Will Trump crush Haley in New Hampshire?

A couple weeks ago, CNN had the race 38% Trump to 32% Haley.

Be careful what you wish for is one of those old sayings that somehow rings true over and over. Nikki Haley has been wishing for a two person race between her and Donald Trump for some time. Her supporters cheered when she announced the DeSantis withdrawal at a rally. She treated the DeSantis announcement as if it was gold!

Now she has to wonder if this is really as good as what she wished for.

When Ramaswamy dropped out, he endorsed Trump. Tim Scott dropped out a while back, and he recently endorsed Trump. Then DeSantis drops out and endorses Trump. While there is no guarantee that supporters will always follow the endorsement of their candidates when those candidates drop out, it much better to have that endorsement than not to have it.

Now pretty much every poll coming out of New Hampshire has Trump closing in on 60% with Haley still stuck and unable to get past that 40% mark. Trump's average polling lead right now is over 18% according to Real Clear Politics. I doubt it's going to get much better for Haley without a real game changer. Mighty momentum is on the side of the former President. If he wins big in New Hampshire, Haley has South Carolina as her last stand. If she doesn't flip the narrative there, then it is over.

If I had to predict right now, I would say that Trump will exceed 60% and win by more than 20% in a state that Haley has clearly put everything into. Her position that Trump was under 50% and that a consolidated candidate would be able to overtake him was clearly nonsense. The logic was flawed as in there were really more pro-Trump candidates than pure anti-Trumpers in the race. Besides Haley, you had Hutchinson and Christie as never-Trumpers. Everyone else of substance was a Trump-lite candidate, hoping to ride his ideas (without the baggage) to victory.

Haley had already consolidated the anti-Trumpers. That is what allowed her to compete with DeSantis for second place in Iowa. Now that Trump has consolidated the various MAGA candidates it looks like clear sailing for the bad orange man.