Wall Street Journal (Opinion)
By Jason Riley
February 3, 2016
So,
it turns out that you can’t call Iowa voters “stupid,” skip a debate in
Des Moines because you don’t like the moderators and still expect to
prevail in the state’s
caucuses. Who knew?
Donald
Trump’s loss Monday night, which is far more consequential than Ted
Cruz’s victory, could mean a return to Republican normalcy in an
election year that has been
almost freakish. Mr. Trump’s poll numbers have soared above his rivals’
for months—the Real Clear Politics average puts him at nearly 36%,
while none of the other GOP candidates is above 20%—yet he lost handily
in the state where the first votes were cast.
Thanks
to the voters of Iowa, conservatives awoke Tuesday morning to a
political world that made sense again for the first time since Mr.
Trump’s rise began last summer.
They learned that bluster and incivility have not become political
virtues. Well-attended rallies are no substitute for traditional
campaigning. Sarah Palin is no GOP kingmaker. And religious
conservatives—real ones in the mold of Mike Huckabee and Rick
Santorum—still
win the Iowa caucuses. Hawkeye voters find Mr. Trump entertaining but
not very presidential. Many Republicans haven’t made up their minds, and
among those tasked with casting the first votes, Donald Trump ranked
closer to the third-place candidate, Marco Rubio,
than the winner.
According
to CNN entrance surveys of Republican voters, evangelicals made up 64%
of the Iowa electorate, and 34% of them went for Mr. Cruz, which is the
main reason he
won. Perhaps more impressive, however, was Mr. Rubio’s strong showing
in a state that doesn’t play to his strengths. He wasn’t supposed to
win, only to exceed expectations, and he did. Mr. Rubio finished third,
one point behind Mr. Trump and five points behind
the winner. Mr. Trump performed best among caucusgoers who prefer
someone who “tells it like it is,” while Mr. Rubio won voters who said
electability is their top candidate quality. Put another way, Trump
supporters want to make a point. Rubio supporters want
to elect a president.
Mr.
Trump’s defeat is a serious blow because a large part of his appeal is
that he doesn’t lose. Iowa Republicans performed a public service in
puncturing the media-generated
Trump hype, and future coverage of the candidate ought to be more
balanced. Heading into the Feb. 9 New Hampshire primary, Mr. Cruz and
Mr. Rubio both have the momentum. But Mr. Rubio is in a better position
to win over eclectic Granite State voters, who are
less enamored of Mr. Cruz’s social conservatism than are Iowans. And to
the extent that Mr. Trump remains a factor in the coming contests, he
probably damages Mr. Cruz more than Mr. Rubio.
The
Republican field is poised to shrink significantly after New Hampshire,
but there is still a chance that the number of Democrats running,
perhaps in the guise of an
independent, could expand. Hillary Clinton’s narrow victory in Iowa did
nothing to assuage liberals who are concerned about her weaknesses as
the would-be nominee. Mrs. Clinton is not worried about losing the
nomination to Bernie Sanders. She’s worried that
he’ll expose her vulnerabilities and invite others to hijack her
coronation.
Last
month Mrs. Clinton assured former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who
is weighing an independent White House bid, that she’ll win the
nomination and so he needn’t
run. Since then, we’ve learned that nearly two dozen emails on the
private server she used as secretary of state were not only classified
but so sensitive that no portion of them can be released publicly, even
in redacted form. And after barely surviving Iowa,
Mrs. Clinton may well lose big in New Hampshire to Mr. Sanders, whom
Real Clear Politics shows leading by 18 points. We somehow doubt that
Mr. Bloomberg, a billionaire who could finance his own campaign, has
been reassured that the Democratic front-runner
has everything under control.
But
even a weakened Mrs. Clinton could win against the wrong Republican
nominee. Mr. Trump and Mr. Cruz are more popular among conservatives but
fare worse than Mr. Rubio
in head-to-head matchups with the former first lady among the swing
voters in battleground states who often decide elections. Mr. Rubio
polls better than both GOP rivals among white women, seniors and
independents. Among moderates and suburban women, he trails
Mrs. Clinton, but unlike Messrs. Trump and Cruz, Mr. Rubio is at least
within striking distance.
Among
Hispanics, all three Republicans trail Mrs. Clinton badly, but some of
this may be guilt-by-association for Mr. Rubio. Of the three, he is the
only one who hasn’t
gone out of his way to antagonize Hispanics while discussing illegal
immigration, which means he is better positioned to make inroads with
this fast-growing voter bloc should he become the nominee. Mr. Trump and
Mr. Cruz are betting that the GOP can win in
November by deepening its appeal. Mr. Rubio wants to widen it.
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