What The GOP Primary Looks Like In The Early States 42:30

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This is a good game. I've always been saying, like, I don't think I got this one right, but, like, I feel like I just, I generate so much, like, trivia in my brain for stuff that no one else will ever ask me about. The remaining factoids I have about 2020 candidates who no one remembers is filling up so much of my brain space, so I'm glad I get to, like, try to use it. Katie, I am right there with you. ♪

Hello and welcome to the FiveThirtyEight Politics Podcast. I'm Galen Druk. Game time for the Republican presidential primary begins in earnest this week. The first debate is being held in Milwaukee on Wednesday, and it marks the beginning of a five-month countdown to the Iowa caucuses, during which there will be monthly debates, nonstop campaigning, and a likely winnowing of the field.

As summer winds down and voters train more of their attention on the primary, we'll also see whether any of the candidates are able to take former President Trump down a peg. He currently leads our national polling average with 54% support. And at the time of this recording, reporting has just come out suggesting that Trump is going to skip the debate in favor of an interview with Tucker Carlson. As an aside, we're recording this on Friday because I'm going to be running around Milwaukee on Monday.

But in any case, while this may be when the nation begins to tune in, folks in the early states have been tuning in either by choice or because of multi-million dollar ad spending for months. And so today, in preparation for the months ahead, we're going to take in the view from the early states. And to do that, I've asked a few local reporters to join me. Going in primary state order is Katie Aiken, political reporter at the Des Moines Register. Welcome to the podcast.

Hey, happy to be here. Next is Josh Rogers, senior political reporter at New Hampshire Public Radio. Likewise, welcome, Josh. Thank you. And Joseph Bustos, politics reporter at The State in Columbia, South Carolina. Welcome. Thanks for having me. So in addition to taking in the view from the early states, we are also going to, later on in the podcast, play our second ever installment of Guess Which Candidate Said This. So folks, get excited.

But let's begin here. As I mentioned, the national polling picture has Trump leading with 54%. After that, DeSantis has 16% support. Then Ramaswamy with 8%, Pence with 5%, Haley with 4%, Christie and Scott with 3% each. And then on down from there, descending to zero support for some of the candidates.

But the lineups in the early states can look quite a bit different based on who's managing to connect with voters there. So Katie, let's start in Iowa. How is the picture different on the ground there?

So the big thing about Iowa is that since we are the first state to caucus, you know, a lot of these candidates, especially some of the lesser known candidates, spend an incredible amount of time and money here. So I believe if this is coming out on Monday, we'll have a new Iowa poll out. So go look at that. I can't talk about it right now. Oh, no. Oh, no. It's still in embargo. I know. No, your timing's horrible.

No, I guess I would just say that, you know, at this point we are on alert for things to be shaken up here a little bit, just because people in Iowa have a lot more time to, you know, go out, see the candidates, get to know them. And, you know, some of the lesser known candidates have been spending a lot of time here. And honestly, some of the better known candidates have also been spending a lot of time here. I mean, DeSantis has been doing a bus tour the last couple of weeks. He's had many stops in the state. Uh,

And Trump just swung by the state fair. So it'll be interesting to see how Iowans respond to that attention. Yeah, I'm going to put some numbers to that because we've been tracking visits to each state. So Vivek Ramaswamy is leading with Iowa visits at 26 visits.

followed by Asa Hutchinson at 22 Iowa visits. Then we have Nikki Haley at 20, DeSantis at 13, Mike Pence at 12, Burgum at nine, Donald Trump at seven, and then it goes on down from there. So some folks have been spending a lot of time in Iowa. And while I know you cannot share the Des Moines Register poll with us right now, which by the way, is conducted by FiveThirtyEight, acclaimed, like best pollster in America, Ann Selzer. Queen of our hearts.

champion and sells her. The New York Times did do some polling there. And what it suggested was that while Trump is still leading at 44%, DeSantis is doing a bit better there at 20%, Tim Scott at 9%, which is triple where he was nationally, Ramaswamy five, Haley four, and on down from there. That's a little bit of the picture in Iowa. We'll come back, Josh.

