MANCHESTER, NEW HAMPSHIRE – As the latest challenger to former President Donald Trump, Nikki Haley is hoping voters in New Hampshire want to keep the former president out of the White House and turn out in droves in the Republican primary.
“America does not elect a king,” Ms. Haley said at a meeting in Franklin, where she appeared with her daughter and son-in-law. “Let’s show the whole media class and the political class that we have another plan in mind and let’s show the country what we can do.”
It’s an uphill battle for the former UN ambassador and former South Carolina governor. Most conservatives want to give Mr. Trump another chance to defeat President Joe Biden, despite Mr. Trump’s 2020 election loss and the 91 criminal charges he faces in four separate indictments.
As early voting in New Hampshire is expected to begin, nearly all top Republican officials have expressed support for Mr. Trump, and polls in New Hampshire show he is expected to trail Ms. Haley in the state, where her platform enjoys broad support.
Former President Trump is expected to hold the last event on Monday evening. He began the day in New York with his trial on a defamation lawsuit filed by a female writer, who an earlier jury found he had sexually abused. This trial was canceled because one of the jurors was ill.
Joining Mr Trump on the stage on Monday were three of his former opponents who now support him: South Carolina Senator Tim Scott, tech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy and North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum. The show of force is part of a broader effort by Mr Trump’s team to secure victory in the primaries and prove the party is rallying around him.
Looking at the poll numbers, Mr. Trump appeared to be in a weaker position in New Hampshire than in all other early polls for the primary. Although voters supported him by a wide margin in the state in 2016, New Hampshire is known for a long tradition of moderation, such as by allowing unregistered party voters to participate in the Republican primary. Ms. Haley’s poll ratings have also been rising, prompting the Trump campaign and its allies to spend millions of dollars trying to slow her rise.
Thalia Flores, a former Democrat who manages stores, changed her registration last fall as an undeclared voter, she intends to vote against Mr. Trump in the New Hampshire primary. She says she would support Ms Haley in a run against President Biden, although she has never voted for a Republican candidate before.
But she is nonetheless aware of the lack of sufficient support for Ms. Haley among traditional conservatives to defeat Mr. Trump.
“What do the Republicans want?” Ms. Flores said at a mass rally for Ms. Haley over the weekend. “Are they staunch supporters of Trump, or do they want the White House?”.
The departure of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis turned the race into a showdown between Mr. Trump and Ms. Haley, which has long been desired by Ms. Flores and a long line of anti-Trump Republicans.
But some indicators signal that Mr. Trump may be in a better position to benefit from Mr. DeSantis’ departure than Ms. Haley. According to an AP Votecast poll, Mr. DeSantis’ supporters in Iowa generally describe themselves as conservative, and in that state Mr. Trump received 53%, compared to Ms. Haley’s 13%.
As soon as he announced his departure, Mr. DeSantis immediately threw his support behind Mr. Trump, saying it was clear that Republican voters preferred the former president.
On Monday, Montana Senator Steve Daines, who chairs the GOP Senate Elections Committee, called Mr. Trump “the expected nominee.”
Never before has a presidential candidate won the Iowa and New Hampshire primaries and then not received his party’s nomination as the official candidate.
“Basically after New Hampshire, it’s an academic exercise,” said Chris LaCivita, a senior adviser to former President Trump. “It really matters here.”
The certainty for Mr. Trump comes even as respected Republicans, such as New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, warn of dire political consequences.
“Republicans are tired of losing. We are tired of losers. We’re tired of Donald Trump,” Mr. Sununu told about 500 of Ms. Haley’s supporters gathered over the weekend in New Hampshire’s largest city.
On Monday, Ms. Haley spoke on the “New Hampshire Today” show, comparing Mr. Trump to Mr. Biden, pointing out that former President Trump has confused her with former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, which she also misspelled. that he ran against former President Barack Obama, as well as warned that Mr. Biden will enter the country into the Second World War, which took place in the period 1939-1945.
“When we have two 80-year-olds running for president, we’re going to see a decline,” she said. “It is natural. It’s what happens.”
Meanwhile, Ms. Haley’s campaign officials have lowered expectations for New Hampshire, after insisting for weeks that a clear victory against Mr. Trump was possible.
“Beating Donald Trump is not easy. He is a massive force,” Haley campaign manager Betsy Ankney said over the weekend during an event hosted by the Bloomberg network. “But how can you eat an elephant? Bite after bite. We must continue to show continued growth and progress. It is the last man, the last woman, who is standing in front of him”.
Still, the tens of thousands of voters who flock to Mr. Trump’s rallies in New Hampshire don’t seem worried, and he’s making no effort to dampen expectations.
Eric Holmstrom, a 43-year-old Republican from Goffstown who supports Mr. Trump, says he sees the former president’s trips from courthouses to campaign events as a sign that he is the best person to get the nomination. party president.
“I want to say that this man’s resistance is unrepeatable. And we need power. We need unity. We need resistance. At this moment, unity is not, but it will happen”.