There is rest for neither the wicked nor the warm undergarments among Republican presidential candidates this week, as the Republican primary rolls from a bone-bustingly cold Iowa to an almost-as-frigid New Hampshire.
In Manchester, the state’s largest city, the temperature dropped to 10F (-12C) in the days before Tuesday’s primary election, cold enough for icicles to cling to cars, rooftops and, in a park near the center of town, a roundabout.
But despite the snow piled high by the sides of roads, and the near constant need for a woolly hat, the remaining Republicans are set to spend the next few days making a last-minute pitch to voters.
After a disappointing time in Iowa, where she placed third in the state’s caucuses, Nikki Haley is hoping the Granite state can hand her a boost, as she seeks to prevent what is threatening to become a Donald Trump march to the Republican nomination, and there are some signs that the former governor of South Carolina might just be in luck.
In a state that takes an unusually aggressive pride in its independence – “Live free or die”, New Hampshire’s state motto, is the kind of thing a guy might scream before ripping off his shirt and initiating a bar fight – Republican voters at least appear to be considering someone other than their party’s de facto leader.
Polls show Haley winning almost 34% of the vote in the state, 13 points behind Trump but riding a surge despite a disappointing performance in Iowa. Haley’s pitch of calm instead of the “chaos” of Trump, and her positioning of herself as a relative centrist, could prove appealing in New Hampshire.
“The Iowa Republican party is dominated by conservative evangelical Christians, whose first, second and third concerns are cultural relations – they care about LGBTQ+ issues, they care about abortion, all that sort of stuff,” said Christopher Galdieri, a professor in the department of politics at Saint Anselm College.
“Republicans here, there is a constituency for those sorts of issues, but a lot of Republicans here, particularly in what passes for the party’s establishment these days, their main concern is fiscal conservatism, low taxes, low regulation.”
Haley, who in the American media’s telling has become the main threat to Trump, was scheduled to hold a slew of events in the coming days, including intimate gatherings in New Hampshire’s smaller towns, such as Keene and Exeter. But in Manchester, where looming red-brick buildings serve as a nod to its UK namesake, it is Trump who seems to have the largest presence, with signs heralding the former president prominent and his campaign headquarters a hub of activity.
The former president traveled to New Hampshire on Friday after spending much of Thursday in court in New York, where a judge is deciding what damages he must pay to E Jean Carroll, who a jury found was sexually assaulted by Trump in 1995. The case appears to have distracted him, at least in the short term, from his efforts to win the presidency: Trump spent Thursday night posting more than 30 times on Truth Social, the rightwing social media network he formed after being banned from Twitter (now X) in 2020.
Still, as the vote approaches, Trump is following a similar plan as the one he used in Iowa, swooping in to New Hampshire to hold bombastic rallies in venues his rivals could only dream of filling. The one-term former president was due to hold four rallies over the four days before the primary, including one at the 10,000-seat SNHU arena in Manchester.
Trump addressed thousands of supporters at the same venue the night before the 2016 primary, memorably calling Ted Cruz, then one of his main rivals, a “pussy”. Trump had narrowly lost to Cruz in Iowa, but swept to victory in New Hampshire with a commanding 20-point victory that lit a fire under Trump’s campaign and propelled him to the Republican nomination.
There are signs that things may be closer on Tuesday.
In recent days Trump has complained about independent voters, who under state rules are able to vote in the Republican primary, potentially backing Haley, and has launched racist dog-whistle attacks against his opponent. He referred to Haley, whose parents emigrated to the US from India, as Nimrada, a butchering of her legal first name, Nimarata. Haley has gone by Nikki, her middle name, since she was born, a spokesperson said in 2021.
For her part, Haley is running a new ad in the state which links Trump with Joe Biden, claiming “both are consumed by chaos, negativity and grievances of the past”, and her relative calm seems to have some appeal.
“I like her policies. I like what she did in South Carolina. I think she’s got good international experience, obviously, as a former UN ambassador,” said Jeanne Geisser at an event at a fancy hotel in Salem, a 20-minute drive from Manchester. She voted for Trump in 2016 and 2020, but said she would cast her ballot for Haley this time.
“With Trump, all these lawsuits that are going on, I don’t know what’s gonna happen with those. And just his demeanor, his belittling of people. I don’t see that as presidential,” Geisser said.
One person mostly absent from New Hampshire is Ron DeSantis, the cowboy boot-wearing Florida governor who came second to Trump in the Iowa caucuses. Though he beat Haley there, DeSantis is averaging 5% in New Hampshire polls, and though he held some events in the state on Friday, he has largely switched focus to South Carolina.
While the focus is on the Republican primary, there are Democratic hopefuls active in New Hampshire too; Dean Phillips, a congressman from Minnesota, and Marianne Williamson, a self-help guru, are engaged in a largely futile battle to replace Joe Biden as the presidential nominee.
Both Phillips and Williamson have both spent weeks criss-crossing the state, but New Hampshire will effectively have no say in the Democratic primary, after an internal party feud. The national Democratic party ditched decades of tradition this year in choosing South Carolina, a much more racially diverse state, to host the first presidential primary. When New Hampshire said it would host its primary first anyway, the Democratic National Committee essentially said it would ignore the results.
That means most eyes will be concentrated on the Republican side of things next week, where Haley’s wealthy backers are demanding a good result.
Ken Langone, the billionaire Home Depot co-founder and a key Haley donor, told the Financial Times on Thursday that he was prepared to spend “a nice sum of money” to support his candidate – but only if she does well in the Granite state.
“If she doesn’t get traction in New Hampshire, you don’t throw money down a rathole,” Langone said.