Give us a scoop on the ground in New Hampshire. Well, generally, the polling, you know, squares with the national polling. You know, Donald Trump remains popular with a big slug of likely Republican voters. Ron DeSantis has not been here quite as much as in Iowa. He's going to have spent the weekend here. He's been pushing and, you know, perhaps spinning his wheels a bit, trying to gain support. Chris Christie is showing a little bit better here than he might be in Iowa. Obviously,

it would be essential for him to perform well here if he truly wants to

do well. This was obviously with the state where he predicated his 2016 campaign here, and I think he came in sixth. And other than that, I mean, it is Trump, DeSantis, everyone else. I will say on the ground, there is a good deal of energy for Vivek Ramaswamy. He's picking up steam, seemingly. And, you know, voters seem to come out of his events wanting more, which is obviously a good thing. We stand up.

for the truth. We fight for the truth. That is what won us the American Revolution. That is what will win us the revolution of 2024. You know, we'll see. It's wide open. There is plenty of support for Trump. He did win his first primary here in his first campaign. And there is some goodwill, but there's certainly the voters who are turning out to see candidates will tell you that they're not necessarily

wedded to supporting him. And one big question in New Hampshire, we have an open primary is what's the electorate going to look like? Is it going to be perhaps, you know, independents are likely to vote in the Republican primary more than in the Democratic primary. And it's sort of unclear what that's even going to look like if President Biden is even going to campaign here due to his favoring South Carolina voting first. So there are a lot of questions and, you know, there's still a lot of time here, but in general,

You know, the contours of the race here seem pretty similar to elsewhere. Yeah. I mean, if we look back at some of the state level polling that's been conducted, Emerson College, which is a pretty high quality pollster, just put out a new poll, which, as you said, Trump is out about 50 percent in that poll. But then Christie is actually in second with nine percent. Not by much. You know, DeSantis is at eight percent.

But what's going on with Christie in New Hampshire? Because when he jumped into the race, a lot of us, especially folks in the national media, said he's so disliked amongst Republican voters that he doesn't have much room to really gain traction with primary voters. Is that like independence or, you know, what what is going on with Christie's support in New Hampshire?

Well, there are some Republicans in New Hampshire who really don't like Donald Trump. And Christie's brand of campaigning, I mean, I will say he hasn't spent all that much time on the ground here, but his brand of campaigning, his favoring of town hall meetings, his willingness to sort of, you know, take questions and mix it up with voters is something that on paper would work here. What I think Republican voters have to ask themselves is two things. First, is he really the guy?

under indictment in four different cases, given the conduct that he committed, someone who can beat Joe Biden or any other Democrat in November 2024? And when are we going to stop pretending that this is normal? And there are a lot of, you know, vestigial, sort of more moderate pre-Trump Republicans and independent minded voters who are out there. I'm

skeptical at this point as to whether you know chris christie uh based on what we know now is likely to to really do that well here but if he is going to do well anywhere the electorate here

is a place where he would stand a decent chance. And just to put a few numbers down before we move on to South Carolina. So visits to New Hampshire, Vivek Ramaswamy, once again, leading the pack with 19 visits. Then we have Nikki Haley with 17 visits. Will Hurd with 11 visits.

Then we got a bunch of folks, you know, in like eight, seven on down from there. Ron DeSantis has only been eight times. Trump has only been five times. Let's move on to South Carolina. Joe, what are you seeing on the ground there?

So polling here shows Trump is ahead as well. He's got a healthy lead, but the race is for second right now. I mean, you see in one Fox Business poll, Nikki Haley was in second place ahead of DeSantis. We have to have a new conservative leader. We have to have a new person that's going to go forward and start giving us solutions. And Tim Scott's numbers have also been improving.

I want people to understand that conservatism works. It doesn't work for the rich, doesn't work for the poor, doesn't work for the black, it doesn't work for the white. It works for America. Mainly that's because South Carolina, in addition to being an early state, also has two South Carolinians running in the early state. So they have a lot of name recognition here.

