Trump closes in on Biden rematch after New Hampshire win
Donald Trump won the key New Hampshire primary Tuesday, moving him ever closer to locking in the Republican presidential nomination and securing an extraordinary White House rematch with Joe Biden.
With vote counting ongoing, Trump's margin of victory was unclear and his sole remaining challenger Nikki Haley was quick to insist she would fight on.
In a speech following the vote, the former UN ambassador during Trump's frequently chaotic presidency said the race was "far from over" and told supporters that Democrats want to run against her former boss.
"They know Trump is the only Republican in the country who Joe Biden can defeat," Haley, 52, warned.
With strong turnout in the northeastern state, Haley had hoped for a major upset. But US broadcasters quickly projected her defeat as the first tallies came in.
Trump was already the runaway leader in national Republican polling, despite two impeachments as president, and four criminal trials hanging over him since leaving office.
While Haley repeatedly questioned the 77-year-old's mental fitness and warned another Trump presidency would bring "chaos," polls indicate her efforts in New Hampshire created little more than a speed bump.
"I think it's a two-person race now between Trump and Biden," Keith Nahigian, a veteran of six presidential campaigns and former member of Trump's transition team, told AFP.
New Hampshire was markedly more Haley-friendly than states she will subsequently face, should she stay in the race, and continuing into February will be a tough sell without a win or at least a narrow loss.
Her next must-win stop will be her home state South Carolina.
Two-person race
Trump won a crushing victory in the first Republican contest in Iowa last week, with Haley a distant third.
What was once a crowded field of 14 candidates narrowed to a one-on-one matchup on Sunday after Florida Governor Ron DeSantis dropped out, following his second-place Iowa finish.
No Republican has ever won both opening contests and not ultimately secured the party's nomination.
Trump did little actual campaigning in New Hampshire. However, his message -- a mixture of personal grievance and right-wing culture war firing his base -- has delivered seemingly insurmountable polling leads.
"I think it's gonna be a wipeout for Biden. He's gone," said Luis Ferre, 72, who traveled from New York to be at Trump's election night party at a Nashua hotel.
Haley spent the week hammering the message, backed by polling, that most Americans do not want to see a Trump-Biden rematch.
"Nikki Haley's supporters will surely feel that Tuesday night in New Hampshire was a reasonably good night. But once the relative shine of the Granite State result wears off... all but the most ardent Haley supporters will be looking through a glass darkly," said Aron Solomon, a political analyst for legal marketing agency Amplify.
Good night for Biden
Networks projected President Joe Biden the winner of the state's primary for Democrats, who because of a row between state and national party officials were forced to write in Biden's name.
Biden marked the day by campaigning alongside Vice President Kamala Harris in Virginia at a rally for abortion rights.
With Trump touting his role in the ending of the constitutional right to abortion, Biden told an enthusiastic crowd that the Republican was "hell-bent" on further restrictions.
After the New Hampshire result came through, the Biden campaign said Trump had "all but locked up" the nomination.
"The election denying, anti-freedom MAGA movement has completed its takeover of the Republican Party," the campaign said in a statement, referring to Trump's "Make America Great Again" slogan.