by Alexandra Ulmer, Gram Slattery and Nathan Layne
COLUMBIA, South Carolina (Reuters) – Donald Trump easily won the Republican primary in the southeastern US state of South Carolina on Saturday, according to projections from Edison Research, strengthening still his status as favorite for the Party nomination for the presidential election next November.
Although Nikki Haley, the former president’s only national opponent, served as governor of South Carolina between 2011 and 2017, it was Donald Trump who was favored to win the state’s election. .
“I have, until now, never seen the Republican Party so united,” declared Donald Trump in a speech delivered to his supporters a few minutes after the closing of the polls and in which Nikki Haley was not mentioned.
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Already an easy winner in previous elections, Donald Trump was in the lead in the polls for the primary in South Carolina, even though he is the target of several legal proceedings.
This result should further strengthen calls from some Republicans, who are asking Nikki Haley to withdraw her candidacy and thus allow the party to rally around Donald Trump.
According to the Edison Research institute, Donald Trump is credited with 59.7% of the votes and Nikki Haley with 39.7% after the counting of almost half of the ballots.
The former United States ambassador to the United Nations reaffirmed Saturday that she would maintain her candidacy at least until “Super Tuesday”, which will see Republican voters vote on the same day in 15 states and one territory.
“We must beat Joe Biden in November,” she told her supporters, gathered in the city of Charleston, after the announcement of Donald Trump’s victory. “I don’t think Donald Trump can beat Joe Biden.”
Nikki Haley argued that her result showed the former president still made many Republicans uncomfortable.
However, there is no evidence that Republican voters are interested in a candidate other than the former tenant of the White House to wear their Republican colors in the presidential election.
An exit poll conducted by Edison Research shows that many voters who participated in the Republican primary in South Carolina on Saturday are concerned about the issues of immigration, a subject that Donald Trump has made at the center of his campaign, and the economy.
Nearly a third of them, however, believed that Donald Trump would be unfit to serve if convicted, according to Edison Research.
Donald Trump is scheduled to appear in a criminal trial in New York on March 25. He is mainly accused of having violated electoral laws by having falsified commercial documents before the 2016 presidential election to conceal the payment of 130,000 dollars to Stormy Daniels in order to buy the silence of the former pornographic film actress, who claimed having had an affair with him a decade earlier.
(With contributions from Tim Reid, written by Joseph Ax and Helen Coster; French version Camille Raynaud)
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