this being an unusually stable — even boring — first-in-the-nation primary. But as they say in sports, we don’t know for sure, and that’s why they play the games.
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As the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran overtakes the foreign policy debate in Washington, two Democratic governors with potential 2028 presidential aspirations — Gavin Newsom and Andy Beshear — recently traveled to New Hampshire, introducing themselves to the state’s famously engaged voters. The two weighed in on the war and both criticized and questioned President Trump’s strategy and endgame.
“If a president is going to take a country into war, and risk the lives of American troops and Americans in the region, he has to have a real justification and not one that seems to change every five to 10 hours,” Beshear told CBS News after a Democratic fundraiser in Keene.
“This President seems to use force before ever trying diplomacy, and he has a duty to sell it to the American people and to address Congress with it,” Beshear continued. “He hasn’t done any of that. In fact, it appears there isn’t even a plan for what success looks like. He’s gone from regime change to strategic objectives and now is talking about unconditional surrender, which isn’t realistic where he is.”
Beshear also said he thought that Congress should have reined in Mr. Trump’s war powers.
“He is trying to ignore Congress. He’s trying to even ignore the American people,” Beshear said.
He went on to note that the president’s State of the Union address took place “three — four days before he launched this attack,” and Mr. Trump “didn’t even have the respect to tell the American people the threat that he thought Iran posed to us.”
Last week, both the House and the Senate failed to pass resolutions to limit Mr. Trump’s war powers and stop him from taking further military action against Iran without congressional support.
For Newsom, the war with Iran constitutes part of a broader criticism of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
At an event last Tuesday in Los Angeles, Newsom had compared Israel to an “apartheid state.” Later, in New Hampshire, he sought to clarify his comment.
“I was specifically referring to a Tom Friedman [New York Times] column last week, where Tom used that word of apartheid as it relates to the direction Bibi is going, particularly on the annexation of the West Bank,” Newsom explained during a book tour event Thursday night in Portsmouth. “I’m very angry, with what he is doing and why he’s doing it, what he’s going to ultimately try to do to the Supreme Court there, what he’s trying to do to save his own political career.”
Friedman wrote that at the same time that the U.S. and Israel are prosecuting a war in Iran, within Israel, Netanyahu’s government has undertaken efforts to annex the West Bank, driving Palestinians from their homes; fire the attorney general who is leading the prosecution against Netanyahu for corruption; and block the government’s attempt to establish a commission to examine the failures that led up to the Oct. 7, 2023, massacre of Jews by Hamas.
CBS News has reached out to the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C., for comment.
On Iran, Newsom said, “I’m very angry about this war, with all due respect, you know, not because I’m angry the supreme leader is dead. Quite the contrary. I’m not naive about the last 37 years of his reign. Forty-seven years since ’79 — the revolution,” Newsom said. “But I’m also mindful that you have a president who still is inarticulate and incapable of giving us the rationale of why? Why now? What’s the endgame?”
Many attendees at Newsom’s book event said that the situation in Iran is a top-of-mind issue for them, too. Some said they’re “horrified” by what is happening.
29-year-old Alicia Marr told CBS News she decided to attend Newsom’s event because of his social media response to the war with Iran.
“There was one spot left, and I decided to pick it up, and it was due to his response to the war, that it is just unacceptable, and I would agree with that,” Marr said.
While some voters like Marr are eager to hear about where potential candidates stand on foreign policy, many at Newsom’s event said they care most about how potential candidates plan to address domestic issues.
“I’m more focused on getting the middle class back on track and fighting the oligarchy, and I’m less invested in international issues,” said Anita Alden, who also attended Newsom’s event,
“I wouldn’t call myself America first, but we have so many problems at home that are my priority,” she told CBS News.
Former Vice President Kamala Harris, who may also be weighing another White House bid, told Fox 2 Detroit last week that she “unequivocally opposes” the Trump administration’s military action in Iran and urged Congress to take action.
“If we want to stop Donald Trump with this random decision that he has arrived at, then Congress must act, and Congress must act immediately. The American people do not want our sons and daughters to go into this unauthorized war of choice,” Harris said.
Mr. Trump has lashed out against Democrats who have pushed back on his Iran strategy, calling them “losers” last week and arguing that they would criticize any decision he made on Iran.
“If I did it, it’s no good. If I didn’t do it, they would have said the opposite, that you should have done this,” the president said.
Local News
A Massachusetts man was arrested late Wednesday night after police say he was driving more than 100 mph on a New Hampshire roadway.
Officers with the Rindge Police Department stopped a vehicle shortly after 11 p.m. on Route 202 near Sears Drive in Rindge following a report of a car traveling at excessive speed, according to a statement from Chief Rachel Malynowski.
The vehicle, a 2020 Kia Stinger, was spotted traveling at 104 mph in a posted 55 mph zone, Malynowski said.
The driver, a 21-year-old man from Attleboro, was arrested and charged with reckless operation of a motor vehicle, according to police.
He is scheduled to be arraigned April 5. If convicted, the man faces a fine of at least $750, in addition to the court’s penalty assessment, and a 90-day license suspension, Malynowski said.
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