Nikki Haley keeps one eye on Iowa as she seeks to win New Hampshire primary

Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley faces a unique challenge in the final two weeks before the Jan. 15 Iowa caucuses.

She must simultaneously woo Iowans who could give her an added boost above rival Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) while stumping in New Hampshire, where independent voters could help her defeat former President Donald Trump, the front-runner, in the state’s primary on Jan. 23.

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Unlike DeSantis and to a lesser extent Trump, Haley has not staked her 2024 campaign on winning the Iowa caucuses. She has instead placed a sizable emphasis on New Hampshire and her home state of South Carolina. But given Iowa’s outsize advantage in the primary, a strong showing there will be crucial in her bid to replace DeSantis as the only viable alternative candidate to Trump.

The Florida governor has gone all in for Iowa, campaigning in all 99 counties and positioning himself for an outright win or a strong second-place finish behind Trump. Haley’s campaign and allies are covertly hoping a second-place finish in Iowa would steal momentum away from DeSantis ahead of the New Hampshire primary, where Haley is hoping for a second-place finish or better as well.

“I think the expectations for Haley in Iowa are appropriately less, but if she can overperform there, then I think she’s got, I think, a strong team waiting for her in New Hampshire led by the most popular Republican in the state,” said Jim Merrill, a seasoned New Hampshire GOP strategist, of Haley and the support of Gov. Chris Sununu (R-NH). “And then she’s going to go to her home state in South Carolina. So it feels like a pretty shrewd strategy that they’re executing here with the final two weeks.”

“It’s tougher to organize in Iowa because it’s harder to find the caucus people … and it’s heavily dominated by evangelical Christians,” said Linda Fowler, a political scientist at Dartmouth University. “So with that context, I think New Hampshire makes sense for her. Plus, she has an enthusiastic governor who’s stumping for her.”

The former U.N. ambassador and South Carolina governor has barnstormed the Granite State with Sununu since she earned his backing last month. Yet Haley hasn’t quite abandoned Iowa and even plans to bring Sununu with her to campaign in Des Moines on Friday. She finished the final days of 2023 in the Hawkeye State and will face off against DeSantis during a CNN debate in Iowa on Jan. 10. (Trump is skipping the debate for a Fox News town hall at the same time.)

“Nikki isn’t taking any voter for granted. She’s traveling across Iowa, answering every question and shaking every hand. We’re fighting for every inch,” said Olivia Perez-Cubas, Haley’s spokeswoman.

There is some historical precedence that Haley’s gamble could pay off. The late Arizona Sen. John McCain in his 2000 presidential run mostly ignored Iowa and went on to beat George W. Bush in New Hampshire but lost the South Carolina primary. He would ultimately lose the nomination to Bush. But during his 2008 presidential run, McCain again bypassed Iowa and won the New Hampshire primary and the South Carolina primary before eventually becoming the GOP nominee.

Haley’s allies aren’t wasting any funds in helping her replicate McCain’s 2008 strategy.

SFA Fund, the super PAC backing Haley’s campaign, outspent all other groups in 2023 at $42 million, according to the ad tracking company AdImpact. That’s roughly $2 million more than DeSantis’s super PAC, Never Back Down, spent in 2023 at $40.2 million. Trump’s super PAC, MAGA Inc., spent $34.4 million.

Americans for Prosperity, the billionaire Koch family-backed group, is spending $70 million to boost Haley in Iowa. “We’re just now starting to see the money, and it could make a difference,” Fowler said of Americans for Prosperity’s efforts to help Haley.

The DeSantis campaign slammed both Haley and Trump and their supporters for spending more than $38.4 million in negative ad spending against the governor, the most out of all the 2024 candidates.

“And despite her team’s best efforts to keep expectations low for Haley in the Hawkeye State, the numbers don’t lie,” wrote Andrew Romeo, DeSantis’s campaign spokesman, in an email Tuesday. “The Wall Street Journal’s John McCormick noted yesterday how Haley and the super PAC supporting her will combine to drastically outspend the competition down the stretch in Iowa.”

Richard Arenberg, senior fellow in international and public affairs and visiting political science professor at Brown University, told the Washington Examiner that a respectable finish in Iowa will help Haley as she prepares to battle against Trump in New Hampshire, a state that will be decided by independents who make up the majority of voters.

But a recent flap-up over the origin of the Civil War could distract from Haley’s efforts. Haley caused a stir last week when she didn’t mention slavery as the cause of the war during a town hall event in New Hampshire. She cleaned up her comments in the aftermath of the backlash.

“I think that had a kind of chilling effect on the enthusiasm of some independents that maybe she could energize to come into the Republican primary and vote for her,” Arenberg said. “But a surprising second place in Iowa could maybe warm that up again.”

Scott Huffmon, a political scientist and the founder of the Center for Public Opinion and Policy Research at Winthrop University, claimed the controversy wouldn’t change her performance in Iowa. It “could move the odd New Hampshire independent,” but it would have “no impact on South Carolina.”

“And, despite her promise to the Sons of Confederate Veterans to not remove the Confederate flag from the statehouse when she first ran for governor, she publicly called for it to come down after the Mother Emanuel massacre, so that inoculates her somewhat,” he added referencing the 2015 murders of nine African American members of Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina.

Still, Haley must face the gargantuan task of somehow beating Trump in New Hampshire, where he polls at 46.3%, according to the RealClearPolitics average of the Granite State, and Haley polls at 24.8%.

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“Trump is still king of the hill in New Hampshire. No question about it. His support has been pretty static. It hasn’t really moved up and hasn’t really moved down,” said Merrill. “Haley has accomplished, I think, half of the battle, which is getting yourself out of the scrum of all the other candidates, whether current candidates or those that have withdrawn like [former Vice President Mike] Pence or [Sen. Tim] Scott [R-SC] to position herself as the No. 2.”

The other half of the battle, Merrill added, is converting undecided voters and encouraging other people to consider voting due to the state’s same-day registration law. “I’m sure the Haley campaign has worked hard to identify people who aren’t currently registered but who could choose to do so Election Day and turn them out,” he said.