National
With just a little under two months until the “official” start of the 2024 presidential election with the Iowa Caucuses, the Republican field has quickly narrowed, while recent developments may have implications on the immediate GOP nomination race.
The Republican nomination field was seen as relatively uneventful this year, not only in terms of candidate quality but also in the form of wide expectation, both due to polling and conventional wisdom, that Trump is the overwhelming favorite to win the nomination for a third consecutive time.
While some of the candidates were fairly impressive in their own rights, none caught on as serious contenders to what has appeared for some time to be a coronation for the former president. Despite this, some candidates had their moments in second place, albeit a distant one.
Initially, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis seemed to be giving Trump a run for his money, but awkward campaigning and a perception that his best political fortunes lie in the near future prevented him from consolidating more support.
Afterwards, biotech entrepreneur and political newcomer Vivek Ramaswamy, of Ohio, presented an interesting alternative for the GOP base: Trump-like populism and a rejection of the status quo, packaged in a demographic mold unlike the base of the party. While Vivek ascended to second place, his condescending debate stage performance proved that Trump’s trademark attitudes are trademarked for a reason.
Most recently, former United Nations Ambassador and former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley has now shot into the second place spotlight. While Haley is skilled on foreign policy, local governance, and legislative hardball, some have criticized her a “neo-con,” and one too hawkish on foreign policy for an America less involved in the world stage.
The relatively large field has quickly thinned to just six candidates, with former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie and former Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson joining the ranks of Trump, DeSantis, Ramaswamy, and Haley. This comes off the heels of the recent departure of North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum, whose technocratic, big-energy platform might have been a welcome fit on the stage, in exchange for more bolstered name recognition.
Ahead of the first contests, however, is something of a shakeup. Outgoing New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu (R-NH) has endorsed Nikki Haley for president. While not a surprise that his endorsement did not go to Donald Trump – Sununu has been a vocal critic of the president – it was a question as to who would end up receiving the immensely popular governor’s blessing for the first-in-the-nation primary.
Not only does this possibly bolster Haley’s chances of scoring more delegates from the primary, something that adds to her newly-minted position in second place, but it also deals a blow to Chris Christie, whose all-in strategy on New Hampshire is a repeat from his failed 2016 bid. Given Christie’s lack of appeal in Iowa, he largely bypassed the state on his first run in 2016; he only garnered 1.76% of the vote in Iowa that year. A bolder New Hampshire strategy made more sense since the northeastern electorate might have been more sympathetic to his presidential plight, but it ultimately only earned him 7% of the vote, with no delegates.
Contrary to DeSantis, who is often criticized as jumping the gun on his presidential aspirations, Christie is often criticized for having long eclipsed his White House potential. After a successful first term as New Jersey Governor, many believed Christie would have mounted a serious presidential bid as a moderate Republican from a blue state. His success in Trenton earned him a landslide re-election victory in 2013, only to be whittled away by his multiple scandals, chief among them separate bridge and beach closures.
After Christie faded into irrelevance following the expiration of his second term, his bulldog strategy in 2016 seemed even more like a political misfire, as attacks only stuck to the weakest candidates in the room, not the frontrunner in Trump.
That said, Christie’s only leg to stand on in the early game is that of the New Hampshire Primary, a possibility that seems largely taken away from him as Haley received the endorsement of the governor. Sununu was flirting with a presidential bid, but instead decided to not seek a fifth two-year term as governor.
New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation primary is seen as a crucial litmus test for educated voters, who lean slightly Democratic but who are overall socially moderate-to-liberal and fiscally conservative. A more Second Amendment-friendly state than other Democratic states, New Hampshire is also regularly in a room by itself when it comes to presidential contests. It is the last New England state to back a Republican nominee – George W. Bush (R-TX) in 2000 – and each election since then has seen the state decided by single digits. In 2016, it was the closest state Hillary Clinton (D-NY) won; she carried it by just 0.4% – or about 2,700 votes out of 700,000 cast.
At just four electoral votes, it’s not a huge electoral college prize, but it is a state that is made up of must-win demographics, especially on a primary level. While Haley could possibly siphon some support for Trump here, early polling does not indicate much remote danger for the former president. According to the FiveThirtyEight polling aggregate, Trump leads the pack with an average 44.2% from recent polls. Haley registers at just 18.7%, with Christie in third place at 13.0%.
Twenty-two RNC delegates are up for grabs in New Hampshire’s Republican Primary this year. Delegates are awarded proportionally to each candidate who garners at least 10% of the popular vote. In 2016, Trump won eleven delegates from the state with 35% of the vote.
Meanwhile, President Joe Biden (D-DE) will not appear on the New Hampshire ballot in the Democratic Primary. After a string of embarrassing early swing state primaries in 2020, Biden found a solid thirty-point win in South Carolina. His attempts to lobby the DNC to place South Carolina’s primary ahead of New Hampshire’s were not successful. New Hampshire Democrats have staged a write-in campaign on his behalf.
State
Governor Kathy Hochul (D) is attempting to combat antisemitic language and actions on college campuses in New York after large-scale pro-Hamas protests were seen in the wake of the conflict last month, and as recent Congressional testification from Ivy League presidents left much to be desired in terms of the college’s stances on what qualifies on-campus behavior as anti semitic.
Hochul wrote a letter to presidents of colleges and universities across New York, stating that on-campus calls for “genocide” violate the New York State Human Rights Law and Civil Rights Act of 1964.
“I assure you that if any school in New York State is found to be in violation, I will activate the State’s Division of Human Rights to take aggressive enforcement action and will refer possible Title Vi violations to the federal government,” Hochul wrote. “The moral lapses that were evidenced by the disgraceful answers to questions posed during this week’s congressional hearing cannot and will not be tolerated here in the state of New York.”
Local
Congressman Nick LaLota (R) of the First District has introduced the Mobile Post Office Relief Act, which would require the USPS to provide a “mobile retail unit to provide retail postal services, including Post Office (PO) Box services, to an area when the post office is temporarily closed.
“For months, the Sound Beach Post Office has been closed with no signs of reopening and no updates on repairs. I have inquired with USPS numerous times as to the status and what we can do to support the community, with no real answers,” said LaLota. “The Sound Beach community deserves a government that is open and transparent with them and a government that works for them, not against them. Providing a mobile post office is the least our government can do while repairs continue. I will fight to right the wrong at Sound Beach and hold USPS accountable until their post office reopens.”
