Asa Hutchinson is suspending his presidential primary campaign, the former Arkansas governor announced on Tuesday.
The announcement follows a dismal showing in the Iowa caucuses, which were dominated by former President Donald Trump. Hutchinson finished a distant fifth, capturing only 191 votes, according to race results.
Since launching his campaign in April, the 73-year-old struggled to gain traction in a crowded field that also included several younger current and former governors who entered the race with larger national followings.
Hutchinson was one of the few GOP candidates openly critical of Trump and had called on him to drop out of the race amid his many legal troubles. His failure to make a dent in the contest underscored the fundamental changes in a Republican base that might have, a decade earlier, considered Hutchinson among its most conservative options.
But polling has shown that many of those same Republican voters appear to have little appetite for a candidate so strongly opposed to the former president, who retains heavy support among the party base and could win his third straight presidential nomination this year. A staunch conservative, Hutchinson was booed and jeered when he spoke at an event last summer hosted by the pro-Trump group Turning Point USA.
Before the turn of the year, it was clear that Hutchinson had pinned his hopes to a strong performance in Iowa, his campaign appealing for support from the early state’s conservative evangelical Christian voters. If they had broken his way, Hutchinson felt he would have enough momentum to be competitive in the Southern states that vote on Super Tuesday, in March, including his home state of Arkansas.
In August, Hutchinson was a late qualifier for the first Republican presidential debate in Milwaukee. But he struggled to stand out onstage as higher-profile rivals dominated the…
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