Trump projected to win New Hampshire Republican primary
Results appear to set up repeat of 2020 race against Joe Biden
Donald Trump is projected to win the New Hampshire primary, according to The Associated Press, tightening his grip on the Republican presidential nomination and bolstering the likelihood of a rematch later this year against U.S. President Joe Biden.
The result was a setback for former UN ambassador Nikki Haley, who invested significant time and financial resources into winning the state but finished second.
Trump's allies ramped up pressure on Haley to leave the race before the polls had closed, but Haley vowed after the results were announced to continue her campaign.
Speaking to supporters, she intensified her criticism of the former president, questioning his mental acuity and pitching herself as a unifying candidate who would usher in generational change.
"This race is far from over. There are dozens of states left to go," Haley said, while some in the crowd cried, "It's not over!"
She was the last major challenger in the race after Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis ended his presidential bid over the weekend, allowing her to campaign as the sole alternative to Trump.
At his own party in Nashua, Trump opened his speech by mocking Haley, calling her an "imposter" and saying, "She's doing, like, a speech like she won. She didn't win. She lost. ... She had a very bad night."
As of 11 p.m. ET, Trump had won 54.6 per cent of the vote, according to Edison Research, while Haley received 43.5 per cent. It was much narrower margin than Trump's victory a week ago in the Iowa caucuses, when he won by a historic margin over second-place DeSantis and third-place Haley.
Trump can now boast of being the first Republican presidential candidate to win open races in Iowa and New Hampshire since both states began leading the election calendar in 1976, a striking sign of how rapidly Republicans have rallied around him to make him their nominee for the third consecutive time.
By posting easy wins in both early states, Trump is demonstrating an ability to unite the Republicans' factions firmly behind him.
He's garnered support from the evangelical conservatives who are influential in Iowa and New Hampshire's more moderate voters, strength he hopes to replicate as the primary quickly expands to the rest of the U.S. Haley was unable to capitalize on New Hampshire's more moderate political tradition.
Now, her path to becoming the Republican standard-bearer is narrowing quickly. She won't compete in a contest that awards delegates until South Carolina's Feb. 24 Republican primary.
As the state's former governor, she's hoping a strong showing there could propel her into the March 5 Super Tuesday contests.
But in a deeply conservative state where Trump is exceedingly popular, those ambitions may be tough to realize and a home-state loss could prove politically devastating.
Biden wins primary in write-in vote
President Biden, meanwhile, won New Hampshire's Democratic primary via a write-in effort after the state party moved forward with its own contest.
Biden easily bested two long-shot challengers, Minnesota Rep. Dean Phillips and self-help author Marianne Williamson, who were on the ballot along with a host of little-known names.
His victory in a race he was not formally contesting essentially cements the president's grasp on the Democratic nomination for a second term.
The New Hampshire race will likely not count toward amassing delegates for the presidential nomination after Democrats in the state bucked a Biden-championed revamp of the primary calendar that placed South Carolina at the fore of the Democratic race for the White House.
Biden championed changing Democratic Party rules to put South Carolina first on Feb. 3, arguing that Black Democrats, the party's most reliable base of support, and other voters of colour needed to play a larger, earlier role in the primary.
But Biden also won South Carolina's primary in 2020, reviving his campaign after a blowout loss in New Hampshire, whose electorate is whiter and older than the rest of the nation.
New Hampshire Democrats rebelled against the new plan and pushed ahead with a primary on Tuesday, alongside the state's Republicans.
The Democratic National Committee has said that the contest won't award delegates that ultimately select the nominee as a result of the rules violation.
Biden shunned the primary as a result, but his allies organized hundreds of volunteers — and got help from a super PAC — to spread the word that New Hampshire Democrats could still write in his name.
From legal battles to campaign stumps
Trump's early sweep through the Republican primary is remarkable considering he faces 91 criminal charges related to everything from seeking to overturn the 2020 presidential election to mishandling classified documents and arranging payoffs to a porn actress.
He left the White House in 2021 in the grim aftermath of an insurrection at the U.S. Capitol led by his supporters who sought to stop the certification of Biden's win.
And Trump was the first president to be impeached twice.
Beyond the political vulnerabilities associated with the criminal cases, Trump faces a logistical challenge in balancing trials and campaigning.
He has frequently appeared voluntarily at a New York courtroom where a jury is considering whether he should pay additional damages to a columnist who last year won a $5 million US jury award against Trump for sex abuse and defamation.
He has turned these appearances into campaign events, holding televised news conferences that give him an opportunity to spread his message to a large audience.
But Trump has turned those vulnerabilities into an advantage among Republican voters.
He has argued that the criminal prosecutions reflect a politicized Justice Department, though there's no evidence that officials there were pressured by Biden or anyone else in the White House to file charges.
Trump has also repeatedly told his supporters that he's being prosecuted on their behalf, an argument that appears to have further strengthened his bond with the Republican base.
As Trump begins to pivot his attention to Biden and a general election campaign, the question is whether the former president's framing of the legal cases will persuade voters beyond the Republican base.
Trump lost the popular vote in the 2016 and 2020 elections and has faced particular struggles in suburban communities from Georgia to Pennsylvania to Arizona that could prove decisive in the fall campaign.
Trump travelled frequently to New Hampshire in the months leading up to the primary but didn't spend as much time in the state as many of his rivals.
Rather than the traditional approach of greeting voters personally or in small groups, Trump has staged large rallies. He has spent much of his time complaining about the past — including the lie that the 2020 election was stolen due to widespread voter fraud.
If he returns to the White House, the former president has promised to enact a hardline immigration agenda that includes stopping migrants from crossing the U.S.-Mexico border and reimposing his first-term travel ban that originally targeted seven Muslim-majority countries.
He's also said the rising number of immigrants entering the United States are "poisoning the blood of our country," echoing Adolf Hitler's language.
With files from Thomson Reuters