MANCHESTER, N.H.— For John Kasich and Chris Christie, even the dream scenario here is followed by a monthlong nightmare. 
 
 Both camps have all along banked on a strong showing in New Hampshire to provide a springboard, but even if they beat expectations Tuesday, there’s trouble ahead: a plunge immediately into a string of states inhospitable to their brand of centrist politics. Conservative South Carolina and unpredictable Nevada await, followed by the dozen, mostly Southern states that have turned March 1 into this cycle's "super Tuesday." 
 
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 The trail doesn't get any easier until mid-March, and to survive until then, the candidates’ have a two-pronged plan: hope that neither Ted Cruz nor Donald Trump can build an insurmountable lead by consolidating the race’s outsider support, and work to pick up delegates on the margins, even in states where they have little hope of winning outright. 
 
 But as they scramble to keep competitive, both camps will be haunted by their all-in investments in New Hampshire. Neither has built up a significant organization in the states that will jointly make up this cycle’s version of “super Tuesday,” and outsider observers are openly skeptical that, wherever they finish in New Hampshire, either has the pieces in place to make headway in the month ahead. 
 
 "Even with an infusion of new money, there's no switch to flip to prepare a campaign virtually overnight for the battle for 674 delegates [on] March 1 and what comes quickly afterwards," said Henry Barbour, a Republican operative from Mississippi. 
 
 "Where [are they] going to then gain?" wondered John Brabender, a top strategist for Rick Santorum's now-defunct presidential bid. "In South Carolina? Probably not. Florida? Probably not ... It’s going to be a much harder climb in a Republican primary for a moderate — even who does well in a primary like New Hampshire." 
 
 Though Christie and Kasich have both built modest teams in South Carolina, there’s little else waiting for them should they reach the March 1 states. Kasich is flying to Charleston, S.C., on Tuesday night, where his team has “several paid staffers.” His team hopes to consolidate prominent establishment donors if he is able to emerge as a consensus choice, which will help with a rapid build-out across the south and a significant press in friendlier March 1 states, like Massachusetts, Vermont and Virginia. 
 
 (Another round of deeply conservative states — Kentucky, Kansas, Louisiana and Maine — vote on March 5.) 
 
 If he makes it to March 15, Kasich is counting on a dominant showing in Ohio, where he has a large operation waiting for him. 
 
 Christie, who’s eyeing a similar strategy, held a meeting with prominent Republicans in South Carolina last month to try to get a foothold there. He plans to be there Wednesday for a presidential candidate forum hosted by the Conservative Leadership Project. 
 
 To succeed after New Hampshire, Christie is counting on a reservoir of goodwill from the governors he helped get elected in 2014, when he was chairman of the Republican Governors Association. He has the endorsements from several governors in critical states, including Massachusetts, Maine and Maryland. He’s also got his organization in New Jersey, which would only come into play if he’s still fighting for delegates in June. 
 
 In the meantime, both candidates are relying on some air cover from their super PACs, which have supplemented ad buys in South Carolina and are taking cues from the early state results. 
 
 But their lack of significant organization in the March 1 states contrasts starkly with the infrastructure Ted Cruz has built, centered largely on tea party organizations and activists. He’s touted prominent endorsements from tea party favorites like Chris McDaniel in Mississippi and Joe Carr in Tennessee, both of which launch failed bids to unseat incumbent senators in 2014. 
 
 Rubio, too, has spent recent days rolling out leadership teams in early-March states like Kentucky and Louisiana. 
 
 Christie and Kasich are taking solace in the fact that party rules require states that vote before March 15 to award their delegates proportionally, making it harder for one candidate to pull away from the pack. 
 
 "No one is going to have a commanding delegate lead after [March 1] because of how delegates are allocated," said a senior Christie campaign source. 
 
 Kasich aides also reject the notion that it's too late for him to surge to victory, noting that he's faced doubters from the moment he decided to run. 
 
 "That theory is a fantasy from rival campaigns who also said we got in the race too late, wouldn't make the first debate, and wouldn't do well in New Hampshire," said Kasich communications director Chris Schrimpf. "They've been proven wrong again and again. The truth is we have a strong path to the nomination. We have already laid the groundwork in the March states to succeed. Other campaigns are already airing negative ads against in the coming states. They wouldn't be doing that if they didn't know we had the organization to win." 
 
