AUSTIN, Texas — Now that the Iowa caucuses are in our rear view mirror, it’s time to the look at what the future might hold for the Republican presidential candidates.
New Hampshire is up next on January 23.
And Republican political consultant Matt Mackowiak says all eyes are on former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley.
“She didn’t get the huge boost out of Iowa that she wanted,” Mackowiak told us on Inside Texas Politics. “She’s got to probably win New Hampshire to have a pathway forward. I think if that doesn’t happen, you look at the rest of the map, particularly the next six weeks, it’s hard to see a place where she is going to win, including in her home state of South Carolina, where I think Trump is very likely to win.”
Mackowiak says he doesn’t think Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has dropped out yet because DeSantis needs Haley to get out first.
“So, he’s got to see if he can survive long enough. That may just be a matter of surviving past Tuesday. Now what we don’t know is how many Democrats and Independents are going to cross over in this open primary contest in New Hampshire and perhaps put Nikki over the top,” said Mackowiak.
Mackowiak says both candidates are trying to make it past early states such as New Hampshire and Nevada to see if they can turn it into a head-to-head matchup with former President Donald Trump, who did win handily in Iowa. Making it to Super Tuesday on March 5, for instance, could lead to new, big-dollar donors for either candidate.
President Joe Biden will be waiting on the GOP nominee come November, and Republicans could face a fundraising issue.
Biden and Democrats raised more than $97 million in the last three months of 2023. And the President’s re-election war chest has around $117 million in cash on hand.
“This is a problem, I think, growing for the GOP side is that Biden, I think, has the largest war chest of any incumbent President at this point. And he’s going to be able to raise those resources,” said Mackowiak.