Something has shifted in Donald Trump‘s pursuit of the White House in 2024. That’s the view of Harris Faulkner, Fox News‘ daytime anchor who is in New Hampshire closely following the candidates she knows well.
The veteran broadcaster, who is well-sourced among the DeSantis, Haley and Trump camps, told DailyMail.com that ‘something has changed with Trump in the last few weeks, he’s much less self-focused and fighting like it’s 2016 again.’
‘You hear him say “Make America Great Again” over and over and over, like 2016,’ Faulkner explained from New Hampshire, where she predicts Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis will need to close Trump’s lead significantly in the upcoming primary to continue with their campaigns.
‘What he’s tapping into with the electorate is this feeling of “we feel everything around us is crumbling, we want the guy who will fight on behalf of us, hear us when we speak and fix the things that we say are broken”‘ she explained.
Faulkner also explained how Biden’s ‘disastrous’ record on the southern border as heightened tensions in the Middle East, including Israel and Yemen, make national security a key issue for voters heading to the polls.
Harris Faulkner, Fox News ‘ daytime anchor claims something has shifted in Donald Trump
The veteran broadcaster, who is well-sourced among the DeSantis , Haley and Trump camps, says issues at the border will influence the election
It comes as Trump swept to victory in Monday’s Iowa Republican caucuses, hoovering up more than 50 percent of the vote, leaving Florida Governor Ron DeSantis just 21 percent and Nicki Haley 19 percent.
Speaking to voters in New Hampshire Faulkner says they tell her that in order to consider a candidate other than Trump they would need someone ‘outside that bubble of politics’ and ‘different enough to get our attention and they ask “can that person eat into Trump’s lead?”’
‘We just learned so much about the intensity of feeling and potentially the intensity of the whole country,’ Faulkner told DailyMail.com.
‘But we certainly learned it about early primary goers and caucus goers in the early rounds. We learned that no weather can stop them!’
Voters turned out despite the icy weather, which is promising for candidates considering New Hampshire is forecast snow and temperatures in the 30s during the critical vote next Tuesday.
Faulkner hasn’t written Haley off entirely, and doesn’t agree that she or DeSantis would need to take the New Hampshire vote out right.
However, she believes they would have to close the gap far more than in Iowa to be considered a viable challenger to the former president moving forward.
‘I haven’t seen voters throw in the towel over the 50 percent, but if it isn’t even close like in Iowa then that would be tough for anybody to rise after New Hampshire’ she explained.
Trump swept to victory in Monday’s Iowa Republican caucuses, hoovering up more than 50 percent of the vote
Faulkner hasn’t written Haley off entirely, and doesn’t agree that she or DeSantis would need to take the New Hampshire vote out right
In assessing the mood among voters Faulkner cited a recent poll that found only 4 percent of Americans believe the country is working for them.
Her reporting has led her to the conclusion that Biden’s well-documented issues at the Southern border are a large factor in this disillusionment ahead of the election later this year.
‘The complete disaster that we have on our southern border is a top three issue for voters’ she explained.
‘It’s disastrous for the people who were coming in illegally and for the people who are trying to come in legally’ she explained.
‘Those coming in legally are getting pushed to the back of the lines because the cartels are manipulating and killing and spending the kind of money they need to win the war of getting more drugs into our country.’
‘On the other side of that are the American citizens who are trapped, we can’t go anywhere else.
‘This is our country, and if our sovereignty is melting away, because our border is being trampled.’
Faulkner is also concerned that the Biden administration is not paying enough attention to the northern border.
‘They are dealing with some of these issues on the northern border too.
‘It matters because you don’t want a situation where you’re so focused on one, that terrorists come across the other.’
In a recent discussion on Fox News Texas congressman Pat Fallon told Faulkner that Biden’s failure to designate the Yemeni Houthi’s as the most severe terror threat left America open to attacks on home soil.
75 percent of Americans now consider the nation’s southern border issues a ‘crisis’ or a ‘very serious’ problem, according to the latest polling.
Those who feel the situation at the border is a ‘crisis’ is on the rise from the spring, when just 38 percent called it a ‘crisis’ in May compared to the 45 percent who now feel the same.
Reports emerged earlier this month showing that the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) is on track this month to process the most migrants in the agency’s history with more than 304,000 encounters in a single month.
‘If your border is porous, and you don’t have firm national security, and you’re engaged around the world where people want to kill you’ Faulkner said, citing America’s support of Israel in their war against Hamas.
‘You make it easier for them to access your home soil’ she warned.