Working his way up steadily in a crowded field, Senator Ted Cruz has emerged as the new formidable challenger for Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump.
In a set of polls coming out just ahead of the year’s last Republican debate, to be held in las Vegas on Tuesday night, Cruz has overtaken Trump in Iowa and taken the No. 2 slot nationally, surging past two other contenders — neurosurgeon Ben Carson and Senator Marco Rubio.
Iowa, the small Midwestern State that traditionally heralds the US presidential primaries, will hold its caucuses on February 1, followed by contests in New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina the same month.
A new Wall Street Journal/ NBC poll, released on Monday, showed Trump still at the top among Republican voters but with a relatively shrinking aggregate (27 per cent), followed by Cruz surging to 22 per cent.
Cruz’s gains appear to be largely at the expense of Carson, who was the No. 2 after Trump for several weeks, including a brief spell last month when he had overtaken the billionaire businessman. In the WSJ poll, Carson has slipped to the fourth slot with 11 per cent, behind Rubio who polled 15 per cent.
In Iowa, Cruz, the junior Senator from Texas, has overtaken Trump in three different polls this month. In the latest one, released by Des Moines Register/Bloomberg Politics on Sunday, Cruz is at 31 per cent in Iowa, with Trump much behind at 21 per cent. The new poll findings have prompted Trump to go after Cruz on Sunday talk shows – a far cry from the camaraderie between them till very recently.
Firing perhaps his first salvo at Cruz, Trump said on Fox News, “I don’t think he’s qualified to be President because I don’t think he’s got the right temperament.”