Trump rejects the plan to nominate him as a Republican Party candidate without a fight

New Hampshire: Two days after winning the New Hampshire primary, Donald Trump was in a Manhattan courtroom on Friday (AEDT) to testify in his defense of E.T. Jane Carroll, the woman who is suing him for sexual assault and defamation.

He was unusually obedient and spent less than five minutes answering his lawyer's questions. He stuck to his previous statements in which he called Carroll a liar — “100 percent yes” — and did not turn the hearing into a circus, as Carroll's lawyers feared.

On the same day, he also turned down the opportunity to become the presumptive Republican Party nominee without a fight. The Republican National Committee, which oversees the party's elections, was scheduled to consider a proposal to announce his selection before he officially received the required number of delegates.

Trump ally David Bossie was behind a draft resolution by his fellow RNC committee members that could have been voted on next week at the group's winter meeting in Las Vegas.

But Trump took to his social media site to stop it: “I feel, for the sake of party unity, that they should not go ahead with this plan, but I should do it the 'old' way, and finish the process.” “Out of the ballot box,” he wrote.

And it seems like the only fight he really cares about right now is the fight against his former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley for the 2024 presidential nomination.

While any other presidential candidate might have collapsed under the weight of as many legal challenges — he faces 91 criminal charges as well as civil lawsuits — Trump has used it as political capital for everyone, as he solidifies himself as a candidate to run again for the White House against Joe Biden. .

“He's clearly the candidate to beat, and as long as he's healthy, there's not much anyone can do about it,” says veteran election analyst Larry Sabato.

“This was all expected because the Republican Party has changed so much. This is no longer your father's or grandfather's Republican Party. “It's Donald Trump.”

But while the results in New Hampshire and Iowa were a huge boost for the Republican Party, they also carried ominous signs that made his candidacy a great danger to his party.

In both states, Trump won a much larger share of the vote than he did in 2016, when he faced Republican voters for the first time.

But Trump also risks losing enough Republicans – as well as a large percentage of independent and swing voters – that he would dampen his chances in the general election in November.

According to an AP VoteCast survey of primary voters, 21% of Republicans who cast ballots in New Hampshire said they would be so dissatisfied with Trump as a candidate that they would not vote for him.

Likewise, 15% of Republicans who participated in the Iowa caucuses last week shared the same opinion, which revealed weaknesses in Trump's ability to lead Republicans to victory.

For his part, Biden also faces major challenges. Four years ago, as America reeled from the COVID-19 pandemic and a national reckoning over racial injustice after the death of George Floyd, the Democratic strongman was widely viewed as the best man to heal a deeply divided nation.

But today he faces unprecedented low approval ratings and deep doubts about his ability to do the job. The crisis on the US-Mexico border, cost-of-living pressures, and his support for Israel in its war in Gaza have eroded support among his traditional coalition: young people, black voters, Latinos and progressives.

His greatest weakness is something he cannot control: his age. At 81, Biden is the oldest person to hold the Oval Office. If he wins the election, he will be 82 years old by the day of his inauguration, and 86 years old by the end of his second term – if he makes it that far. Trump is 77 years old.

“Things are bound to get worse, especially if you have a demanding life, as Biden certainly did,” says Sabato, founder and director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia.

“So he has to address the age issue. It's inevitable.

There is no escape from the fact that America is now 284 days away from return elections, which the vast majority of its citizens do not actually want.

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A Reuters/Ipsos poll published this week showed Trump leading Biden 40 percent to 34 percent, but most respondents were either unsure who to prefer, planned to vote for someone else, or would not show up at the polls. Absolutely.

This was consistent with the mood among New Hampshire voters this week.

In Salem, Terri Taylor, a registered Republican, wanted Haley to be the party's presidential nominee, citing her “quiet nature,” foreign policy experience and background as an accountant and two-term governor of South Carolina.

But she added that she hates Trump so much that if he gets the Republican nomination, she will likely vote for Biden instead, albeit reluctantly.

“I don’t understand his popularity,” she said of the support the former president enjoys among his base. “It's like a cult.”

In the state capital, Concord, registered Democrat Chris Mack said she did not trust Biden and used this week's primary race to vote instead for his distant rival for the presidential nomination, Minnesota Congressman Dean Phillips.

“He's made quite a few blunders, and his age is certainly an issue,” she said of Biden. “He's shown weakness at times. Most of all, I don't think he can beat Trump — and that scares me.”

Meanwhile, about 50 minutes south in the town of Windham, 72-year-old Benjamin Grill said he would definitely support Trump, just as he did in 2016 and 2020, citing the economy and border security as his top priorities.

“But I have no doubt that he is a bad man,” he added.

The lack of enthusiasm for a rematch between Trump and Biden is exactly what Haley is counting on to stay in the race.

She set the tone shortly after Trump was declared the winner of the New Hampshire Republican primary with more than 54 percent of the vote — about 11 points more than Haley.

In a speech that angered Trump, Haley insisted that she would continue to fight for the nomination, starting with the South Carolina primary on February 24.

The next day, she returned to her home state for a rally in North Charleston, and embarked on an ad campaign targeting Trump as “too much of a mess” and Biden as “too big.”

“There's a better choice for a better America,” says one of the ad's narrators.

But Haley faces an uphill battle over the next month to maintain her momentum – and, more importantly, the support of donors whose money she needs to keep her campaign alive.

She has lost two of those major voters since her defeat in New Hampshire — metals tycoon Andy Sabin, who said the race is essentially over, and Reid Hoffman, the billionaire co-founder of LinkedIn, Reuters reported. But according to New York timesIt has raised about $5 million more than Trump — $50.1 million ($76 million) in the final six months of 2023 — with the help of Wall Street and corporate executives keen for Trump not to return to the Oval Office.

But she trails Trump by 30 points in her home state, and an overwhelming majority of Republican leaders have rallied around him. Most notable is South Carolina Senator and former presidential candidate Tim Scott, whom Haley appointed to Congress while she was governor, and whose endorsement she was seeking.

Moreover, Trump's vitriol and bullying are likely to worsen. And in the past few weeks alone, Hailey's first name, “Nimarata” Nikki Randhawa, has often been cited as a dog whistle to remind people that she is the daughter of Indian immigrants.

He refers to her as “Bird Brain” to insult her intelligence, falsely claims that she wants open borders and plans to cut Social Security and Medicare benefits for most Americans.

This week, he even published a post on Truth Social warning that anyone who contributes to her campaign will be “permanently banned from the MAGA camp.”

“We do not want them, and we will not accept them,” he wrote.

Haley, at least for now, appears undeterred. In any case, only two states voted for their preferred presidential candidate, she says, and there are 48 other candidates.

“So we're not going to sit there and give up,” she says.

“Bring it, Donald.”

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