Which candidates will drop out before the Iowa Caucuses?

[ElectionsGuy]

**Only select this option if he ends up running in the future after the creation of this thread.

Jim Webb
Lincoln Chafee
Ben Carson
Rick Santorum
Bobby Jindal
Carly Fiorina
Lindsey Graham
George Pataki
Jim Gilmore
Mark Everson

[Donald Trump 2016 !]

Reince Priebus will have struck a deal with Trump to drop out before the Iowa caucus.

[Vega]

O'Malley is definitely a maybe for dropping out; it depends on whether or not Biden enters.

[Maxwell]

Jim Webb, Lincoln Chafee, George Pataki, Jim Gilmore, and Donald Trump

[Crumpets]

Chafee, Santorum, Pataki and Gilmore. The former two for fundraising, and the latter two for poor polling. I think there will be a huge drop-off between Iowa and New Hampshire, though, of many of the conservatives who aren't in the top three (Huckabee, Cruz, Jindal, and Webb). Carson and Rubio I think will stay in until South Carolina regardless.

[ElectionsGuy]

Post-debate bump.

[Adriano Chiká]

Webb, Chafee, Pataki, Gilmore, Everson and Christie. Christie will start to fall and when you exit the Top 10 and with no prospect of climbing do not want to wait until Iowa.

[Penelope]

O'Malley, Trump, Huckabee, Santorum, Gilmore, Everson.

Trump is going to implode between now and February, and Santorum will likely drop unless he somehow gets invited to a prime-time debate. I get the feeling the Huckabee campaign is just going to kind of stagnate once conservatives start flocking to fresher faces like Carson, Cruz, Rubio, and Walker. He'll probably drop out early to make room for the eventual conservative opposition to Bush.

I can see the logic behind people like Pataki, Chafee, Graham, or Perry, but those candidates can all delude themselves into thinking they can win NH or SC to gain momentum. Also, I suspect Graham will at least stay in until SC. After seeing him tie every answer back to foreign policy in the last debate, it's clear that he's mostly running an ideological campaign.

[Mr. Morden]

Chafee's campaign can barely afford to do any campaign events not within driving distance of his house.  But I think he'll try to stick it out until the first debate in October, assuming he qualifies.  But he'll probably drop out shortly thereafter.

On the GOP side, all of the candidates in last week's kiddie debate except for Fiorina stand a good chance of dropping out before Iowa (especially Gilmore and Pataki).  Christie might as well, though I could go either way on that one.  Christie's still somewhat limited in fundraising by New Jersey's "pay to play" rules, isn't he?  I guess we'll see how that goes.  If he doesn't make any headway in the New Hampshire polls in the next five months, then I suppose he might drop out.

[ElectionsGuy]

Bravo to the one person who said Walker.

[#TheShadowyAbyss]

Everson, Lessig, Pataki, Gilmore, Santorum, Huckabee, Chafee and Everson.