Why Haley focuses on long game, despite Trump’s South Carolina lead

At a series of campaign stops for Nikki Haley ahead of Saturday’s South Carolina primary, voters gush about the Republican presidential hopeful. They praise her foreign policy experience and her calm demeanor in handling former President Donald Trump’s attacks. They point out approvingly that she’s not an octogenarian. They say it’s past time the United States elected its first female president. 

What they do not say, however, is that they believe Ms. Haley can win. 

“I don’t know that anyone thinks she’s going to win the state,” says Bev Denny, a campaign volunteer wearing various NIKKI stickers and pins, as she waits to see Ms. Haley speak in a park in Irmo. “[But] she doesn’t have to win our state to continue running.”

In a normal presidential election cycle, this would probably be a campaign declared dead. Ms. Haley came in third in Iowa, lost by double digits to Mr. Trump in New Hampshire, and suffered an embarrassing symbolic defeat in Nevada’s primary, where she came in second behind “None of these candidates.” (Mr. Trump was not on the ballot, running instead in the state’s GOP caucus.)

Now the South Carolina native, who served in the state Legislature and was twice elected governor, is facing the prospect of a resounding defeat in her home state, where polls show her trailing Mr. Trump by 20 to 40 points. Nevertheless, she’s already shrugging it off, insisting she’s in the race for the long haul.

“Dropping out would be the easy route,” the former ambassador to the United Nations said in a recent campaign speech, noting that another 21 states and territories will vote over the next 10 days. “I’ve never taken the easy route.”  

And in this highly unusual and unpredictable campaign season, some say Ms. Haley actually has good reasons to keep her candidacy going. They range from a controversial front-runner whose legal woes present a potential threat to his campaign, to Ms. Haley’s success in raising money, to a political environment in which many voters say they’re hungry for candidates other than the two major-party front-runners. 

“Political rules hit the fan as soon as Donald Trump got into the race,” says Dave Wilson, a South Carolina GOP strategist. “If you’re the backup quarterback and something happens, guess who the coach is going to put into the game?”

The most obvious reason for Ms. Haley to keep running is Mr. Trump’s legal situation. The former president is facing 91 criminal counts in multiple jurisdictions, with his first criminal trial scheduled to start next month in New York. Recent civil suits against him have already resulted in awards of more than $400 million, a serious blow to his personal finances. And lawyers’ fees are absorbing more and more of his campaign cash.

So far, Mr. Trump’s legal woes have generally worked to his advantage with Republican primary voters, many of whom believe he is being treated unfairly. But polls also indicate that a small but consistent percentage would be less likely to support him were he to be convicted. And even Mr. Trump’s staunchest defenders might have second thoughts about his ability to win the general election in the wake of a criminal conviction.

Given all the “what ifs,” many Haley supporters agree she’d be foolish to end her bid before a win became mathematically impossible. Even after that, they say, the party may need a Plan B.

“I still think something is going to happen where Trump is not going to be able to run,” says Greg Ayers, a financial adviser in Rock Hill, as he waits to hear Ms. Haley speak in a ballroom near his home. 

Financially, Ms. Haley has more than enough resources to hang around for a while. Her campaign brought in $9.8 million in contributions in January, $1 million more than Mr. Trump’s (though her campaign cash on hand is still less than half of his).

“As long as there are donors who are willing to put gas in the tank of Nikki Haley, she is going to keep going,” says Mr. Wilson. “Politics today is a money game.”

Many of those donors are establishment Republicans and independent voters who dislike both Mr. Trump and President Joe Biden – an environment that some observers suggest could create an opening for a third-party run.

Ms. Haley has flatly ruled out running on a third-party ticket, and many states have “sore loser laws” that prevent a failed primary candidate from mounting such a bid. But she might find herself tempted once the GOP nomination window formally closes, if voters are still clamoring for another choice. 

More realistically, strategists say, Ms. Haley is probably thinking about 2028. If Mr. Trump wins the GOP nomination this year and then loses the White House again, Republican voters may start looking for the kind of political reset that Ms. Haley has been pitching – and would be positioned to lead.  

Lately on the campaign trail, Ms. Haley has leaned into attacking Mr. Trump in ways she previously had avoided. 

In Rock Hill, she criticized the former president for using campaign contributions to pay for his personal legal bills (to boos from the crowd). Outside a retirement community in Fort Mill, she told supporters that Mr. Trump would fail to protect the “success story” that is NATO and would “side with a thug who kills his political opponents,” referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s alleged killing of dissident Alexei Navalny. Speaking to several hundred voters in Irmo, Ms. Haley reminded them of Mr. Trump’s record at the ballot box, saying, “Everything he touches, he loses.”

At every stop in South Carolina, a state with one of the highest shares of both active duty military and veterans, Ms. Haley brought up Mr. Trump’s disparaging comments about the whereabouts of her husband, Michael, who is currently deployed. 

“She’s finally taking a stand on [Trump], and I hope it brings more undecideds to her,” says Maria, a two-time Trump voter and part-time medical tech from Fort Mill, who declined to give her last name. “But I wish she’d done it sooner.”

Others say they understand why Ms. Haley waited to attack the man so far ahead of her in the polls. 

“There were so many people running in the early primary season. And, I mean, Chris Christie was [attacking Mr. Trump], and where did that get him?” says Jonathan Taylor, a Haley supporter from York, referring to the former New Jersey governor whose campaign never gained traction. “Whether she should have started earlier – I don’t know if it would have been heard. But now she’s a clear, singular voice.”

Despite the growing likelihood of a third Trump GOP nomination, Mr. Taylor credits Ms. Haley’s campaign with providing voters like him at least a glimmer of possibility – which, for now, is something.

“I’ve never been so discouraged in a political season in my life,” says Mr. Taylor. “I’ve voted Republican all my life, and I’m done with the Republican Party. Except she gives me hope.”