Nikki Haley was surprisingly peppy as she took the stage in New Hampshire on Tuesday, considering she had just suffered her second bruising defeat by Donald Trump. Trump beat Haley by 11 points in New Hampshire, a victory that came on the heels of the former president’s 30-point win in the Iowa caucuses.
Undaunted by the reality of her losses, the former UN ambassador pledged that she would continue on in the Republican presidential primary. Haley voiced confidence about her performance in her home state of South Carolina, which will hold its Republican primary on 24 February.
“New Hampshire is first in the nation. It is not the last in the nation,” Haley told supporters in Concord. “This race is far from over. There are dozens of states left to go, and the next one is my sweet state of South Carolina.”
But everyone not named Nikki Haley appears all too ready to declare the Republican primary over. With Trump winning a historic majority of votes in Iowa and New Hampshire, Haley’s path to the nomination appears increasingly difficult – if not impossible. In his victory speech on Tuesday, Trump belittled her efforts to downplay her losses and mocked her decision to stay in the race.
“She had a very bad night,” Trump said. “She came in third [in Iowa], and she’s still hanging around.”
In a rare moment of agreement between Trump and Joe Biden, the president made clear that he would turn his attention to the general election in November, effectively writing off any chance of a Haley comeback.
“It is now clear that Donald Trump will be the Republican nominee. And my message to the country is the stakes could not be higher,” Biden said in a statement. “I want to say to all those independents and Republicans who share our commitment to core values of our nation our Democracy, our personal freedoms, an economy that gives everyone a fair shot – to join us as Americans.”
Despite Haley’s claims to the contrary, her prospects in South Carolina and beyond look bleak. According to the FiveThirtyEight polling average, Trump is running 37 points ahead of Haley in South Carolina, where he has already locked up the endorsements of the state’s governor and senators. If anything, Haley’s losing performance in New Hampshire may represent a high-water mark for her, given her strong support among independent voters who were allowed to participate in the Republican primary.
There’s also the question of money. Haley has reportedly planned a major fundraising swing with big donors in the coming weeks. However, if those donors start abandoning her in large numbers, Haley may have no choice but to withdraw .
Of course, Haley’s campaign insists she can be competitive in many states that will vote on Super Tuesday, which falls on 5 March. In a campaign memo circulated on Tuesday, Betsy Ankney, Haley’s campaign manager, noted that roughly two-thirds of the 874 delegates up for grabs on Super Tuesday are in states with open or semi-open primaries.
“Until then, everyone should take a deep breath. The campaign has not even begun in any of these states yet,” Ankney said. “A month in politics is a lifetime. We’re watching democracy in action. We’re letting the people have a voice. That’s how this is supposed to work.”
As Haley looks ahead to South Carolina, her campaign has leaned into the message that she is the most electable Republican candidate. In one of two new ads that the Haley campaign dropped in South Carolina on Wednesday, a narrator highlights Biden and Trump’s unpopularity and makes the pitch for a new era of political leadership.
“Biden – too old. Trump – too much chaos,” the narrator in the ad says. “A rematch no one wants. There’s a better choice for a better America.”
Some data supports Haley’s electability argument. She performed well with moderate Republican voters in New Hampshire, pointing to a potential vulnerability for Trump in November, and one Wall Street Journal poll frequently cited by Haley’s team showed her beating Biden by 17 points in a general election.
The problem is, she has no viable route to that general election.
Nevertheless, at the election night watch party in Concord, Haley’s supporters echoed the candidate’s resilience.
“I’m not about to have a panic attack after one state,” Marie Mulroy, 76, said moments after Haley spoke. Mulroy is an independent New Hampshire voter who backed Biden in 2020 and remains hopeful she’ll have the opportunity to cast her ballot for the first female president in November.
“If it’s like this after Super Tuesday, then you start thinking,” she added.
Mary Ann Hanusa was so committed to electing Haley that she flew to New Hampshire to volunteer for her campaign after caucusing for Haley in Iowa, where she lives. Hanusa said she was prepared to go to South Carolina to help.
“I think Americans deserve a choice,” she said. “We’ve got 48 states to go.”
