The time is fast approaching for the first of the GOP primaries - with Iowa actually a caucus on the night of Feb 1st 2016.
With some questions around the validity of the polls and how well they will predict the result I thought I would take a look at the 2012 run up to the
caucus in Iowa (which took place earlier on Jan 3rd)
Going into the 2012 Caucus the polls read (RCP averages @ Jan 2nd 2012):
Gingrich 27.4% , but on a downward trend from 35%
Romney 25.2%, pretty static (maybe a slight upward trend)
Paul 12.2% , on a slight up trend
Santorum 4.0%
Bachman 6.2%
Perry 6.4%
In the final month leading into the caucus, Gingrich had actually surged and then fallen back again, Romney had made a 4% move upwards, as had Paul,
but overall there was not a great deal of movement in terms of positions.
What actually happened:
Santorum won with 24.56% of the vote
Romney 24.53%
Paul 21.43%
Gingrich 13.3%
Perry 10.33%
Bachman 4.98%
So, a huge surprise with a Santorum win, given he was polling at 4% (note in the late polls he was polling higher but this post is really to judge the
current polls we are seeing and the level of accuracy they may hold).
Gingrich underperformed massively - it looks like a large part of his vote swung to Santorum - who had been working extremely hard in Iowa leading up
to the election night. Perhaps some switched to Ron Paul also.
Romney achieved about waht he would have expected from the poll numbers
Paul did better than his numbers suggested he would, by almost 10%.
The above poll vs result suggests to me, in Iowa at least, the polls are not that reliable and Gingrich's result will no doubt be a warning to Trump
and Cruz who currently have strong leads. Its probably also worth pointing out that Iowa was not representative of how the rest of the states
voted.
The current Iowa polling numbers from RCP are:
Cruz 30.3%
Trump 27.5%
Rubio 12.0%
Carson 9.3%
Bush 4.8%
Paul 2.8%
Christie 2.3%
Huckabee 2.3%
Fiorina 2.3%
Kasich 1.5%
Santorum 0.5%
There are a lot more candidates this time around - will Santorum get another lift from those that voted for him last time round? Perhaps taking a few
percent off one of the leading candidates? Maybe. The number in the field also highlights the potential GOP Splitter strategy may play a role here,
limiting the delegate count for the 'winner'. I do not expect any candidate to win the state with 50%+% and therefore score a state win agains the 8
win threshold to be eligible for nomination at the convention.
Overall this does lend some credence to those ignoring the polls and suggests Rubio and Bush are not quite sunk yet, despite falling poll numbers.
Whilst Iowa does not seem to be a huge influence, it does offer the advantage of some early momentum, I guess (at least some good PR as Santorum got
last time round) There are 30 delegates at stake here, 27 of which are district or at-large (all 27 will be proportionally allocated based on the
state wide vote). 3 more super delegates will be selected by the RNC.
Interestingly because delegates are unbound, they can vote for who they like at the convention, and in 2012 Ron Paul actually won 22 of the 30 Iowa
delegates, so I would expect the anticipated delegate count reported on the night to change again come convention time.
edit on 30/12/2015 by UKTruth because: (no reason given)
edit on 30/12/2015 by UKTruth because: (no reason
given)
edit on 30/12/2015 by UKTruth because: (no reason given)
edit on 30/12/2015 by UKTruth because: (no reason
given)