 Tucker Martin, an adviser to pro-Christie super PAC America Leads, said that the organization has already booked TV ad time from Feb. 11 to Feb. 20 in South Carolina. But he suggested Kasich's super PAC, New Day for America, is also ready to go on the air in South Carolina and Nevada, touting a $500,000 ad buy encompassing both states. As for March 1, a senior adviser to the PAC suggested no one is truly well-organized in those states — not even Cruz, who's campaign has touted his heavy investment in the south. "A lot of what he’s been doing in these states has been exaggerated," said the adviser. 
 
 As Christie and Kasich scramble to find enough support to stay competitive with outsiders like Cruz and Trump, they face pressure from establishment allies to quickly coalesce behind a consensus choice. Republicans looking for a centrist alternative to Cruz or Trump worry that if a clear favorite doesn’t emerge quickly, it could be too late. If Kasich or Christie can’t keep pace with Rubio or Bush, they’ll find themselves under pressure to drop out entirely. 
 
 That pressure eased slightly Saturday night when Rubio stumbled at the debate. Coming off a strong third-place finish in Iowa, he appeared to be a strong finish in New Hampshire away from leaving the governors behind. Then he wilted under interrogation from Christie, repeating the same argument even as Christie ripped him as unable to do more than repeat talking points. 
 
 "I think that the debate changes the calculus for Chris Christie on this. The destruction of Marco Rubio in that debate was such that barring a disaster for Chris Christie in New Hampshire, I think he’s earned a ticket out, at least to South Carolina in a tumultuous race," said Steve Schmidt, who managed John McCain's 2008 presidential campaign. 
 
 Schmidt added that Rubio's slip could lift all the governors still running. "It wasn’t just a bad debate performance on the scale of President Bush’s first debate performance in 2004 or Barack Obama’s in 2012, it was a debate performance on par with Dan Quayle’s against Lloyd Bentsen’s. It was a fundamental unmasking." 
 
 There’s also the threat of Bush, who is also jockeying for the establishment mantle and has a formidable war chest. His campaign is hopeful that it can finish strong in New Hampshire and rely on support from South Carolina's senior Sen. Lindsey Graham to help lift him in the next contest on Feb. 23. 
 
 While the Christie and Kasich campaigns project optimism, operatives inside the early March states are less confident about their prospects. 
 
 As one Alabama GOP operative unaffiliated with any presidential campaign noted, Trump has collected endorsements from allies of immigration hard-liner Sen. Jeff Sessions, though Cruz is vying for the senator’s nod, too. 
 
 Of Christie, the operative noted a strong relationship with the Alabama House Speaker Mike Hubbard, who has deep connections in the state despite facing serious legal charges . Kasich scored an early endorsement from Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley. 
 
 Among establishment candidates in Tennessee, Bush has an edge because of deep ties to Gov. Bill Haslam, added one veteran establishment-oriented operative from the Volunteer State. Rubio and Cruz, the operative noted, have tapped former rivals to Haslam and senior Sen. Lamar Alexander to lead their campaigns. But he added that Cruz has the most sophisticated ground game in Tennessee: "Cruz, by far" he said, "is knocking it out of the damn park. They’ve got a really good organization." 
 
 Kentucky is wide open, with Sen. Rand Paul now out of the presidential race. Jesse Benton, a longtime adviser to Paul said the best organization in the state so far belongs to Rubio, followed by Cruz. "The governors are going to have some trouble getting much oxygen," he added. 
 
 In Louisiana, which has a its primary the same day as Kentucky's,Timmy Teepell — a longtime adviser to former Gov. Bobby Jindal, who recently backed Rubio — predicted little chance for Christie and Kasich to make inroads. "Trump and Cruz will do well. Rubio will get some votes. And if Bush is still in the race, he'll get some votes too," Teepell said. 
 
 Stuart Stevens, a senior strategist to Mitt Romney's 2012 campaign, said all of the second-tier jockeying will mean little if the candidates don't take harder shots at Trump. 
 
 "I've never seen so much effort put in by so many campaigns on fighting over the ranked position of losing instead of focusing on winning," he said. "As long as no one goes after Donald Trump in a serious and sustained way, the race is about who will be first, second or third loser." 
 
