There are some interesting details to be found in the Iowa exit polls, though many of them aren’t all that surprising. The CBS exit poll showed that Cruz won thanks to his large advantage with self-described conservatives, especially the “very conservative” voters that make up the bulk of his support everywhere.
Among all conservatives (85% of the voters), 31% backed Cruz to 23% for Trump and 22% for Rubio. Among “very conservative” voters (40% of all voters), the gap was much wider: Cruz 44% Trump 21% Rubio 15%. Where Trump did best was among moderate and liberal voters that are helping him establish large leads elsewhere, but in Iowa they made up just 15% of voters. Among moderates, Trump won easily, but that couldn’t offset Cruz’s advantage with conservatives. 34% of moderates backed Trump, 28% backed Rubio, and just 9% backed Cruz. In many later states, there will be significantly more moderates and fewer “very conservative” voters, and that points to some of the limitations for Cruz going forward. In 2012, moderate and liberals made up 47% of the Republican primary electorate in New Hampshire and 32% in South Carolina, so we shouldn’t be surprised to see Trump’s lead in these states remain quite large.
Rubio showed that he could get some “very” and “somewhat” conservative voters and a good number of moderates as well. “Somewhat” conservative voters made up 45% of the voters, and Rubio led with this group 29% to Trump’s 24% and Cruz’s 19%. We have seen in the past that this tends to be Rubio’s best ideological group, and so it was again. He led among those that said economy/jobs was the most important issue for the country (30% to Trump’s 24%), but trailed Cruz among those that said terrorism and government spending. For those that considered immigration the most important issue, Trump dominated with 44% and Rubio did poorly with 10%, but these voters made up just 11% of the total. Voters that prized a candidate’s ability to win the general election (21% of all voters) went for Rubio in a big way (44%), and that more than anything seems to account for his late surge. Rubio clearly won the very late-deciders with 30% of the people that decided in the last few days. Trump and Cruz were tied among those that had decided before that at 30%.
Cruz didn’t score well on electability. Only 22% of voters that considered that the most important quality backed Cruz. Where Cruz won by a mile was among those that wanted a candidate to share their values (38%), and these voters account for 42% of the total. That was fueled in large part by the huge turnout of evangelicals (64%), of whom 34% backed Cruz. Cruz was unsurprisingly weakest of the top three with non-evangelicals (18%), but since they were just over a third of voters that didn’t trip him up as much it likely will in later states.
Cruz did very well in a caucus state that was very well-suited to a candidate with his background and profile, but it isn’t likely to travel very well in places that don’t have a lot of evangelicals and “very conservative” voters. Very much like Huckabee in 2008, I suspect Cruz is going to have difficulty with non-evangelicals and non-Southerners, and that doesn’t bode well for his chances later in the primary season.