Even though Donald Trump is popular, he has the biggest names endorsing him. The governor, he's Governor McMaster. He's got Lindsey Graham and several of the congressmen who are all backing his campaign. So Trump right now is in the poll position.

Jumping off that real quick, I would just say, you know, something that's been interesting in Iowa is DeSantis has really been racking up the Iowa endorsements. I mean, because we're first, some of our statewide office holders choose not to endorse. They say that they're just trying to welcome people to the state. But DeSantis, I believe, is up to 40 legislative endorsements in Iowa. And so...

when Trump brought some of his Florida endorsers to the Iowa State Fair as sort of a jab at DeSantis, DeSantis responded by bringing a bunch of his Iowa endorsers to the state fair, essentially being like,

Whatever. I have these people in this state. So it's been interesting to see how he's been focusing on the endorsement game here. And the endorsement game is kind of interesting in South Carolina, too. Nikki Haley, who was a state representative for six years and a governor for six years, spending 12 years in the statehouse, only has a handful of state lawmakers backing her.

Tim Scott, who only spent one term as a state rep and then went on to Congress, he had like maybe 30 to 35 current former state lawmakers backing him. So that's been an interesting dynamic as well. What's the endorsement game like on the ground in New Hampshire, Josh? Well, we have a massive citizen legislature, 400 members of the New Hampshire House. So it's easy to rack up a significant number of endorsements that may

have a little functional effect. And so there's a good deal. I mean, certainly Trump and DeSantis have both rolled out slates of endorsers. You know, a factor that at least he thinks it's important, our governor, Chris Sununu, who, you know, toyed with Iran himself and traveled the country and didn't really seem to pick up much traction. He is out there explicitly as a critic of Donald Trump at this point. Donald Trump doesn't even really act like he was president, right? He tries to kind of erase all that and kind of

He's trying to act like some sort of new candidate, that he wasn't there not draining the swamp. He wasn't there not, you know, driving bad fiscal responsibility, which he did. One thing that I'm watching is whether he can hold any sway. He is terrifically popular in New Hampshire. If he decided to run for a fifth term, he would almost certainly win reelection. He's out there saying Republicans need to get behind somebody else other than Trump. And he said he's intending to sort of throw his weight behind

an alternative. But, you know, they're all the all these candidates have endorsers, you know, Ramaswamy, Haley, they all have slates of endorsers. I'm not sure it makes a great deal of difference in New Hampshire in this day and age. And I'm curious to know if, you know, other other people think these endorsements mean as much as they might have in a pre sort of digital era, because I just don't see them as being terribly significant in New Hampshire politics.

Yeah, I think that's fair. I mean, I think that Iowans are very tuned in to sort of the national narratives, national media in a way that maybe they weren't many cycles ago. You know, in Iowa, like I said, many of the statewide elected officials are not weighing in. And so, for instance, Governor Kim Reynolds is not endorsing anybody, but she and Trump kind of had a little spat a month or two ago because he essentially said,

on Truth Social, he posted, she should be endorsing me, essentially. Like I made her governor and she has said that she won't do that. So they're a bit on the outs right now. And it's just been really interesting to see that because Reynolds is also incredibly popular here. She won reelection by a wide margin. Republicans consistently really approve of her. So I don't think it's necessarily tipping the scales very much, but it is an interesting dynamic that the leadership of the state seems less interested

in Trump than maybe they once were. And I'll add this about Nikki Haley's endorsements. She's kind of turned into that. She's kind of like, all right, I didn't get along with the legislature, even though they were, was Republican controlled. I took on the establishment. I took on the good old boys club. That's kind of what her, her handling of that is of the lack of endorsements here in South Carolina. There's a small handful that she's getting.

