The GOP usually loves governors as its presidential nominee, but not this year, where a pack of very experienced and accomplished chief executives is struggling to even break 15 percent in national polls — combined.
Instead it’s political outsiders Donald Trump and Ben Carson who are leading, and two Washington-based freshman lawmakers, Sens. Marco Rubio of Florida and Ted Cruz of Texas, who come next.
It’s all a sign of GOP voters, who in the past gravitated toward someone experienced outside Washington, now just being fed up with most political experience altogether, no matter where it was earned.
“Among approximately 50 percent to 60 percent of Republicans, experience and expertise are either vastly overrated qualities or are even disqualifying factors,” said Charlie Cook, of the nonpartisan Cook Political Report, which analyzes elections. “So anyone running on ’my experience as a governor’ is not going to get much traction.”
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, the best-performing of the chief executives, has slipped and now sits in fifth place with just 6 percent support in the latest RealClearPolitics.com average of polls. The two casualties in the massive GOP field were also governors — former Texas Gov. Rick Perry and current Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, who both withdrew in September as they struggled to gain traction and raise money.
Still, analysts say the field is unsettled and some governors are likely to get another look before all is said and done — and they expect either Ohio Gov. John Kasich or New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie to have the best chance of capitalizing.
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Both Mr. Kasich and Mr. Christie are focusing on New Hampshire. The Ohio governor is running fourth in the polls and is banking on a strong performance in the first-in-the-nation primary scheduled for Feb. 9.
Mr. Christie, meanwhile, is gaining momentum in the latest polls from New Hampshire, where a recent Monmouth University Poll found his favorable rating among GOP primary voters has jumped from 38 percent to 54 percent. Mr. Kasich’s favorable rating, meanwhile, has dipped from 54 percent to 45 percent.
“Candidate ratings can be a leading indicator for potential shifts in the vote choice,” said Patrick Murray, director of the Monmouth University poll. “These results could be good news for Christie and bad news for Kasich.”
Mr. Christie’s backers say he is well-positioned to catch fire in the wide-open race.
“Republican voters are looking for someone who can fight and win,” said Phil Cox, head of the pro-Christie America Leads super PAC. “Christie has nothing to do with Washington, D.C. — he’s an outsider who has shown he can fight and can win. He advanced a conservative agenda in the face of a Democratic legislature that tried to block him every step of the way.”
It remains to be seen whether any of the governors will be able to break through in the current political climate.
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By a 65 percent to 29 percent margin, GOP voters in a September Pew survey said it is more important for a presidential candidate to have new ideas and a different approach than to have experience and a proven record. The findings marked a stark shift from March when GOP voters went with experience by a 57 to 36 percent margin.
Like Mr. Christie, the other governors have tried to adapt to the political landscape by branding themselves as not-from-Washington reformers armed with the governing skills necessary to navigate the political channels of Washington and advance the conservative agenda in Congress.
But that approach, at least so far, has not worked.
“I think there was an opportunity for a current or former governor to run an anti-Washington campaign, but the problem is there are so many candidates who fit that description, that it makes it hard to break out of the pack,” said Nathan L. Gonzales, of the nonpartisan Rothenberg & Gonzales Political Report, which tracks elections.
“I think there is still a narrow path for Bush, Christie and Kasich, but they’re not a neat ideological fit with the most passionate primary voters,” Mr. Gonzales said. “Their success depends on how long they can survive and who else is left in the race.”
Tuesday’s prime-time debate was limited to candidates that reached 2.5 percent in recent national polls. Of the eight candidates that qualified, just two of them — Mr. Bush and Mr. Kasich — had gubernatorial experience.
Mr. Christie and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, the winner of the 2008 Iowa caucuses, were relegated to the undercard debate, along with former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, the winner of the 2012 Iowa caucus, and Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, who has yet to win entry to a prime-time debate and has focused his attention almost entirely on the Iowa caucuses on Feb. 1.
Former New York Gov. George Pataki and former Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore were left out of both events, along with Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina.
Timmy Teepell, Mr. Jindal’s campaign manager, said governors are struggling in the nomination contest because of the way the Republican National Committee and the television networks have relied on national polls — instead of early primary state surveys — to determine who gets into the prime time debates.
“This process is winnowing the field before actual voters (who typically do prefer governors with proven track records) have a chance vote,” Mr. Teepell said in an email.
“Short circuiting the traditional early state vetting process by using national polls as the debate criteria, and excluding candidates from debates all together, gives an outsized advantage to Senators who can grab national media attention because they live in the DC media market and have plenty of time to chase TV cameras,” he said.
• Seth McLaughlin can be reached at smclaughlin@washingtontimes.com.
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