Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and former United Nations Ambassador and South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley are continuing their campaigns to become the next Republican presidential nominee after suffering record-setting defeats in the Iowa Caucus.
Both Haley and DeSantis face long-shot odds at securing the Republican presidential nomination as former President Donald Trump continues to consolidate important endorsements, including one from U.S. Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) immediately after his blowout win in the Iowa Caucus.
Still, both Sunbelt governors believe they have a path to winning the GOP nomination and made their cases clear in multiple speeches and appearances in the aftermath of the Iowa Caucus.
DeSantis claimed that he “punched his ticket out of Iowa” by finishing in second place with 21.2% of the vote in a speech he gave after results were tallied. DeSantis elaborated on his decision to stay in the race during a CNN Town Hall held in New Hampshire on Tuesday night. DeSantis said that Trump’s 51% tally in Iowa proved there is an appetite for new leadership in the Republican Party.
“You still had roughly half of the Iowa caucus-goers make another choice. So, that tells me that there is an appetite for a different leader. I think what I represent is somebody that has delivered on those key conservative policies that we’ve all been wanting to see in Washington, DC.”
DeSantis also attacked the media in the aftermath of the Iowa Caucus, claiming that the media interfered in the election by calling the race early in the night. A news release from his campaign claimed the media called the race early to help Trump.
“It is absolutely outrageous that the media would participate in election interference by calling the race before tens of thousands of Iowans even had a chance to vote. The media is in the tank for Trump, and this is the most egregious example yet.”
DeSantis’ second-place finish in Iowa came despite an overwhelming ad-spend campaign. DeSantis and aligned political action committees spent over $90 million on ads since early 2023, representing 70% of total ad-spending in the state’s caucus.
Despite the spending, DeSantis barely edged out third-place finisher Nikki Haley, who is now polling as Trump’s strongest opponent in New Hampshire and her home state of South Carolina.
A statement released by the Trump campaign indicated that the camp believes DeSantis’ strategy is to wait for a potential legal conviction of Trump to remove the former president from the race.
“Though, even more telling, a top DeSantis fundraiser confessed that their strategy relied on endless political prosecutions of President Trump by radical Leftist prosecutors.”
Nikki Haley’s campaign, which did not invest as heavily in the Iowa Caucus, seems to have a more straightforward path to becoming the main alternative candidate to former President Trump. This belief was echoed when she declared the primary race a “two-person race” after finishing third in Iowa.
Haley may have been referring to her strong polling numbers in New Hampshire, a famously moderate Republican primary state. Haley stands at 30.6% in the 538 Project’s poll aggregation, while Trump stands at 43.5%. DeSantis is polling at just 5.4%.
Bolstering Haley’s case as the primary Trump alternative is South Carolina’s position as the third state to vote in the GOP’s primary calendar. RealClearPolitics’ polling aggregation pegs Haley in a distant second place with 21.8% in her home state to Trump’s 52%. DeSantis lags behind both Trump and Haley in the Palmetto State with 11% polling support.
Haley reasserted her belief that the Republican Primary is a two-person race with a declaration that she will only debate former President Trump or President Joe Biden from this point in the campaign forward, spurning DeSantis and causing ABC News to cancel a scheduled debate in New Hampshire.
Haley sharply criticized both Trump and Biden’s age in her post-Iowa Caucus speech that made the case that she was the last viable alternative to a Trump-Biden rematch.
“70% of Americans don’t want another Trump-Biden rematch. A majority disprove of both of them. Trump and Biden are both about 80 years old.”
Trump responded by launching an attack of his own on both Haley and Ron DeSantis on his social media platform Truth Social.
“Anyone listening to Nikki’ Nimrada’ Haley’s whacked-out speech last night would think that she won the Iowa Primary. She didn’t, and she couldn’t even beat a very flawed Ron DeSanctimonious, who’s out of money, and out of hope.”
Trump also hosted a Tuesday evening event in New Hampshire with businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, who dropped out of the GOP Presidential Primary and endorsed the former president.
The results of this recent flurry of heated political gamesmanship will be revealed when New Hampshire voters cast their votes in the GOP primary slated for January 23.