New York, Jan 21 (IANS): The race for the 2028 presidential election is on and the front runners are Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis, even though it is only 2024 with a poll this year.

Being crushed by the Donald Trump road roller, neither has a chance of getting the Republican Party’s presidential nomination this year unless something cataclysmic happens like a court verdict to push the former president off the ballot.

RealClear Politics (RCP) averages of national polls show Trump at 66.1 per cent, with Haley at a distant 11.5 followed by DeSantis at 10.5.

For Haley, 53, and DeSantis, 45, the contest this year is a prelude to 2028.

As the intraparty elections, the primaries and caucuses for the Republican presidential nomination roll on, it is a test of who would be the last one standing against Trump, and the big test will be on March 5, the Super Thursday, when 15 states have the internal elections to select the party’s candidate.

That’s the realistic deadline for Haley, the former governor of South Carolina and member of Trump’s cabinet, and DeSantis, the Florida governor and a former Navy lawyer, to decide if they want to continue their quixotic challenge to Trump who polls in 60 per cent range in various states.

Trump crushed them both in Iowa last week, where he got 51 per cent of the votes against 21.2 per cent for DeSantis and 19.1 per cent for Haley.

In that race, the spending by the candidates and their supporters was $67 million for Trump, $37 million for Haley and $35 million for DeSantis roughly reflecting the outcomes.

Indian-American Vivek Ramaswamy, the maverick who swaggered around as a mini-Trump, dropped out after getting only 7.7 per cent of the votes and threw his lot with the former president.

DeSantis dropped a hint in a conservative radio programme that he might wind up his campaign.

He said cryptically: “I’m in it to win it, and at some point, if that’s not working out for you, I recognise that."

After an initial promise in March when he was only 15 per cent behind Trump in RCP poll averages, he has slid to about 55 per cent behind him.

Haley hasn’t given any hint about what she’d do if her nomination bid doesn’t make headway.

If one drops out, the other may not pick up that candidate's support as it'll split with some going to Trump, especially in the case of DeSantis.

Haley underperformed the expectations in Iowa where it was expected that she would come in a high second boosted by independents and Democrats changing their political affiliations at the last minute; perhaps she didn’t make it because they were not motivated enough to brave the extreme coldwave.

Now the focus is on her in New Hampshire which holds the primary on Tuesday, and the test is whether, with the help of independents, she could beat Trump or come close to him.

The latest polling average from the opinion research site 538 shows Trump ahead of Haley there by 13.1 per cent at 49.1 per cent to her 33 per cent, which is the best showing by any candidate opposing Trump so far.

Haley’s home state, South Carolina, where she was the governor before Trump appointed her to his cabinet and posted her as the permanent representative to the United Nations, follows New Hampshire with primaries on February 24.

The 538 polling average shows her trailing Trump on her home turf by nearly 47 per cent, with 24.8 per cent to Trump’s 61.

DeSantis, who is at 8.9 per cent there and is locked in the battle for the second place, moved there swiftly after the Iowa caucuses to campaign in a display of their rivalry.

Even if Haley pulls off an upset or a near upset in New Hampshire, a decisive defeat by Trump in her home state would be a setback hard to recover from.

Making things harder in South Carolina, Haley’s one-time protege, Tim Scott, whom she nominated to the Senate for an interim vacancy launching his national political career, dropped out of the Republican presidential nomination race and backed Trump.

The major primary before Super Tuesday is in Michigan, where Trump, according to 538, has a commanding lead with 63.7 per cent; Haley comes next with 16.2 and DeSantis is third with 9.3 per cent.

In the Super Primary States that include California, Virginia and Massachusetts, Trump holds commanding leads in the 60 per cent range, effectively assuring him of the Republican nomination and closing the nomination race in practical terms.

Now if something happens to knock Trump out of the race before the Republican Party Convention in mid-July where the presidential nominee will be anointed, DeSantis, who is ideologically closer to Trump would pick up the bulk of the former president’s supporters giving him a leg up in a race against Haley.

Haley, who is a centrist in the mould of former presidents, the Bushes, has broader appeal across party lines, but the Republican Party has been reshaped by Trump from an ideologically conservative party to a populist organisation verging on the radical right.

DeSantis fits in with the Republican Party majority that is consumed by the culture wars on matters like school books and by the more substantial issue of banning abortions nationally.

She is more realistic and less of a hardwired ideologue on issues like abortion and the culture wars, is a foreign policy hawk, and not an economic populist, putting her at odds with a substantial part of the party base.

The banking and investment giant JPMorgan Chase’s CEO Jamie Dimon has called on liberals to back her.

Several billionaires, seeing her as a palatable alternative, have donated to her cause, among them the Koch brothers, David and Charles, pillars of the Republican Party.

They endorsed her and put their Americans for Prosperity political network to work for her.

Reid Hoffman, the co-founder of LinkedIn and a prolific donor to Democratic Party causes, has donated $250,000 to a Super Political Action Committee supporting Haley, skirting legal limits on how much they can contribute directly to her.

There have been call for independents and Democrats to support her in primaries and caucuses where last-minute changes in party affiliations are permitted.

All this puts her in the firing line of both Trump and DeSantis and their supporters who have hurled the epithet, RINO or Republican in Name Only, against her and called her beholden to corporate interests and a front for the Democrats.

With an appeal to moderates among Republicans and Democrats disillusioned by their party candidates and the radicalism, Haley may be the most electable in a general election, but not within the party as of now because of the pull of radicalism and populism.

Although she boasts of the lead of 17 per cent in a match against President Joe Biden in a Wall Street Journal poll published last month it has since shrunk in recent polls to low single digits. However, Haley still has an edge over the president.

If the 2028 Republican race turns out to be a faceoff between DeSantis and her, Haley will face these handicaps and the outcome will depend on how the Trump base breaks out – and, more importantly, who Trump endorses or if he is himself a candidate.

Haley and DeSantis have been measured in their criticism of Trump, making sure to also praise his past performance, and not taking his bait like when he made outlandish claims about her ineligibility to be considered a “natural born citizen” qualified under the Constitution to become president or mangled her middle name.