Can Trump broaden base as he faces 'political & significant legal complications' ahead of November?
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00:00 Donald Trump once again proved his vice grip on the Republican Party Tuesday.
00:06 The former U.S. president won the New Hampshire primary by more than 10 points,
00:10 besting his last remaining challenger, former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley.
00:15 Trump had been hoping to get Haley to drop out, but she's vowing to fight on.
00:21 "We'll see you on the ground."
00:22 "She ran up when it was 7, and you know, we have to do what's good for our party.
00:28 And she was up, and I said, 'Wow, she's doing like a speech, like she won.'
00:34 She didn't win, she lost. And you know, last week we had a little bit of a problem.
00:41 And if you remember, Ron was very upset because she ran up and she pretended she won Iowa.
00:48 And I looked around, I said, 'Didn't she come in third?' Yeah, she came in third."
00:53 "I want to congratulate Donald Trump on his victory tonight. He earned it.
00:58 And I want to acknowledge that.
01:01 Now, you've all heard the chatter among the political class.
01:06 They're falling all over themselves, saying this race is over.
01:10 Well, I have news for all of them.
01:14 New Hampshire is first in the nation. It is not the last in the nation."
01:21 For more on the state of the GOP race, we welcome Jordan Cash to the program.
01:25 He is an assistant professor of political science at Michigan State University.
01:29 Thank you so much for joining us here on France 24.
01:33 Now, Trump is the first non-incumbent Republican to win both the Iowa caucus and the New Hampshire primary.
01:39 These are generally two very different groups of voters.
01:42 And while it feels really early to be saying this race is over, if you look at the polls, it appears to be over.
01:50 Yeah, I think that's generally right.
01:54 I think Trump, the fact that Trump is a former president makes this a very unusual race, that he basically is running as an incumbent.
02:01 And so far, Republican voters are voting like he is an incumbent.
02:06 And while Nikki Haley is pledging to fight on, go to her home state of South Carolina,
02:11 it's tough to see a path for victory for her at this point.
02:15 So why do you think Haley is staying in?
02:20 Well, it's hard to say. I think part of the reason is she feels that she needs to stay in at least through her home state.
02:26 There's always the possibility that her favorite daughter's status in South Carolina may create a surprising outcome.
02:33 And if she can come close again, especially in a state like South Carolina, then perhaps she thinks she could extend the race a little further.
02:40 Another possibility might be that just to raise her profile more, Republicans do, at least prior to Trump,
02:48 had a tendency to reward the second place finisher in their presidential primaries with the nomination the next time.
02:55 So you could see this is Haley building up her profile even more for a run four years from now, even if she loses this time.
03:03 And we're just going to look forward a little bit and pretend that Trump has already locked this up.
03:09 A poll released this week found that 59 percent of registered U.S. voters say they are, quote,
03:15 not enthusiastic about a Trump Biden rematch, but it looks like that's what the country is about to get.
03:23 So what does that level of discontent signal to you as we look toward the general election in November?
03:31 Well, it's hard to say at this point, but I think you could see two possibilities.
03:34 One would be that the level of discontent goes on both sides.
03:40 So you could see the Republicans being very enthused to get Biden out of office or the Democrats to get Trump out of office.
03:46 But that kind of negative fuel to get out the vote efforts.
03:49 What I think you're more likely to see is a lower turnout than you might otherwise expect in a presidential race like this,
03:57 that both Democrats and Republicans end up staying home.
04:01 Then the real question will be which base is more fired up, is less, you might say, depressed and actually gets out to the polls in November.
04:09 A really inspiring outlook for the country there.
04:13 Now, just to make it clear to our viewers, the factors that help you win the Republican nomination are not necessarily what helps you appeal to a wider general electorate in the U.S.
04:26 Republican nominating contests, you tend to need to be more conservative.
04:30 So what are the challenges for Trump when he needs to appeal to more than his base in the general election?
04:38 Yeah, there are a couple of different challenges that he'll have to overcome.
04:42 One is the fact that, yeah, his base is more conservative.
04:46 And that's been to his strength in Iowa and New Hampshire and even in the primaries going forward, where he'll have to draw more voters who voted for Nikki Haley, quite frankly.
04:57 Independent voters, moderate voters, try to get some Democrats on his side.
05:02 And Trump so far in both this election and in his prior elections has not exactly shown a great ability to do that or do that consistently.
05:12 So that's a real big issue for him.
05:14 The other issue, of course, is with these criminal trials coming up for him.
05:19 There is a lot of concern that if Trump is convicted in any of those trials, that many voters will see him as, even voters who might otherwise support him, might see him as unsuitable for the presidency.
05:30 And then, of course, we have this issue of several states trying to take Trump off the ballot, Colorado in Maine in particular.
05:37 And that's going to be argued in the Supreme Court fairly soon.
05:40 Not only are there these political complications for Trump, there are significant legal complications that he'll have to be dealing with as he runs against Joe Biden, assuming he gets the nomination.
05:50 Jordan Cash, assistant professor of political science at Michigan State University, thanks so much for being on the program.
05:56 Thank you very much.