Cruz ’92 surpasses Trump in Iowa polls, Christie gains support in N.H.

U.S. Senator from Texas Ted Cruz ’92 has surged in the Iowa polls for the 2016 Republican presidential primary, while New Jersey governor and ex officio University Trustee Chris Christie is polling much lower.

According to the Des Moines Register, Cruz made a 21 percentage-point increase in the Iowa polls since October 22, making him the lead among Republican candidates. Real estate developer Donald Trump, the former leader, is now 10 points below Cruz, while Ben Carson, who previously held second place, dropped to third.

The Register said that Christie has three percent in the Iowa polls, tied with former Governor of Arkansas Mike Huckabee and U.S. Senator from Kentucky Rand Paul.

USA Today presented a national poll Monday showing that Trump still holds the lead with 41 percent of the votes, while Cruz holds second place with 14 percent. All other candidates, including Christie, polled below five percent.

However, USA Today also noted that Christie remains a contender in New Hampshire. According to the New York Times, Christie has been actively seeking endorsements in New Hampshire, a state that remains significant because it has the earliest primary in the nation. In November, he received an early endorsement from the New Hampshire Union Leader, a well-known newspaper for Republicans in state politics, the Times stated.

Christie was endorsed by New Hampshire Senate Majority Leader Jeb Bradley on Dec.7. The Political Monitor said that Bradley appreciated Christie’s persistence and willingness to listen and believes that these qualities would appeal to voters in New Hampshire, where 43.7 percent of residents are undeclared. Christie has over 100 endorsements from political leaders in New Hampshire.

Neither Christie’s nor Cruz’s campaigns responded to requests for comment.

University politics professor Paul Frymer said that Cruz has gone up a bit further as an alternative to Trump on the far right and has likely benefitted from Carson’s decline in the polls. However, he added that more needs to happen, with other candidates declining in the polls, before Cruz can become a front-runner for the nomination. He noted that while Rick Santorum won the Iowa caucus in 2012 and Huckabee won the Iowa caucus in 2008, neither won the eventual Republican nomination.

“At the end of the day, it’d still be quite shocking for someone as far right as him to be the nominee, and I assume that once the more moderate wing of the party sorts out its different candidates, that we'd see a move of support for someone other than Cruz,” Frymer said.

Candidates typically rise when they aren’t in the limelight and fall once they get there, Frymer noted. The question to ask, then, he said, is whether Cruz can withstand the scrutiny that comes with being more competitive now that people are starting to pay attention to him.

Frymer added that Cruz’s links to the Tea Party are currently helping more than Christie’s links as a moderate. He said he believes that Christie will not drop out of the race if he thinks he can do well enough to re-energize his campaign.

“Christie is hanging in [there], with some help with a big New Hampshire endorsement, but has yet to really separate himself from the likes of Rubio and Bush,” he noted.

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Frymer noted that traditionally, the political spectrum changes as more candidates drop out and parties think about the general election where they want a candidate who can beat the Democratic nominee in the national race. However, such changes won't happen until it gets closer to the elections day, he added.

An unexpected turn in the race was terrorism, which was the focus of Tuesday’s GOP debate and has given yet more life to Trump’s campaign and all the attention for his hardline anti-terrorism, Frymer noted. He added that Trump is willing to fuel people’s anger in a way that no one else can or deems appropriate.

“It’s hard for others to compete, especially if they want to engage in any set of facts or realities,” Frymer said.