Trump Rises in Iowa, Walker Loses Top Spot

Following the first Republican debate earlier this month, the polls are now reflecting how things shook out in the minds of voters. For Donald Trump, the news remains good. Some other candidates, on the other hand, are starting to lose some ground in the early states.

Report from Bloomber:

When Republican Scott Walker arrives Monday at Iowa’s state fair, he’ll land in an unfamiliar position: he won’t be the front-runner in the state that holds the first presidential nominating contest.

Like most every other candidate in the historically crowded field, the Wisconsin governor’s standing in state and national polls has been hurt by the summer surge of billionaire Donald Trump, the party’s front-runner.

No state is more critical to Walker’s future than Iowa, where media expectations about his candidacy have grown to the point that anything short of a win in the Feb. 1 caucuses is likely to be viewed as a serious momentum killer.

…

Walker, who has enjoyed a consistent lead all year in Iowa, dropped to third in the most recent CNN poll. He was backed by just 9 percent of likely caucus participants, below Trump at 22 percent and Carson at 14 percent.

It’s a dramatic fall for a guy who led in a Bloomberg Politics/Des Moines Register Iowa Poll with 17 percent as recently as late May. That was approaching the level of support—roughly 20 percent—that most party insiders agree could win the caucuses in a 17-candidate field.

So why the drop? Perhaps more people are paying attentiong or perhaps Walker simply didn’t do enough during the debate to help his candidacy which caused him to lose ground. Either way, Trump is currently holding the top spot in Iowa according to several polls. Then again, FiveThirtyEight tosses cold water on the Trump campaign noting that polling well in the summer before the primaries is often the first step in losing. Just ask President Giuliani.

In other words, Walker will hold on for a while and dropping from the number one spot this early in the game, especially when the leader is barely cracking twenty percent, may not mean much in the end.