Nikki Haley is using one of former President Donald Trump’s favorite barometers for success against him: polls.
Less than a month out from the Jan. 15 Iowa caucuses, Ms. Haley stresses that if Republicans want to flip the White House next year, they must focus on surveys showing she’s the biggest threat to President Biden.
“You look at the last general election poll, head-to-head with Biden, Trump is even,” Ms. Haley said last week at a campaign stop in Iowa. “On a good day, he will be up two points.”
“[Florida Gov. Ron] DeSantis doesn’t beat Biden,” she said of her rival. “In every one of those general election polls, everyone, I beat Biden by double digits.”
The Washington Times asked the Trump campaign for comment.
Ms. Haley is hoping the message will help her build on the momentum she’s carrying into the end of the year, cement herself as the chief Trump alternative in the race and chip into his lead in the early primary states.
That’s a challenge for Ms. Haley, who served in the Trump administration as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and, before that, as governor of South Carolina.
Despite losing the 2020 election, leading the GOP into disappointing election results and facing a smorgasbord of legal challenges, Mr. Trump has maintained a stranglehold on the GOP primary electorate.
He leads by 30 points in Iowa and 19 points in New Hampshire, which holds its primary on Jan. 23.
Republicans once again rallied around Mr. Trump last week after the Colorado Supreme Court banned him from the state’s ballot because he engaged in an “insurrection.”
The ruling ripped some of the limelight away from the rising Ms. Haley and her message that she’s the party’s true general election killer.
Ms. Haley points to a recent Wall Street Journal poll of registered voters that showed her with a 17-point lead over Mr. Biden, with Mr. Trump holding a four-point edge.
Muhlenberg College last week released a poll of registered voters in the battleground state of Pennsylvania that had Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump in a statistical dead heat.
Ms. Haley, meanwhile, held a five-point lead over the commander-in-chief.
Last month, a New York Times/ Siena College survey showed Ms. Haley outperforming Mr. Biden in six battleground states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
The same poll showed Mr. Trump leading Mr. Biden in five of those states.
The outlier was Wisconsin, where Mr. Trump trailed Mr. Biden by a couple of points, and Ms. Haley led the president by 11 points.
Mr. Trump glossed over that fact at campaign stops where he celebrated the rest of the findings as proof he has Mr. Biden’s number.
Yet Ms. Haley had larger leads than Mr. Trump over Mr. Biden in Arizona, Michigan and Pennsylvania.
It’s a point that Ms. Haley and her allies are seizing ahead of the first nomination contests next month as they look to convince voters she’s the Republican best positioned to beat Mr. Biden.
“America is not past our prime; it is just that our politicians are past theirs,” Ms. Haley says in an ad the SFA Fund Inc. super PAC started running this week that highlights her polling strength against Mr. Biden. “If you are tired of losing, put your trust in a new generation.”
• Seth McLaughlin can be reached at smclaughlin@washingtontimes.com.
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