Haley surprises the pollsters, still loses to Trump

CONCORD, NEW HAMPSHIRE >> Just a week ago, on Jan. 16, the Realclearpolitics average of polls for the New Hampshire Republican presidential primary showed former President Donald Trump leading former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley by 13.2 points.

That was a significant lead, but then it just kept growing: 15.6 points on Jan. 19, 18.2 points on Jan. 22 and 19.3 on primary day.

In the face of such grim predictions, Haley and her top supporters sought to redefine downward what would constitute success in the primary. While at one time they had been quite brash — in December, Haley's most important endorser, Gov. Chris Sununu (R-N.H.), predicted she would “win in a landslide, and that's not an exaggeration” — they were reduced to saying only that Haley expected to be “stronger” than she had been in Iowa, where she lost to Trump by 32 points.

So, what would a “strong” finish be for Haley? Some observers settled on a single digit-double digit standard. If Haley lost to Trump by less than 10 percentage points, she could claim the race was on and head to the next primary in her home state of South Carolina. But if she lost by 10 or more points, it would be hard for her to make the case for staying in the race. Maybe that formulation was a little too rigid, but it at least got across the idea that Haley needed to hold back a Trump landslide for her to keep going.

Then came election night. There was never any question Trump would win; the race was called for Trump just minutes after the last polls closed at 8 p.m. But even before the polls closed, word spread around political circles that Trump's margin would not measure up to the 19.3-point blowout that the polling average suggested. Some even thought the margin would be a lot smaller. Half an hour before the polls closed, political communications guru Frank Luntz, firmly anti-trump, posted on X that “my numbers have [Trump] beating Nikki Haley by about 4-8 points.”

Now, that would have been big. And in the earliest minutes of vote counting, it looked like Luntz might be right. At 8:20, the early results showed Trump ahead by just over 7 points. It was close! At that moment, Haley decided to take the stage at her headquarters in Concord to make a speech that was a brief concession followed by a long vow to keep going. “This race is far from over,” she told the rowdiest, most enthusiastic crowd of her New Hampshire campaign. “There are dozens of states left to go, and the next one is my sweet state of South Carolina.”

As Haley spoke, the vote counting went on. The early returns came from some of the places she did the best, on top of exit polls that seemed to suggest the electorate was far more prohaley than had been the case in Iowa. The problem for Haley was that later returns would come from rural areas that were more pro-trump. Some observers saw a historical parallel in the making. “Shades of 1992 here, potentially,” MSNBC analyst Steve Kornacki posted on X. “Exits/early results had Bill Clinton even w/ Paul Tsongas. Clinton ran to the cameras to declare himself `the comeback kid.' Late returns pushed Tsongas to a solid 8-point win. Tonight, Trump lead is expanding as small towns come in, 10+ point win possible.”

Give Kornacki the Prediction of the Night award; that is exactly what happened in the hours after Haley's speech. Trump's lead crept slowly upward. Right now, with 91 percent of the vote counted, the lead is 11.3 points, 54.5 percent to 43.2 percent. That might change a little as the last votes are counted, but not much.