Former President Donald Trump looks to be less than two weeks away from a landslide victory over his last major opponent for the 2024 Republican nomination in her home state.
But former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley still poses one clear danger to Trump as long as she remains in the race: Until she is gone, Trump will attack her, occasionally in ways that could reinforce his liabilities with suburban women in the general election.
The race took a nasty turn when Trump asked where Haley’s husband, Maj. Michael Haley, is on the campaign trail. The South Carolina Army National Guardsman is deployed overseas.
Haley called Trump’s reference to her husband “disgusting,” saying in a statement, “If you mock one veteran, you’re mocking all veterans.”
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Rather than mocking veterans, Trump was probably trying to call attention to other rumors. On both that and the whereabouts of one’s spouse on the campaign trail, Trump is hurling stones from inside a Mar-a-Lago-sized glass house.
It won’t have any impact on the Republican primary. Not only has Trump repeatedly survived feuds with bigger GOP leaders before, but the competitive phase of this race appears to be nearing the end — if it ever truly began.
The latest CBS News poll shows Trump beating Haley by 35 points in South Carolina, where she was twice elected governor. That brings the RealClearPolitics average for the next big primary to 61.3% Trump, 31% Haley.
If Haley continues after a home-state shellacking of that magnitude, the polling in the Super Tuesday states looks worse. Recent polling shows Trump leads in some of them ranging from 41 to 77 points. Nationally, he takes 74.3% to Haley’s 18.1%, according to RealClearPolitics.
This is after Trump beat Haley 74.2% to 25.8% in the low-turnout Virgin Islands caucuses. Haley lost the Nevada primary by more than 30 points to “none of these candidates,” receiving zero delegates. Trump participated in the caucuses instead, winning 99.1% of the vote and all the delegates.
Trump could safely pivot to the general election after South Carolina. But his inclination is to stay on offense as long as he has a primary opponent of any notoriety and would likely point to his continued dominance as proof his approach is working.
Yet the polls may really prove the attacks are unnecessary. Trump’s comments about Haley’s husband stepped on a bad news cycle for President Joe Biden, who is reeling from comments about his memory and mental acuity in special counsel Robert Hur’s report. The flap also gave Haley press coverage she wouldn’t have otherwise had.
Trump’s focus should probably be on Biden’s problems, not Haley’s. And in the general election, voters attracted to Haley’s campaign could be helpful.
Suburban women were a challenge for Trump in both 2016 and 2020. They don’t need fresh examples of why they dislike him. Weeks of calling a woman who served in the Trump administration “birdbrain” could provide such fodder.
Trump isn’t going to change his tactics at this late date. It remains to be seen how long Haley can continue her campaign. It’s possible that if Trump starts breaking 60% to 70% of the vote on a consistent basis, the problem will solve itself.
The former president’s loyalists have always wanted an early end to the primary campaign. They don’t want to spend resources fighting for the Republican nomination, especially with all his legal troubles, ahead of a rematch with Biden.
Democrats have concluded a competitive primary against Biden will only weaken them in November. That’s why no one with greater stature than Rep. Dean Phillips (D-MN) challenged him. Republicans made a different bet, though the field has collapsed quickly against Trump.
Haley is hanging in there, at least for now. She has no obvious path to the nomination. She may not win a single primary, or even come particularly close.
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But if Haley’s continued presence in the race causes Trump to behave in ways that reinforce his general election negatives, she could still have an impact.
That impact will be detrimental to Trump, though he will shoulder much of the blame himself. The wounds will be mostly self-inflicted.