Yeah. And of course, as we saw in 2016, you know, the nominee ended up being somebody who didn't get a an endorsement from a congressional Republican until like February of the year of the primary. So, yeah, you know, it doesn't need to matter. I mean,

When we talk about the party deciding and the reason we track endorsements in order to get a sense of whether or not the party is coalescing around someone, usually we can only say, yes, the party has decided if somebody is the runaway leader with endorsements. And I don't think we're seeing that so far. And certainly you're not suggesting that on the ground in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina. But, you know, one of the reason that y'all states matter is because

grassroots movement can end up having a ripple effect and creating, as we like to call it, momentum that can end up making somebody a nominee who might not otherwise have been. I think probably the most famous recent example would be Barack Obama, but like Jimmy Carter is the classic example. So is there any sense that you're getting from either talking to voters or, you know, maybe something that the polls can't tell us that there is interest in sort of moving on from Trump and finding somebody different?

I mean, I've heard plenty of that. But again, this is mainly speaking to voters who are at campaign events for Trump's rivals. And so, you know, to even show up, they've crossed some sort of threshold in terms of being willing to consider others. And this evening, I'm going out to Ron DeSantis is doing some campaigning at a local Republican dinner. And this will be full of

people from the southern part of the state. They're going to be in Nashua. And one thing I'm hoping to find out from voters is how, you know, how serious they are about

being comfortable with Trump. A lot of them will tell you, well, I might want to move on, but, you know, I feel he's getting a raw deal from Democrats or I liked his policies. There are some people who will just tell you they just want him gone, Republicans, but they're not the predominant slug of voters I'm talking to these days. Yeah, I would agree. When I'm at events for Trump's opponents, I talk to a lot of voters who are still shopping around and

But we saw, I call it Gail Wilder went to a Trump rally in Pickens, South Carolina, a town of I think about 5,000 people. And he shut down the town, attracting tens of thousands of people. Well, hello, Pickens, and hello to South Carolina. It's great to be with you. We've had great success together. And there's a huge amount of support for Donald Trump here in South Carolina.

What is it like when you talk to folks who support Trump after sort of everything that he's been through, but everything he's sort of taken the party through, including like a lackluster showing in 2022, you know, a lot of national attention on indictments?

doing it for them? I think that this is something we've observed over and over again at this point, but I have heard it on the ground in Iowa too, that for some voters, you know, every time there's a new indictment that's unveiled, they

They truly believe that this is an effort against Donald Trump and they think it's an unfair effort against Donald Trump. And so, you know, I've spoken to Trump supporters here in Iowa who say it just makes them more inclined to rally around him and to support him. Trump doesn't owe anybody anything.

And he's got my support 100%. I don't think that's true for all Trump supporters. You know, I think there are other people who feel more hesitant and who are concerned about the fact that, you know, this could hurt his electability despite the fact that they like him as a candidate. But I think that for so many of these true Trump supporters, they're with him through thick and thin. And the more...

things that happen that seem like they would be stumbling blocks for Trump, some of these people just dig in even deeper. And I think that that's a phenomenon that the other candidates don't really know what to do with. I think part of it also is everyone that I speak to supports Trump. They like what he did when he was running the country. They like what he did when he was president. So let's give him another four years. I talked to a guy by the name of John Wenzel. He's from a

from Irma and he said this about Trump. He did a great job for his first time around, even though he got hijacked and railroaded. And I feel he'll continue to do the same. So there's just a support of Trump and what he did as president.

And I also think there's also the absence of another candidate rising up and really demonstrating that they would necessarily be stronger. And that's one thing that, you know, I've spent some time following Ron DeSantis around. And he obviously, you know, labors to make the point that Donald Trump didn't deliver on his promises. He said he was going to drain the swamp. He did not drain the swamp, not even close. We ended his presidency with Anthony Fauci running the country. You couldn't even fire Fauci?

And so now you're going to go drain the swamp. In Florida, DeSantis points to his record. You know, but and a lot of Republicans say they like what DeSantis has to say. I mean, there is obviously sort of an emotional connection. A lot of voters feel to Trump that that DeSantis just doesn't seem to capture whether or not, you know, months away when it actually comes to time to vote. You know, he might be able to build that.