 If Kasich and Christie focus on states where their brand of politics could get them elected governor, they might be able to survive, he said. "But until somebody goes after Trump and he starts to shed those votes," he said. "It's all about the order of losing." ||||| In anticipation, Christie has been furiously hopscotching the country in recent weeks. | Getty 2016 Chris Christie to announce 2016 bid as early as next week 
 
 Chris Christie is in the final stages of preparing his 2016 presidential bid, with a formal announcement possible as soon as next week, according to several sources familiar with the discussions. 
 
 The New Jersey governor’s planning has intensified in recent days. On Monday, his campaign-in-waiting announced that he’d hired two additional staffers in New Hampshire, a state seen as critical to his White House hopes. Earlier this month, Maria Comella, a longtime Christie aide, departed the governor’s official office to take a senior position at his political action committee. 
 
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 A Christie spokeswoman, Samantha Smith, declined to comment. The governor’s aides have previously said that he isn’t likely to launch his presidential campaign until the New Jersey legislature finalizes the state budget — expected to be around the end of June. 
 
 The announcement will mark the latest chapter in a tumultuous political career. After defeating a Democratic incumbent in 2009, Christie established himself as the GOP’s foremost rising star — a swaggering, tell-it-like-it-is pol who seemed to be the antidote for a party that was struggling to win over voters in blue states. In the years since, however, Christie’s national prospects have been damaged — especially by the revelations that his top aides concocted a plan to close lanes on the George Washington Bridge in an act of political retribution against a local mayor who refused to endorse the governor’s 2013 reelection bid. 
 
 Christie’s once-stratospheric poll numbers — both nationally and in his home state — have since plummeted. A Fairleigh Dickinson University poll released on Tuesday showed Christie with just a 30 percent approval rating in New Jersey, while a Suffolk University poll showed him winning the support of only 5 percent of likely voters in New Hampshire. 
 
 But Christie’s aides insist there’s room for him in the 2016 field. With former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush struggling to distance himself from the rest of the pack, they say, the lane for an establishment candidate remains open. Aides to Ohio Gov. John Kasich, who is also contemplating a run, have put forward a similar argument for his potential candidacy. 
 
 The hope, Christie’s team says, is that his authentic political brand will shine through, both on the debate stage — Republicans are preparing to hold their first primary debate in August — and in New Hampshire. The state has a history of breaking for moderate, independent-minded Republican candidates, and Christie has been a frequent visitor there. Those familiar with his early planning for a 2016 bid say he’s prepared to make it the cornerstone of his electoral strategy. 
 
 In anticipation of his announcement, Christie has been hopscotching the country in recent weeks, attending Republican cattle calls in Oklahoma City, Utah and Washington, D.C., where he delivered fiery speeches castigating a Republican rival, Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, over national security. 
 
 “If you want to know how little [senators] know, watch what Rand Paul’s done the last two weeks,” Christie told Republican donors at a conference in Deer Valley, Utah, hosted by Mitt Romney, referring to Paul’s opposition to the PATRIOT Act. “Because, I will tell you, he’s made America weaker and more vulnerable, and he’s done it for his own personal and political gain, and he’s done it to raise money.” 
 
 Christie has also delivered speeches in early primary states in which he’s detailed his policy proposals on issues like entitlements, taxes and electronic surveillance. 
 
 In addition to building a campaign apparatus, Christie has also hired for a super PAC, America Leads, that will be supporting his candidacy. The group recently announced that it had brought on Gene Ulm, a veteran Republican pollster, and Mike Leavitt, a mail consultant. 
 
 While Christie won’t be nearly as heavily funded as Bush — whose super PAC is believed to have brought in around $100 million so far — the New Jersey governor has a team of donors that includes Home Depot CEO Ken Langone and hedge fund manager Stanley Druckenmiller. Both are expected to write big checks. (“I am going to work my ass off to make sure that Chris Christie never needs money,” Langone told POLITICO in January.) 
 
 Earlier this month, Christie dropped another hint that he was nearing a run. While campaigning in New Hampshire, the governor said that his family — one of the last major hurdles to his entering the race — was on board. 
 
 “This is about me now,” he said. 
 
 Follow @politico ||||| Former Florida governor Jeb Bush, shown addressing the Detroit Economic Club about his “Reform Conservative Agenda” in Detroit this month, is amassing a significant war chest. (Rebecca Cook/Reuters) 
 
 Jeb Bush’s money juggernaut is far eclipsing the efforts of his would-be rivals for the 2016 GOP presidential nomination, putting his two political committees on pace to amass an unprecedented sum of tens of millions of dollars by early spring. 
 
