NASHUA, N.H. — If New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation primary is truly a bellwether of the race to come, then the 2024 Republican presidential nominating contest may well be over already.
On Tuesday, Granite State voters sent the nation a resounding message, proclaiming loudly through their vote that, despite any legal complications or efforts to see his name removed from statewide ballots, former President Donald Trump is their man.
Though results were still coming in from several districts as of press time, the race for New Hampshire’s almost two-dozen delegates to the Republican National Convention was called by major news networks for the 45th President less than an hour after the last polling places closed at 8 p.m.
While polling trends seemed to indicate former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley’s much sought after come-from-behind finish was within sight, as the night carried on the voting tally would eventually show Trump winning the state’s largest districts by wide margins.
Trump’s margin of victory, according to early results, appears in line with polling, which for weeks has shown he would beat Haley by convincing but not historic margins. Early indications show he earned about half of the vote, compared to Haley’s around 30%.
That’s a better result than Haley achieved in Iowa, where she was at less than 20% support and came in behind Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, but still not enough to topple Trump, even after the Sunshine State’s governor unexpectedly suspended his bid for the White House on Sunday. DeSantis has endorsed Trump’s White House run.
Tuesday’s win in the Granite State’s primary represents the third time the former president has taken the majority of the state’s 22 delegates. In 2016, Trump won 11 of the 23 delegates available in that race, after securing just over 35% of the vote. Then-Ohio Gov. John Kasich took 15% of the vote and four delegates. Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, of Texas, each earned about 11% of the vote and three delegates. U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, of Florida, earned two delegates after earning the minimum support to qualify of 10%.
Then-President Trump broke New Hampshire state primary history in 2020, when he won all of the delegates and earned over 129,000 votes — almost 85% — beating former President Bill Clinton’s record of 76,000 votes. Former Massachusetts Gov. Bill Weld earned 9% of the vote in 2020, less than the 10% required to win delegates.
George Villemaire was at Trump’s 2020 victory party, and he was the first guest through the ballroom door on Tuesday night. The 71-year-old Hudson native said that a Trump victory is “vital” to the future of the country.
“The border is on the line, getting our economy back on track is on the line,” he said. “You gotta have somebody who has got guts. Trump has guts.”
Trump’s continued domination of conservative politics comes despite four grand jury indictments from as many jurisdictions, detailing a total of 91 felony charges leveled against former president. Additionally, courts in New York determined his vast business empire was built upon decades of fraud, and a federal Judge, Lewis Kaplan, made quite clear that though he was not charged with the crime of rape under New York law, he did, in fact, rape author E. Jean Carrol.
Many of the charges the former president faces deal directly with his alleged attempts to maintain his office after losing the 2020 election to President Joe Biden by more than 7 million votes and his actions — or lack thereof — on Jan. 6, 2021, as a violent mob stormed the U.S. Capitol and halted the certification of his loss.
The attack on the Capitol, along with an apparent conspiracy to provide the U.S. Congress a slate of fake presidential electors with the aim of falsely claiming Trump won several battleground states, was enough to convince judges in Colorado and elections officials in Maine and elsewhere that he violated Section Three of the 14th Amendment.
Passed following the Civil War, the amendment is meant to prevent anyone who engages in insurrection against the U.S. Constitution, after swearing an oath to uphold it, from holding office.
Whether Trump’s activities amount to insurrection, or, like he has claimed, were nothing more than a U.S. president following his oath to look into concerns he had about the outcome of the election, or whether the 14th even applies to the U.S. Presidency, are now distinctions left for the nation’s highest court to make.