I don't know. But but, you know, again, that's one thing that Ramaswamy has going for him is that voters come out of his events wanting more and feeling good. You get less of that with a lot of the other candidates. I think that that's one reason why.

they haven't been able to chip into Trump's clear advantages. That's an interesting point about the Ramaswamy effect. I want to dig into that a little bit more. You know, basically, if we go back to March before any of the indictments came out, Ron DeSantis and Donald Trump were close to being tied in the national polling. You know, DeSantis was at about 35 percent. Trump was in the 40s. And if you squinted, it looked like it was really going to be a close race between those top two.

In the months since then, the indictments have blotted out the sun. There have been four in over a span of five months. And for folks like you mentioned, Katie, who feel like they need to be there to defend, you know, a popular former Republican president, that's maybe what's occupied their space. And also for anyone else trying to break through, like you mentioned, Josh, it hasn't been possible because those indictments have blotted out the sun. Now, who knows? But like this debate is sort of a...

turning of the page a little bit. We're not expecting any more indictments, although there will still be news about trial dates and, you know, defense plans and so on and so forth. But for the time being, we might be able to turn our attention to the real sort of campaign. And when we do that, are any of you seeing like

Something on the ground like, oh, this person's really resonating. And why? Like, why is Ramaswamy resonating? Why is he prompting that emotional response? Why isn't DeSantis sort of maintaining that level of support at, say, 35 percent? Something I would say, too, like thinking about the fact that DeSantis entered the race with, you know, national polling that was closer to Trump. I think obviously the indictments are a huge part of that.

But I've been following DeSantis the most closely here in Iowa. I've been assigned to his campaign primarily. And I would say that there's been notable changes that he's had to make since he entered the race. I mean, you know, he kind of stumbled when he entered. There was the whole thing with Elon Musk on Twitter. And then he wasn't actually in Iowa very frequently at first. So he, I think, has shifted significantly here. And it remains to be seen whether or not that's going to help him pick up in the early states.

I also have noticed some significant energy around Ramaswamy, right? I mean, he's interesting. He's a good speaker in a way that some of these candidates are just not quite as compelling. The nuclear family is the best known form of governance to mankind. Capitalism is the best system known to man to lift people up from poverty. You know, my question is,

How serious are they about him? I've heard from a lot of people who are interested in him. They like what he has to say. They like his energy. But I've also gotten the sense from some Iowa voters and, you know, who knows, but I've gotten the sense from some Iowans at this point that they aren't really sure they're ready to caucus for him. Like they aren't sure that they're ready to throw their full support behind him, even though he's kind of fun and young and interesting to them.

I think that's a fair, fair question. I mean, a lot of voters up here that I've talked to, you know, find him compelling. I mean, some wonder about he's too young. Do we really know enough about him? You know, what are his sincere views on some issues? He's a good campaigner and he has fun while doing it and he can connect with people and he's

you know, very credible sort of political athlete in terms of like the actual performative aspect of campaigning, which, you know, may ultimately not be what voters make up their minds on. But if you're attending a campaign event, that's more he's more compelling than many of the other Republicans.

Galen, you mentioned something about Tim Scott's poll numbers, right? How they've improved or they're doing well in Iowa. How much have you been seeing in terms of the Tim Scott related ads? He came in with a war chest, so they started spending that and he's got...

a couple of decent super PACs that are spinning on his behalf too, right? Yeah. I just got to ask, what is it like watching television in your states right now? Okay, look, I'm going to out myself as the young millennial that I am and say that I'm mostly using streaming services. And it hasn't been horrible for me yet, but it's definitely, it has started up for sure. It's just not yet to the point where it's every single advertisement, which is what I'm expecting soon.

I mean, there's a good deal of DeSantis pack ads up. Those are hard to miss. Hi, this is Governor Ron DeSantis. Our mission is simple. We are going to send Joe Biden back to his basement in Delaware on a permanent vacation. Certainly, I watch a lot of tennis and there's been a lot of Tim Scott ads on the tennis channel. And if you're a man, you should play sports against men.