 The former Florida governor’s overwhelming dominance in the race to line up financial backers has come at a speed that has impressed longtime Republican money players, who say wealthy party backers have rapidly migrated to Bush since 2012 nominee Mitt Romney decided against another White House run two weeks ago. 
 
 At one Manhattan fundraiser for Bush at the Park Avenue home of private-equity titan Henry Kravis this week, about 25 attendees paid a minimum of $100,000 each just to get in the door. It’s one of six events for Bush’s political action committees — including one next weekend in Palm Beach — with such a price tag. 
 
 “I think they will come up with an eye-popping figure,” said veteran GOP fundraiser Fred Malek. 
 
 Bush’s press for dollars has been so intense — averaging one fundraiser a day — that his Republican competitors do not even claim they can compete at his level and acknowledge that he is the unrivaled financial leader. 
 
 “Are they raising a lot of money? Yeah,” said Ray Washburne, a Dallas real estate developer who is heading efforts to solicit contributions for Gov. Chris Christie’s new political action committee. “We’re in the making-friends stage.” 
 
 The gravitation to Bush is being driven in part by the wide network of donors who supported his father and brother, as well as a sense among many in the establishment that his policy acumen and moderate stance on immigration makes him the strongest contender in a general election. 
 
 Despite Bush’s robust lead, party strategists and fundraisers agree that there is still plenty of room for his rivals to maneuver because of the changed nature of this year’s money primary. Super PACs that can raise unlimited donations have already been embraced by the expected candidates, allowing them to scoop up massive contributions before their campaigns officially launch. And the pool of potential givers has greatly expanded in the past several years, as the freewheeling era of big-money groups has attracted a new class of political donors. 
 
 “There’s a lot more room in this environment,” said Richard Hohlt, a Republican lobbyist in Washington who is helping raise money for Bush. “I am shocked, as a person who has done this since the Nixon campaign, how there are so many mega-donors who are willing to write significant checks. The point is, candidates can stay alive a lot longer.” 
 
 Still, there are mounting signs that Bush’s financial momentum is coming at other candidates’ expense — especially Christie’s. While the donor class seems increasingly intrigued by Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin, enthusiasm for Christie has dimmed, according to major GOP contributors and bundlers across the country. 
 
 “Everybody says, ‘Bush, but I like Walker,’’ or ‘Walker, but I like Bush,” said one senior party figure, who declined to be named to describe private conversations with donors. “I don’t hear anyone saying Christie.” 
 
 Supporters of the New Jersey governor have been taken aback by the number of top Romney fundraisers who have already signed up with Bush. 
 
 And Christie’s stumbling remarks about child vaccines on a recent trip to London so alarmed some of his supporters that the governor had to make a round of calls to assure them that he does support vaccination for diseases such as measles, according to a person familiar with the outreach. 
 
 “Gov. Bush will get the majority of the money here, the big money,” said Theresa Kostrzewa, a lobbyist in North Carolina who backed Romney in 2012 and is now supporting Bush. “And Gov. Walker will get a fair share. But I think the interest in Gov. Christie was fleeting. 
 
 “For people in North Carolina, it’s like going on a date with the high school football star and you’re wowed, but then it’s not deep enough to form an attachment,” she said. “Then when he’s been stumbling, what little attachment there was has fallen away.” 
 
 Christie backers contest that and say he is drawing a strong response among party financiers. His allies are expected to launch a super PAC in the coming days, giving him a vehicle to pull in the kind of huge donations that Bush is getting now. 
 
 “He will have significant and sufficient funds to be very competitive,” said Bobbie Kilberg, a top Republican fundraiser in Northern Virginia who backs Christie. “We need to focus on the fact that this is a marathon, it’s not a sprint. And as long as you are competitive, you don’t have to be number one in fundraising.” 
 
 Bush advisers argue that he is actually the one playing catch-up, noting that likely 2016 contenders such as Sens. Rand Paul of Kentucky, Ted Cruz of Texas and Marco Rubio of Florida have long had leadership PACs in place. 
 
 “Gov. Bush is the only person among his contemporaries considering a run who hasn’t had a political operation,” said spokeswoman Kristy Campbell, who said his travels across the country have been aimed at introducing him to both donors and voters alike. “A lot of this is really about reconnecting with people.” 
 
