Haley Ties DeSantis in National Polling Average for 1st Time

Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley holds a town hall meeting in Nevada, Iowa, on March 9, 2023. (Scott Olson/Getty Images)

Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley has tied Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis in the FiveThirtyEight national GOP primary polling average for the first time.

Nathaniel Rakich, a senior editor and senior elections analyst for the polling analysis website FiveThirtyEight, incorrectly stated on Jan. 2 that the former South Carolina governor and U.N. ambassador had pulled ahead of Mr. DeSantis as the two were tied at 11.3 percent.

“With all necessary caveats about confidence intervals and there being multiple ways to calculate an average: Nikki Haley has now pulled ahead of Ron DeSantis for 2nd place in 538’s national GOP primary polling average,” Mr. Rakich posted on X, formerly Twitter, on Jan. 3.

He included a link to the FiveThirtyEight page showing national polling averages for the GOP presidential candidates.

The Haley and DeSantis campaigns didn’t respond by press time to a request by The Epoch Times for comment. Former President Donald Trump still dominates the polling, leading in the average by 50 percentage points.

The development from FiveThirtyEight came a day before the Haley campaign announced that it raised $24 million between October and December 2023.

The campaign got 83,900 new donors in the fourth quarter—close to the number of fresh donors the campaign brought in between July and September, according to the campaign.

Ms. Haley’s campaign raised $16.25 million through mail and digital grassroots initiatives, it said. She has $14.5 million cash on hand, according to the campaign.

Ms. Haley has begun a campaign blitz over the past couple of months with ads ahead of the Jan. 15 Iowa caucus and the Jan. 23 New Hampshire primary.

Since she started her campaign in February 2023, Ms. Haley has garnered $50 million from 180,000 donors through her fundraising arms: Nikki Haley for President Inc., SFA Fund Inc., and Stand for America PAC.

“This is a two-person race between Nikki Haley and Donald Trump,” Haley campaign manager Betsy Ankney said in a statement.

“Nikki is the only Trump alternative with the voter support, the operation, and the resources to go the distance,” she continued. “Our momentum continues to build as we head into 2024.”

Polls show that Ms. Haley is second in New Hampshire and a close third in Iowa.

The latest fundraising number comes on the heels of Ms. Haley’s picking up major endorsements of New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, who is popular in the Granite State, and Americans for Prosperity Action, which is backed by billionaire and Trump critic Charles Koch.

It’s the first time the largest conservative grassroots organization in the United States has waded into a presidential election.