Former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley narrowly defeated Donald Trump in the Vermont Republican primary, preventing the former president from sweeping all 15 Super Tuesday states.
Haley won the Green Mountain State with just under 50 percent of the vote, the U.N. ambassador’s second win of the GOP presidential primary campaign following her victory in Washington, D.C., on Sunday.
Vermont’s popular Republican governor Phil Scott endorsed Haley ahead of the New Hampshire primary that saw Trump triumph over Haley. She received additional backing from Vermont state legislators and a former Republican governor ahead of the state’s primary.
Recognizing the fertile ground, Haley campaigned in South Burlington over the weekend before a crowd of an estimated 700 people. She discussed a wide range of pressing issues and made her familiar pitch as the candidate for a new generation. Scott urged independents and Democrats in his state to help put Haley over the finish line against Trump.
A poll taken of likely GOP primary voters last month showed Trump leading Haley 61 percent to 31 percent. Three quarters of the sample of likely GOP voters in the poll were Republicans and the rest were independents and Democrats.
Haley likely benefitted from the state’s open primary format, which allows independent and Democratic voters the chance to participate in the GOP contest. Open primaries in states such as New Hampshire and Virginia have proven more favorable to Haley because of strong anti-Trump sentiment among independent and Democratic voters.
Outside of Vermont, Trump defeated Haley resoundingly in Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Oklahoma, Maine, Alabama, Massachusetts, Texas, Arkansas, Colorado, and Minnesota at the time of writing. California, Alaska and Utah have yet to be called. A third of the attainable GOP delegates, 865 in total, were up for grabs at the start of the evening.
“They call it Super Tuesday for a reason and the pundits tell me there has never been one like this,” Trump declared at his Mar-a-Lago estate, the site of his victory speech. He is the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, although Haley is not yet mathematically eliminated from contention.
Haley held no events on Super Tuesday and spent the night in Charleston, South Carolina as speculation mounts over whether she will drop out. She indicated on Sunday she does not feel bound by the RNC’s pledge to support the party’s eventual nominee.