South Carolina’s Democratic Primary: A Portrait of a Superstar, a Fresh Face, and an Endurance for Ms. Haley
A former president and a governor of South Carolina will battle it out in the state’s Republican primary. A lot of polls show Mr. Trump has a big lead.
In the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary, the speed of a race call can give the victor a sense of legitimacy and even an air of inevitability. The Iowa caucuses were called for by Mr. Trump before they’d even ended.
Polls in South Carolina will close at 7 p.m., and Ms. Haley is expected to speak in Charleston once the winner is declared. The Trump campaign will hold a “watch party” in the state capital of Columbia, where the former president is expected to speak.
An early night for the two remaining candidates will say a lot about where the race is heading as they turn to Michigan next week ahead of Super Tuesday on March 5, when 15 states will vote to award 874 of 2,429 Republican delegates.
Regardless of the outcome in South Carolina, Ms. Haley will stay in the race. Still, she would like to exceed expectations so that she can remind voters of her favorite campaign T-shirt, ”Underestimate me. That will be fun.
Just after the New Hampshire primary, Mark Harris, the chief strategist for Ms. Haley’s super PAC, SFA Fund, said that the former governor did not have to win her home state but that she did have to exceed her share of the vote in New Hampshire — 43 percent — to show she is making progress with Republican voters.
Poll after poll has found that most Americans do not relish a rematch between President Biden and Mr. Trump, the major party nominees in 2020. Mr. Biden won the South Carolina Democratic primary with a large percentage of the vote. It was always predicted that there would be anemic turnout, but only 131,302 people went to the polls.
Unlike Iowa, where subzero temperatures and blowing snow most likely held down turnout, the weather in South Carolina will be fine on Saturday — gorgeous even. There was not much drama in the state, which may have led to a low turnout. If the poor showing of South Carolina is added to, then Ms. Haley has a point about voters wanting a fresh, younger face to vote for in November.
South Carolina has three different subdivisions: the Upstate around Greenville and Spartanburg, where the question is what church you belong to, the Midlands dominated by the state capital, and the mellower of Lowcountry.
That leaves the Lowcountry, where affluent Republicans fix up 19th-century mansions in Charleston and Beaufort, golf on Hilton Head or build sumptuous beach houses in the Charleston suburbs of Isle of Palms and Sullivan’s Island — and where Ms. Haley lives, on Kiawah Island. Haley country is what the Lowcountry should be.
But a surge of newcomers — the largest cohort from New York and New Jersey — has swelled more middle-class, inland suburbs around Charleston, as well as in Horry County, home to Myrtle Beach. They were not in the office of Governor Haley.
How this region votes will speak to the appeal of Mr. Trump to affluent Republicans who used to control the party and to suburbanites who have not had a chance to know Ms. Haley.
Nikki Haley called comments Donald Trump made about Black people at an event Friday “disgusting” and proof Republicans would lose the presidential race if he’s the nominee.
That is the chaos that happens with Donald Trump. That offensiveness is going to happen every day, and that’s why Donald Trump cannot win a general election. He won’t.
The former president of the United States made comments at a Black Conservatives Gala in Columbia, South Carolina suggesting that Black voters support him due to his criminal charges and that they have “embraced” his mug shot.
Haley, speaking to reporters after casting her vote in the South Carolina primary Saturday near her home in Kiawah Island, S.C., said the comments are the latest example of a “huge warning sign” if he’s the GOP nominee.
“It’s disgusting, but that’s what happens when he goes off the teleprompter,” Haley said to reporters after voting on Kiawah Island. The chaos that comes with Donald Trump. That’s the offensiveness that’s going to happen every day between now and the general election, which is why I continue to say Donald Trump cannot win a general election. He won’t.”