 Party fundraisers in various camps say that many prominent GOP money figures remain undecided, including a large number of wealthy donors who were hoping Romney was going to run again. Two of the biggest players, hedge fund manager Paul Singer and New York Jets owner Woody Johnson, have not yet committed to anyone, according to their spokesmen. 
 
 Some wealthy donors also say they plan to hold off pledging themselves to a single contender, eager to see how the field develops. 
 
 “We’re going to dabble in the beginning and try to help people get their message out, probably more than one,” said Frank VanderSloot, chief executive of an Idaho nutritional-supplement company, who said he is most intrigued by Walker, Rubio and Bush, “probably in that order.” 
 
 “We’re watching really carefully, and we think each of them have different assets,” he added. 
 
 The 2016 money race kicked off early with the launch of two pro-Bush political committees on Jan. 6, both named Right to Rise. One is a super PAC that can accept unlimited personal and corporate donations and another is a leadership PAC that can take donations up to $5,000 a person. Donors and fundraisers have been urged to meet presidential campaign-style goals by March 31, with tiers of $50,000, $100,000, $250,000 and $500,000, according to people involved in collecting checks. 
 
 Bush is already using his growing war chest to shower money on key GOP officials and state parties. On Friday, his leadership PAC announced it had doled out $122,800 — including $10,000 a piece to the state parties in Florida, Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire and South Carolina. 
 
 On Tuesday, Bush is scheduled to headline two more fundraisers in the Washington area: a mid-morning event at the offices of the powerhouse lobbying shop BGR Group and a pricier reception at the McLean, Va., home of DLA Piper partner Jamie Wareham and his wife, Laura. Among the three dozen co-hosts for the latter — who each donated or raised $25,000 — are former George W. Bush White House counsel C. Boyden Gray; Bush’s younger brother Marvin with wife, Margaret; and his sister Doro and her husband, Bobby Koch. 
 
 Next week, the former Florida governor is slated to hit Chicago and Palm Beach for more finance events. 
 
 Bush’s nonstop fundraising pace stands in marked contrast to the low profile of the leading potential Democratic nominee, Hillary Rodham Clinton, whose decision to hold off announcing whether she is running has hampered the ability of a key super PAC ally to secure financial commitments. 
 
 The former Florida governor appears to be following a playbook used by his brother, then-Texas Gov. George W. Bush, who stunned the Republican presidential field in 1999 by raising a then-staggering $37 million in his first four months of active campaigning. 
 
 Jeb Bush — who has yet to even officially announce his candidacy or set up a campaign committee — is expected to be building a much larger war chest, though his aides dispute reports that they have a $100 million goal. 
 
 His committees are not required to report their receipts to the Federal Election Commission until mid-July, but Bush could voluntarily announce his fundraising haul earlier. 
 
 While the figure is expected to be daunting, party fundraisers said other candidates will be able to remain competitive with the help of independent groups fueled by just a few wealthy patrons. 
 
 “It’s just a completely different world,” said Mississippi-based political strategist Henry Barbour, noting that Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum were both bolstered in their 2012 bids by allied super PACs. 
 
 Such groups will play “an increasingly important role” this year, said Barbour, who expects many will not only work to run down the opposition, but will focus on building up their own candidates. 
 
 “It’s driven by dollars,” he added. “For some of these candidates, it will be a whole lot easier to raise $20 million into a super PAC, while a campaign may only be able to raise $5 or $6 million.” 
 
 Since candidates cannot coordinate with independent groups once they officially announced their bids, Barbour noted, “whoever is running that super PAC is going to have to be pretty innovative.”
– Despite the many, many, many times he has said he's not running, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie spent the weekend considering whether he should. He discussed the logistics of a late entrance to the race with his aides as well as his family, sources tell the Wall Street Journal, and he is expected to make an announcement within days. Filing deadlines for New Hampshire, Florida, and South Carolina all loom less than a month away, and Christie would have just three months to launch his campaign, since Florida's primary is now set for Jan. 31 and other primaries could also be pushed to early January—or even late this year. Because of the tight timeline, sources say Christie's aides have become more daunted in recent days. "The afterglow of Nancy Reagan's flattery" at an event last week "has been replaced with the reality of building a state-by-state organization and the abdication of his day job to do this," says one operative. And unlike Bill Clinton, who launched his campaign at a similarly late date but who had already put out feelers and formed an exploratory committee, Christie has apparently not reached out to Republican leaders in the key early states. Says one prominent New Hampshire GOP strategist, "All that I can deduce is he's not running."