March 5th was Super Tuesday: the landmark day of primary voting in which residents of 16 states chose their favored presidential candidates for both the Democratic and Republican primary. It was also, as Donald Trump crowed after the polls had mostly closed, an “amazing day” for the Republican leader. Nikki Haley, Trump’s last remaining challenger for the Republican nomination, won only one state (Vermont), and has since dropped out of contention. Of the requisite 1215 Republican delegates required to clinch the GOP nomination in a few months, Trump has already won over 1000 –Haley attracted just 89.
In a characteristically fiery speech, Trump lambasted both Nikki Haley and President Biden, lamenting what he described as America’s slide into the “third-world” over the past three years, and criticizing Haley as “a very angry person” who was “bitter” in her opposition to MAGA-ism.
Trump might have appeared confident as he strutted onstage at Mar-a-Lago wearing a trademark smile. Yet, his ebullience may not be entirely justified. That Nikki Haley has waged a campaign against Donald Trump with such relative success for so long is indicative of latent resentment of Trump’s preeminence atop the Republican party. Wall Street business types have helped Haley raise far more cash than Trump for each of the past few months. She is the type of pragmatic, pro-business Republican who exemplifies the dwindling Reaganite wing of the party: her backers included the Koch brothers (who through their PAC, Americans for Prosperity, injected $32 million into the Haley effort from November through February), the hedge-fund billionaire Kenneth Griffin and Jim Davis, the founder of New Balance. Big backers like these have increasingly tired of Trumpian antics.
A majority of those who supported Haley in North Carolina say that they would be “dissatisfied” if Trump became (as he all but certainly has) the Republican presidential candidate. Haley pointedly refused to endorse Trump, instead calling on both candidates to win over her constituents. Many of these voters — mostly affluent suburbanites — have equally low opinions of Biden and Trump. Polls indicate, however, that they would mostly remain loyal to the Republican party or refrain from voting at all. For Trump, the question is whether he can sway the remaining few percent of Haley voters who are undecided, or whether his grotesque brand of demagoguery will see some Republican moderates vote across party lines for Biden.
As such, Trump’s task in the coming months is not to reinforce his appeal to hardline Republicans, but to make his campaign more palatable to the small sliver of American voters who remain undecided about their course of action in November. This necessarily means adopting moderate stances on a range of issues. Yet, it seems to be in Trump’s nature to be thrilled by the kind of forceful, absolutist rhetoric which characterizes both rightist and leftist politicians of their parties’ more distant wings. This is an instinct which he would be wise to temper ahead of November’s election.
Trump must also court the mega-donors who have funded the Haley campaign over the past few months. The estimated cost of counsel in the many court cases which he faces amounts to $5 million a month. More than half of every dollar put toward the Trump campaign ends up paying for his legal bills, according to the campaign’s FEC filings. At the end of last year, Trump had just under $50 million in cash to spend on his campaign, where Biden had $120 million in hand. Unless the likes of the Koch brothers support Trump with the same vigor that they did Haley, Trump may find his ad spending lagging dramatically behind Biden’s in key swing states, which will in turn make it all the harder for him to win doubtful moderate votes.
There is also a long-term threat posed to the current system of party politics by Haley and her ilk — Mitt Romney, Joe Manchin, Larry Hogan and other prominent national center-right politicians. Haley may not have beaten Trump in the Republican primary, but polls indicate that she is more electable than either Trump or Biden. A centrist force in American politics will not emerge for as long as highly-partisan, gerontocratic politicians have control over America’s electorate on both left and right. But Donald Trump is 77. His vein of Republicanism will not last forever, and when it does fall, Haley (who is 52) may seek to assume the mantle of American conservatism. Haley quoted Margaret Thatcher in her concession speech, imploring her voters to “never just follow the crowd … make up your own mind.” Haley has given constituents and her chief rival much to think about.