America needs more victors and less victims. But it's really the mail pieces have been, particularly from DeSantis, it's every day getting those. And, you know, there's one that my family received yesterday that says, you know, only in America could you have a hamburger that tastes so good. Only in America could you have a truck this large. Only in America could you have a story like Ron DeSantis.

- Wow, evocative. - One of my neighbors commented that this left DeSantis in third place behind the hamburger. So I don't know, the DeSantis, I mean, they're spending a lot of money, the pack is here in New Hampshire. - The Never Back Down pack that's backing DeSantis, they spent some TV money.

In South Carolina, I think a couple of months ago, I think Trump may have also been on the air a little bit, or at least Trump PAC had been on the air. We haven't been inundated yet. It's actually calmed down. But I have done some tracking, at least the old tedious way of looking at the old FTC files. And I know Tim PAC has reserved time for, I think, around November and December to

getting in those cheap breaks while they can. Yeah, Joe, South Carolina is definitely getting short shrift out of the early states. I didn't mention the number of visits, but no one has visited South Carolina in the double digits. So, you know, once again, the leader there, or I guess the leader there is Nikki Haley, perhaps unsurprisingly, but with only seven visits and then, you know,

a couple Asa Hutchinson, Tim Scott, five visits, Vivek Ramaswamy, Ron DeSantis, four, Trump, three. Hey, I want to point out something. We'll have a month between New Hampshire and South Carolina. We're going to get our share. And we kind of hope that some take that trip out West, give us a little bit of a break, but I don't know how much they're going to, how many are going to head up in Nevada. So, so, you know, one question I have before we play our game is like, put the candidates aside for a second. When you're talking to voters, right?

What's motivating them? Maybe beyond, and like, I know you're talking to voters at a lot of political rallies. And so those people are oftentimes going to be primed by, say, partisan media or the candidates themselves to say whatever is motivating them. Like if they're at, you know, say a Mike Pence campaign rally, they may be saying, you know, abortion is really motivating me or whatever. But are you seeing patterns or even getting beyond the people at campaign rallies? Like what's concerning folks? You'll hear, yeah.

border from time to time, concerns about the southern border, and I think tax policy or at least having the economy function well. Economy and immigration? Yeah. Sounds standard. Yeah. I was trying to think if there's anything particularly groundbreaking, but I think that Joe's totally right, that it's the same issues that

are often, usually motivating voters and particularly Republican voters here in Iowa. You know, the economy is huge, you know, wanting prices to go down, lower taxes. There is a focus on immigration and the border as well, despite the fact that we're way up here in the Midwest. That's still an issue that's very concerning and present for voters.

And I would say, too, just the Iowa flavor, less so than the other two. But people are concerned about, you know, energy, energy independence. You know, Iowa is a huge ethanol exporter. So people want biofuels. People want the candidates to be talking about that issue while they're here. But I don't know if it's make or break for people who aren't.

directly corn farmers. I mean, one thing that I've been hearing some from voters is certainly, you know, some of the culture war issues as well, certainly stuff around education and, you know, some of the biggest cheers at the events are

do come when Republicans are really laying into so-called woke politics. Those seem to get the emotion in the room. In terms of voters, you might talk to at the dump or at old home days or something. Certainly inflation is probably the biggest concern I'm hearing from voters. Housing is a big issue in New Hampshire. Housing is quite expensive and there's a real paucity of available housing. And

you know, abortion rights are a big thing. And, you know, a certain larger than average percentage of Republican voters in New Hampshire actually support abortion rights. And, you know, how that manifests itself is something that, you know, it'll be interesting to see less of a primary issue, but certainly, you know, is motivating some Republican voters I talked to away from certain candidates. And, you

you know, distrust of government and, you know, at Republican events, a lot of real just disdain for Biden. Yeah, I would say disdain for Biden is a theme all the time at all of these Republican events. And jumping off of that, Josh, too, disdain for government in general, I think it's very prevalent as well. I was at an event for Representative Ashley Hinson a couple of weeks back, and she had, I think, about six or seven of the candidates there to speak. And

Both Ramaswamy and Perry Johnson, in their STEM speeches, they basically advocate for eradicating entire federal departments. They say, no more FBI, no more Department of Justice, no more Department of Education. And people were really cheering for that. People seemed really eager to just rip it all out and start over, which is...

