Nikki Haley secured her first victory in the 2024 campaign by winning the Republican primary in the District of Columbia, interrupting Donald Trump’s dominance in the GOP voting contests.
This triumph, announced by the Associated Press on Sunday night, comes after Haley’s recent losses in South Carolina.
Despite facing setbacks, Haley expressed her commitment to staying in the race through the upcoming Super Tuesday races.
She refrained from specifying particular primaries she felt assured of winning. Following her defeat in South Carolina, Haley maintained her stance that voters in subsequent locations deserved an alternative to Trump, who has been dominant in the campaign.
The victory in Washington, a predominantly Democratic area with a limited Republican presence, earned Haley all 19 delegates at stake.
Despite the city’s Democratic leanings, Trump, in a statement, sarcastically congratulated Haley as the “Queen of the Swamp” by lobbyists and DC insiders.
After her win, Haley held a rally in Washington, D.C., before returning to North Carolina for the Super Tuesday primaries. At a hotel ballroom gathering with over 100 supporters, she quipped, “Who says there’s no Republicans in D.C., come on.”
“We’re trying to make sure that we touch every hand that we can and speak to every person,” Haley stated.
While delivering her usual campaign speech, critiquing Trump for increasing the federal deficit, a rally attendee loudly exclaimed, “He cannot win a general election.
It’s madness.” This elicited agreement from Haley, who asserts that she can prevent Biden from securing a second term, unlike Trump.
Although Haley identifies as a staunch conservative during her campaign, she tends to resonate more with moderate and independent-leaning voters.
In South Carolina’s GOP primary, 40% of Haley supporters described themselves as moderates, compared to 15% for Trump, according to AP VoteCast—a survey encompassing over 2,400 voters in the Republican primary in South Carolina, conducted by NORC at the University of Chicago.
Conversely, 80% of Trump supporters identified as conservatives, while only about half of Haley’s backers did.
During his 2020 reelection bid, Trump won an uncontested D.C. primary, but in the previous election, he placed a distant third behind Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida and former Ohio Gov. John Kasich. Rubio’s victory was one of the three wins in his unsuccessful 2016 bid.
More centrist Republicans like Mitt Romney and John McCain secured the city’s primaries in 2012 and 2008, respectively, on their way to winning the GOP nomination.
