MANCHESTER, New Hampshire — Polls are open in New Hampshire as Granite State voters decide whether the Republican race is already over or will continue for at least another month.
Former President Donald Trump leads former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley by a comfortable margin in most polls, but the only poll that will matter in the end is the one that takes place today.
Polls opened at 6 a.m. in Manchester, the state’s largest city, though some open at 7 a.m. or 8 a.m., while the tiny community of Dixville Notch continued a long-standing tradition of voting at midnight and awarding all six of its votes to Haley. Polling places will be closed by 8 p.m.
Both remaining GOP candidates have seen their polling numbers rise in the final days, per the RealClearPolitics average, as other campaigns, including those of Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL), entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, closed shop in recent days. Ramaswamy still had campaign ads popping up on Manchester billboards as of Sunday afternoon.
There’s a sort of undercard race happening as well, with Rep. Dean Phillips (D-MN) launching an insurgent campaign against President Joe Biden and the Democratic National Committee, which has abandoned New Hampshire in favor of South Carolina for its opening primary. Biden’s name will not appear on Granite State ballots.
New Hampshire hasn’t played along with the DNC, pointing to a state law requiring it to hold the nation’s first primary. Phillips is hoping to step into that void and a Biden write-in campaign with the slogan, “If he wrote you off, why would you write him in?”
However, with Biden expected to cruise in other states and the DNC vowing not to award delegates to New Hampshire, much more attention will be paid to the GOP result.
The problem for Haley is that while she has grown from polling below 20% in early December to more than 35% today, Trump has crossed the 50% threshold in the closing stages, which would see him lock up a win if that number holds.
Haley has worked to temper expectations and insists that a win isn’t necessary to remain competitive.
“I have been consistent,” she said Sunday. “In Iowa, I wanted to be strong. We did that. We started at 2%. We ended at 20%. In New Hampshire, I want to be even stronger than that. And in South Carolina, I want to be even stronger than that. We’ll find out what strong and stronger is on Election Day, but that’s always been the goal.”
Exactly what “stronger” means remains undefined, but her campaign says it’s the votes that will matter.
“So far, only one state has voted,” Haley’s campaign said in a statement. “Half of its votes went to Donald Trump, and half did not. We’re not a country of coronations. Voters deserve a say in whether we go down the road of Trump and Biden again, or we go down a new conservative road.”
Trump is working to squeeze out his last primary opponent. He appeared at his Saturday night rally with a team of South Carolina officials, including Gov. Henry McMaster (R-SC), who endorsed Trump instead of their home state choice. He’s spent the eve of the primary campaigning with his former rival Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) and earned the endorsement of Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC).
He has also attacked Haley by calling her a “RINO,” or a “Republican in name only,” who is pro-amnesty and pro-China.
“Trump is going to dominate tomorrow night, and the primary will be over,” New Hampshire-based political strategist David Carney predicted on Monday. “There’s nobody really bleeding off Trump votes to make it more of a competitive race. Trump has a superior message and a superior organization.”
While Trump has the endorsement of elected South Carolinians, Haley has Gov. Chris Sununu (R-NH) on her side acting as a sort of attack dog at her campaign events.
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“If you think Donald Trump is a threat to democracy, don’t sit on your couch and not participate. You gotta go vote,” Sununu said to voters on Friday night. “Did you know since 2016, here in New Hampshire, [in] federal races, Republicans are 0 for 11 with Donald Trump at the top? I am sick of that.”
“We are tired of losers. We’re tired of Donald Trump,” he added.