It was a little surprising to me just because I hadn't heard them on the trail as much. And I don't know how many of those individuals would really vote for that versus cheer for that. But I think that there is a lot of bad feelings towards Washington, D.C. right now, which I don't think is a surprise to anyone who has ever watched the news. Well, what a positive note to end on. But we are going to play our second installment ever of Guess Which Candidate Said This. So let's do it.

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As you all know from being on the trail, sometimes the candidates' messages can meld together, and sometimes the candidates can sound like they don't even belong to the same party. And so I'm going to see if after all the time you spent listening to them, you are able to tell the difference. Is everyone ready?

I'm nervous. I wasn't here. I am terrified. I'm nervous for this game, yeah. Okay, the way we're going to do this is to sort of equalize it. We're going to have you all write down the answer on a piece of paper and then show it at the same time, and I will try to keep score the best I can. Let me open up my Notes app as we speak so I can keep score. All right, here we go. So the first candidate quote is,

I do know the difference between a genius and a war criminal, and Vladimir Putin's unconscionable and unprovoked invasion of Ukraine was an act of naked aggression. Can I just say, politicians love the word unconscionable. I don't think I ever said or heard the word unconscionable before I started covering politics. Now I hear it every day. All right, is everyone ready? Yeah. Three, two, one, reveal.

Oh, no. Katie, you have Pence. Joe, you have Christy. And Josh, you have Haley. It is Mike Pence. Katie, that is one for you.

Congratulations. What was the giveaway for you? Pence has talked a lot about Ukraine in Iowa. And it's like marked him as different from many of the other candidates, because a lot of the other candidates at this point are saying, like, we shouldn't be sending that much money. We need to focus on America. And Pence has been really consistent about bringing it up and being like, I think that we need to keep fighting the good fight and helping Ukraine. So that was that was my best guess.

All right. And it was a good one at that. Next quote. Here we go. We need to deal with China as the threat they are. The way I would deal with it is number one, I wouldn't allow them to buy U.S. soil. We would take the land that they bought back from them. This is a good game.

I've always been saying, like, I don't think I got this one right. But, like, I feel like I just, I generate so much, like, trivia in my brain for stuff that no one else will ever ask me about. The remaining factoids I have about 2020 candidates who no one remembers is filling up so much of my brain space. So I'm glad I get to, like, try to use it. Katie, I am right there with you. Okay, here we go. Three, two, one, reveal.

- Okay, we have Katie with DeSantis, Joe with Haley, and Josh with Haley. It is Haley. So congratulations, Josh and Joe. - Right, gonna stick with Haley. - Just keep writing down Haley for each one. - That's a good strat. - All three of you have won. So two questions in, we are tied. - I'm just glad I got one.

Honestly, while I sort of came up with this game, I would not be caught dead playing it. I would be way too nervous. So thanks for being bold and playing along with me. All right, next one. I know many people find this extreme.

I shouldn't have talked about what I talked about. Three, two, one, reveal. You all got it. It's Vivek Ramaswamy. I guess it could have been Perry Johnson, although you did preview that one a little bit. I don't

out on the trail. Here we go. Here's the next one. You know who loves it when Republicans are fighting with each other on stage? Not just Joe Biden. China loves that. China loves that absolutely, because why wouldn't they want a president whose policies on energy are actually almost written by China? All right, here we go. Three, two, one, reveal. I'm absolutely wrong. Okay, so Katie had Burgum, Joe had Haley, and Josh had DeSantis.

Katie, you got it. It's Doug Burgum. Whoa. Yes. Okay. So at that same event with Ashley Hinson, I knew that Burgum, he has his three main things in his STEM speech. He has the economy, energy, and whatever the third thing is. China? I don't think it was that. Actually, it's national security. National security. Okay. Okay.

