MANCHESTER — For nearly four hours Monday night, the two dozen Republican voters who’d come to watch coverage of the Iowa caucuses at Murphy’s Taproom were glued to the TV.
“I’m between Cruz and Rubio, but I’m thinking that if Cruz wins Iowa, maybe I should vote for him next week,” Bob Greene, an undecided New Hampshire voter, told the Washington Examiner just minutes before exit polls began emerging.
By 11 p.m., Cruz emerged victorious with approximately 28 percent of the vote, while billionaire Donald Trump and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio were declared Iowa’s second and third-place winners at 24 and 23 percent, respectively.
For Greene, and thousands of voters across New Hampshire, where all eyes and candidates will be until the first-in-the-nation primary next Tuesday, Cruz’s grassroots victory, Trump’s second-place finish and Rubio’s last-minute surge have only served to further complicate their decision.
“This was a tough night for Trump. He had candidate beating him and one candidate within striking distance, and to be honest, I’m not entirely sure what’s going to happen to him here,” one undecided voter, who plans to attend the businessman’s rally Tuesday evening in Milford, told the Examiner.
Congressional candidate Jamieson Gradert disagreed, claiming tonight’s results were “just a hiccup” for Trump and that the real estate mogul will go on to win New Hampshire’s Republican primary “in a landslide.”
On the other side of the dimly lit mahogany bar, shaking his head at Gradert, was Cruz supporter Sam Pimm. The Manchester-based Republican was one of several staffers to depart a pro-Ben Carson super PAC in early January, and after watching the results come in Monday night, he expressed sincere hope that Carson, and other candidates who underperformed in Iowa, will choose to end their campaigns before New Hampshire.
“It’s now a three-way race. Everybody else ought to be rethinking their role,” Pimm said.
However, New Hampshire-based GOP strategist Mike Dennehy cautioned against describing the GOP race as a “three-way” contest just yet. While recognizing Rubio’s overperformance in the first voting state, Dennehy said there’s a lot riding on how well his campaign handles the momentum he’ll have when he arrives in the Granite State Tuesday.
“The results tonight were very strong for [Rubio] and I think everyone will be looking to whether or not he can knock out [Jeb] Bush, [John] Kasich, [Chris] Christie and company, and make it a three-way race for the nomination,” Dennehy said.
“Rubio needs to commit to campaigning the way he campaigned in Iowa [and] he needs to convince voters that it is a three-way race,” he added. “I know he wants to focus on Hillary Clinton, and that’s a very admirable strategy, but if he leaves New Hampshire without a second or strong third-place finish, then he will struggle to win South Carolina.”
Rubio, Trump and a handful of other GOP candidates, will begin descending on the Granite State Tuesday morning for the final week before the state’s Feb. 9 primary. Despite the great deal of uncertainty still surrounding the Republican race in New Hampshire, most voters Monday evening expressed tremendous excitement that their state is next in line to take the baton.
