A pollster for the super PAC supporting former President Donald Trump says ex-U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley is surging in Iowa and New Hampshire after last week’s first presidential debate while Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) holds steady in a distant second place.
Tony Fabrizio, who is polling for MAGA Inc., released a memo obtained by the Washington Examiner on Tuesday finding Haley with double-digit support in Iowa and statistically tied with DeSantis in New Hampshire. Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, meanwhile, won last Wednesday’s debate, according to the poll.
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Trump skipped the debate in favor of an interview with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson, citing his lead over the GOP field. Fabrizio found Trump ahead of DeSantis, at one point considered his chief rival, by 26 points in Iowa and 37 points in New Hampshire.
The memo, reported by Axios, appears to address speculation that Trump’s absence could hurt him in the primary and at least one poll showing a slight decline in support. The former president’s numbers before and after the debate are “statistically unchanged,” Fabrizio wrote.
It also contradicts a poll commissioned by the DeSantis campaign that found him closing the gap on Trump in Iowa, particularly in a head-to-head matchup.
Trump registers at 44% and 48% support in Iowa and New Hampshire, respectively, in the Fabrizio poll, while DeSantis pulls in 18% and 11%. The Florida governor is followed closely by Haley and Ramaswamy in New Hampshire, each with 9% support, but his second-place lead is larger in Iowa, where Haley attracts 10%.
The poll, taken Aug. 25-28, surveyed 500 likely caucusgoers or primary voters in each state, home to the first two contests of the GOP’s 2024 nominating calendar.
Fabrizio, the head pollster for Trump in both 2016 and 2020, casts his lead as “rock solid,” finding that 72% of Iowa Republicans and 81% of New Hampshire Republicans supporting Trump don’t plan to change their mind. DeSantis’s and Haley’s support, by contrast, is “fungible,” he said.
Sixty-eight percent of DeSantis supporters and 90% of Haley supporters in New Hampshire, for example, said they may vote for someone else.
The memo knocks DeSantis for his debate performance, arguing it did not provide him the bump he needed to pull away from the second tier of primary candidates. Although the DeSantis camp touted a snap poll showing him the winner of the debate, Fabrizio’s own polling found Ramaswamy decidedly in first place, followed by Haley and DeSantis.
“Despite the continued wishful thinking of some, Trump remains firmly in control in both states,” Fabrizio writes. “The much hoped for DeSantis ‘bounce’ was really a ‘dead cat bounce’ in that it doesn’t exist.”
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The DeSantis campaign did not respond to a request for comment but has previously pointed to a $1 million-plus fundraising haul to signal momentum in the 24 hours after the debate.
“Ron DeSantis showed Wednesday night that he is a proven leader who will deliver results as president, and we are thrilled with the flood of support we have received since his debate victory. We look forward to building on this momentum in the weeks and months ahead as the Governor continues to outwork everyone in this race as he lays out his vision to reverse our nation’s decline and revive the American Dream,” campaign manager James Uthmeier said in a statement.