So Josh has two. Katie has three. Joe has two. Are you ready? Ready for the next one? Here we go. Quote, I said I'm pro-life. I will be a pro-life president and we will support pro-life policies. At the same time, I look at what's going on in Congress and I don't see them making very much headway. I think the danger from Congress is if we lose the election, they're going to try to nationalize abortion up until the moment of birth. All right.

Three, two, one, reveal. Ooh, we have Katie says Haley, Joe says Scott, and Josh says Scott. No one got it, so we're going to do a redo. Do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do. Do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do.

All right, reveal. Okay, so Katie has Hutchinson, Joe has Christie, and Josh has DeSantis, and it is DeSantis. Congratulations, Josh. Josh, what made you think DeSantis? You know, he didn't say that in New Hampshire. He doesn't talk about abortion so much up here. You know, I don't know. You're like, process of elimination. It was a hunch. It was a hunch. My sense is that it's like...

focusing on the electoral argument is the thing that makes it DeSantis-y, right? He's like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, we're all pro-life, right? But we got to win Congress in the first place. Otherwise, none of this matters. Haley has made a similar argument saying, yeah, we all would like to see some sort of abortion ban, 15 weeks, 20 weeks, whatever it is.

But until you get 60 votes in the Senate, it's really it's not worth the time to be arguing over what kind of a national abortion ban to go for. So what I'm hearing from Joe is I should have half a point. Discuss. The other thing I mean, I'm biased because I know the answers to all of these. But the other thing he says is we will support pro-life policies and DeSantis always.

oftentimes refers to him and his campaign as we, as opposed to I. I don't know if anyone else has picked up on that. Anyway, okay, moving on. Here's the next one. Quote, there are things more important than politics, and I believe that restoring the sanctity of life to the center of American law is the calling of our times. All right, three, two, one, reveal.

We got a Scott from Katie, a Scott from Joe, and a Pence from Josh. It is Mr. Mike Pence. So congratulations, Josh. What gave it away for you? I mean, that's what he likes to say, that kind of thing. You're like, well, it's pretty obvious. Okay, we have Josh with four, Katie with three, Joe with two.

Here's the next one. Minorities don't vote for people because of the color of their skin. They vote for people because they're going to lift them up, because they're going to take care of them and not just take care of a select few. I'm going to start playing like Josh, which is entirely vibes based.

That's how I live my life. All right. Three, two, one, reveal. Ooh, we have Katie has Elder, Joe has Scott, and Josh has Ramaswamy. No one got it. Do we want to do another round? All right. Three, two, one, reveal. You all got it this time. All right. It was Haley. Is that the final non-white candidate in the Republican primary? Yeah.

I guess, yeah, you all were onto that. All right, next one. Quote, Three, two, one, reveal.

Wow, everyone got it again. Okay, now we're getting to the easy ones. It's all, everyone said Chris Christie. It is Chris Christie. I can tell some of y'all have spent some time on the campaign trail. Okay, we have one left. Should we make this interesting and make this worth more than one point? Because right now Josh is at six, Katie's at five, and Joe is at four. I mean, that would only be sporting, so why don't you do that? All right, we're going to make this worth three points.

Here we go. We have a man right now who can't put two sentences together and he's negotiating on our behalf with nuclear weapons. He's lost every country. Now we're enemies with Russia, with China, with North Korea, with Iran. I've got between two. I see now I'm psyching myself out because I feel like you're going to do something mean and make it like will heard. You know what I mean?

I'll never tell. Well, you will in a minute. Well, I will in a minute. All right. Three, two, one, reveal. You all got it again. It's Trump. So Josh, you win. And Joe and Katie, I think you ended up tied. Thank you so much for playing along. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. Put those spare, you know, trivia...

brain cells to good use. All right. Well, congratulations, Josh. Your award is in the mail. We're going to leave it there for today. My name is Galen Drew. Tony Chow is in the control room. You can get in touch by emailing us at podcasts at 538.com. You can also, of course, tweet at us with any questions or comments. If you're a fan of the show, leave us a rating or review in the Apple Podcast Store or tell someone about us. Thanks for listening and we'll see you soon. Bye.