Barring an unexpected and seismic political upset, former President Donald Trump is going to win the Iowa caucuses next week, and if the polls are any indication, it isn’t even going to be close.
The RealClearPolitics average of polls currently gives Trump a 35-point lead over his closest rival, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, who has just surpassed Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) in the polls in the last few days.
The lead for the former president is so large that it has essentially turned the caucuses into a race for second place with two questions: How much will Trump win by? And can Trump be held under 50%?
Haley is hoping to get second place and force DeSantis to suspend his campaign before the New Hampshire primary, which offers her a much better opportunity to win. Meanwhile, DeSantis must get second place to make a plausible argument for him to remain in the race.
The problem for DeSantis (and to a lesser extent Haley) is that getting second place in Iowa isn’t going to matter much if Trump wins by the margin he is expected to.
Iowa has 40 delegates that are distributed to the candidates based on what proportion of the vote they receive. So if Trump exceeds 50%, or even pushes 60%, he will get at least 20 delegates and could get as many as 25. The remaining 15 delegates will be split between DeSantis, Haley, and Vivek Ramaswamy, who could further spoil DeSantis and Haley’s ability to accumulate all of the remaining delegates.
Here is roughly how the delegates would shake out if Trump slightly exceeds 50%, Haley and DeSantis each get around 22%, and Ramaswamy gets the 6% he is averaging in the polls. Trump would get roughly 21-22 delegates, Haley and DeSantis would each get seven or eight, and Ramaswamy would get two or three.
In the states that follow Iowa, the former president leads the polls by 14% in New Hampshire, 30% in South Carolina, 58% in Nevada, and 47% in Michigan. Combined, those states have 153 delegates, all of which will be awarded before Super Tuesday on March 5, and it’s safe to assume that Trump will only pad his lead as each state holds its respective contest.
The only state where Trump is even polling under 50% is New Hampshire, which has a measly 22 delegates. And Trump is assured to get a sizable share of the delegates there, too, even if Haley finishes first.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
No matter how you slice it, if the results turn out as expected, Iowa will deliver Trump a significant delegate lead that will not change at all, even if Haley eeks out a narrow win in New Hampshire.
The reality is that finishing second place in the Iowa caucuses while Trump cruises to a landslide victory is not going to deliver any sort of significant momentum for DeSantis or Haley. All it will do is provide the illusion that the race for the Republican nomination can shift to a two-person race and give the runner-up an excuse to continue their campaign.