Trump wins big in NH, Haley vows to press on

Jan. 23—Former President Donald Trump made history Tuesday, winning a record third straight New Hampshire primary, though former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley said she did well enough to continue the battle a month from now in her home state.

"You know we won New Hampshire three times — three," Trump said. "This is a very special to me, very important."

Taking the stage before a throng of supporters at the Sheraton Nashua Hotel, Trump defied any notion he would be a gracious winner and quickly fired away at Haley for claiming she beat expectations and had a win of her own.

"Let's not have somebody take a victory when she had a very bad night," Trump said.

Haley, 52, told a loud and supportive crowd at the Grappone Conference Center in Concord that she came "close to getting half of the vote" and outperformed pre-primary polls that had her losing to Trump by 15 points or more.

"You have all heard the chatter among the political class. They have fallen all over themselves saying this race is over," Haley said.

"I have news for all of them: New Hampshire is first in the nation. It is not the last in the nation."

New Hampshire voters in the GOP primary were the biggest winners with turnout over 500,000 voters or more than 200,000 above the previous record the Democratic primary had set in 2020.

Without offering any specifics, Trump claimed Haley committed practices that, should she become the nominee, would put her under federal investigation.

"I could tell you five reasons why already. Not big reasons, but a little stuff she didn't want to talk about," Trump said.

"She would be under investigation in 15 minutes."

While Trump's lawyers have admitted in his court cases that he lost the 2020 election, the candidate Tuesday night resumed insisting he really won.

"If you really want to play it straight, we won in 2020 and by more" than he did in 2016, Trump said. "As they said, we lost by just a whisker, no, no, no, but we can't let that happen."

Trump also mocked Haley's biggest supporter, Gov. Chris Sununu who he called a "very unpopular governor."

"He has to be on something. I have never seen a guy like him on energy," Trump said.

With 80% of the vote counted by 11 p.m., Trump, 77, was up by 11.4% with 277,239 votes (54.9%) compared to 219,701 for Haley (43.5%).

Trump was clearly angry that Haley came out early on to claim her moral victory when the lead was less than 10%.

As the night wore on with more results, Trump's victory margin grew into double digits.

While Haley won in left-leaning communities like Lebanon and Holderness and even suburbs like Bedford, Trump ran up the score in working class and GOP suburbs, including Manchester, Claremont, Brentwood and Hampstead.

Haley predicted President Joe Biden would defeat Trump this November, just as the GOP has lost major elections since Trump's first midterm in 2018.

"The worst-kept secret in politics is how badly the Democrats want to run against Donald Trump," Haley said.

Biden-Harris Campaign Manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez said New Hampshire primary results have all but ended this race.

"Tonight's results confirm Donald Trump has all but locked up the GOP nomination, and the election-denying, anti-freedom MAGA movement has completed its takeover of the Republican Party," she said.

Trump's campaign issued a statement calling on Haley to drop out. She dismissed the suggestion out of hand.

"This race is far from over, there are dozens of states left to go and the next one is my sweet state of South Carolina," Haley said.

Trump has all the political establishment support in South Carolina and a huge lead over Haley in the polls.

Backers react to returns

Independent Sabrina Antle, 44, has been with Trump since 2016.

"I didn't like him much in the beginning, but I don't trust the career politicians. I feel like they're bought. Trump will talk to everybody. He wants to talk to the people," said Antle, Trump's Henniker captain. "What he explained he wanted to do for the country sounded right and I trusted him."

Gerry Baskins, 68, of Hollis said she backed former United Nations ambassador Haley because she doesn't want to see Trump win again.

"I don't care who it is, Haley, or Biden, I just don't want Trump," Baskins said. "Today is about stopping Trump. And I like the idea of voting for the first female president."

But James Thompson of Plaistow, 54, said he felt Haley needed to beat Trump in New Hampshire for her to have any chance in the GOP race moving forward.

"Trump won in such a landslide in Iowa," Thompson said. "She's got a long road ahead of her, but hopefully it starts tonight."

Early signs of high turnout

Signs of a higher turnout emerged in late afternoon when Secretary of State David Scanlan confirmed that 12 towns had requested additional ballots in the GOP primary.

These included Amherst, Brentwood, Concord, Hanover, Holderness, Hollis, Hopkinton, Newmarket and Windham.

Scanlan had forecast a record 322,000 would show up, breaking the 300,000 mark Democrats set in the 2020 presidential primary won by Vermont independent Bernie Sanders.

Trump took to social media after TV networks reported the first wave of exit polls had 45% of voters in the GOP identifying as independents and 8% as Democrats.

When Trump won his first GOP primary race here in 2016, 42% of independents took part and 3% Democrats.

Democrats had to change their party by last October in order to take a GOP ballot Tuesday.

"So ridiculous that Democrats and independents are allowed to vote in the Republican primary especially since Crooked Joe Biden has abandoned New Hampshire — but the word is we are doing really well!!!" Trump posted on Truth Social, half an hour before the first polls had closed at 7 p.m.

In a move that signaled how much Trump wanted to deliver a knockout punch, he made an unexpected visit to the polls in Londonderry Tuesday afternoon.

Trump denied he was calling on Haley to get out of the race.

"I would never do that," Trump told reporters.

Should he wrap up the nomination soon, Trump did say he was confident Haley supporters would come into his camp when the choice is him or Biden.

"They are all going to vote for me again, everybody, and I am not sure we are going to need too many" to win in November.

"They are all coming back, and I think you see that here."

For her part, Haley and her chief booster, Sununu, bristled earlier Tuesday at the notion that she should drop out if she came up short.

"When have we ever had two people — down to two people in New Hampshire? And you, say, 'Oh, it's over.' We don't do that," Haley told "Fox and Friends," adding she's already bought $4 million of TV time in South Carolina.

Sununu: NH not end of road

Sununu said New Hampshire's job was to winnow the field, not short-circuit a real competition.

"If Nikki wins here, is Trump done? No, of course not," Sununu said.

Tuesday's election capped what most observers viewed as a bizarre presidential primary cycle of historic proportions.

Trump sought to get into the record books on multiple fronts, including his bid to become just the second in American history to win back the office he had lost four years ago.

Throughout nearly this entire race, Trump held a commanding lead over his rivals, a group that began with 13 exploring such a run that starkly ended Tuesday with only Haley left standing as his major opponent.

One by one, Trump's opponents decided they had neither the campaign cash nor the political horsepower to compete with Trump, who week after week dominated the 24/7 news cycle.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis started out with such promise as a contender and at one point even had more elected legislators at the State House backing him than Trump did.

klandrigan@unionleader.com

Union Leader Reporters Paul Feely and Jaime Costa contributed to this report.