there really was no one else that chris christie and their field this year when he ended his campaign tonight it also means the end of the one real anti trump dynamic that has been playing out life in competitive republican politics. that has not come to an end. does that mean the already pretty clear road to the finish line for donald trump is just that much clearer? does it mean a candidate like nikki haley now has a chance to consolidate a non-trump, if not an anti trump option that could conceivably legitimately can beat for the top spot. what does it mean for the biden campaign and the general election now that the last republican trump antagonist is off the board? joining us now is someone who is deeply important to joe biden, as president, and to the joe biden campaign. veteran south carolina congressman jim clyburn. he s a co-chair of the biden harris campaign. congressman clyburn, on and have you with us tonight, thank
republican politics. that has now come to an end. does that mean the already pretty clear road to the finish line for donald trump is just that much clearer? does it mean that the candidate like nikki haley now has a chance to consolidate a non-trump if not an anti trump option that could conceivably legitimately compete, for the top spot? what has this been for the biden campaign in for the general election now that the last republican trump antagonist is off the board? joining us now is someone who is deeply important to joe biden as president and to the joe biden campaign, veteran south carolina congressman jim clyburn, a co-chair of the biden harris campaign. congressman clyburn, a real honor to have you be with us this evening. thank you very much for having me. what is your reaction to the decision by governor christie to leave the race and the way that he did it, the way that he
race. iowa caucuses have been decided in the past by 14 points, narrow margins. this is a contest maybe for 2028, maybe for vp and bragging rights or think trump isn t going to last forwhatever reason. he is. the non-trump contingency is not a majority. if trump is 52% in the average all the non-trump together is less than that. two people have benefited from the 105 million of ads in iowa. donald trump the frontrunner and the people who get paid 20% to run those ads. they are convincing these candidates that it is worth their time and money and precious political currency to continue the run the ads. i think it s political mal practice. harris: how important is iowa at this point? we have seen others, ted cruz, mike huckabee others running for the white house who won iowa but didn t go on. how does it play into the scheme
opening to any other contenders, even a sliver? well, lindsey, as long as there are so many candidates in the race, donald trump is going to have a major advantage because most of those maga voters are obviously aligned with him. however, these numbers reveal that there is a 54% of iowa republicans who do not consider themselves maga republicans. so if this field pins out and one candidate can really start consolidating the support of the non maga element, of the non trump element of the republican party, then you can see a path. the problem is, the party needs to have a lot of discipline to do that. and people have to get out at the right time as democrats did for joe biden in 2014. are you saying that there is an opportunity for one of the more moderate? because if you look at the debate stage, it was the more moderate candidates on the fringes here because they essentially stacked that stage, whoever was ranking the highest
at 42%. no one else in double digits. we also asked folks who would your second choice b, outside that first choice, here you see something interesting. we do see trump as the second choice at 10%, you could see that 40 to potentially moving up a little bit for him. ron desantis is actually the number one second choice on this list here, with 20%. but what you really see is this second choice number is spread out. there is no clear consensus, sort of default second choice when it comes to being a non-trump candidate at this point. all of these other candidates, desantis, scott, all of the non trump candidates would like to have all of that non-trump vote coalesce behind them. you see a scattering of second choices here. that is one of the things that is helping trump. it s not just that he s at 42%, it s how scattered the opposition is. i think this is notable in terms of where trump supporters coming. from even angelical christians, in 2016 the iowa republican caucuses, almost two thi