New Hampshire Voters Likely Set Up Biden-Trump Rematch For November
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Voters cast their ballots at a polling location setup at Winnacunnet High School on Jan. 23 in Hampton, New Hampshire.
CONCORD, N.H. ― New Hampshire voters on Tuesday appear to have set up another November general election featuring Democrat Joe Biden and Republican Donald Trump, only this time with Biden as the incumbent and the coup-attempting former president as the challenger.
Trump’s second straight victory in the primary calendar, albeit with a narrower than expected margin, will likely make it difficult for former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley to have a credible chance in her home state late next month, or in the slew of states, many in the Trump-friendly South, two weeks later on Super Tuesday.
By clearing the path to a Trump nomination, Republican voters in Iowa and New Hampshire have likely saddled their party with someone who could well be a convicted felon by the time of the November election, if not the summer convention.
Trump is facing a total of four criminal prosecutions, two for his efforts to remain in the White House despite having lost the 2020 election to Biden. One of those, brought by U.S. Department of Justice special counsel Jack Smith, could result in a trial as early as March ― depending on how quickly an appeals court and possibly the U.S. Supreme Court decide Trump’s argument that he has “total immunity” for anything he did as president.
Biden’s margin of victory in Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary is still unclear. Because his name did not appear on the ballot ― South Carolina is the first official contest on the Democratic side this election ― all his votes are write-ins, which must be counted by hand.
New Hampshire is only the second contest in the 2024 presidential primary season, and is technically not even an official election on the Democratic side. The Democratic National Committee, at Biden’s request, put South Carolina first on the schedule, which upends tradition but empowers Black voters, who make up a large share of the Democratic electorate there.
Nevertheless, Rep. Dean Phillips, a Minnesota Democrat, has concentrated his efforts to challenge Biden in New Hampshire, hoping to capitalize on voter anger about the snub to the primary schedule. That led Biden supporters to start a campaign to have Democrats write in Biden’s name on their ballots to quash Phillips as early as possible.
