The Georgia primary election that happened earlier this week could be a bad omen for presumptive GOP nominee Donald Trump — not only in Georgia but in some other key battleground states.
Despite dropping out of the presidential race a week before, former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley still picked up more than 77,000 votes in the Peach State.
In total, Haley received 77,761 votes, or roughly 13.2% of the state’s total, Decision Desk HQ numbers show. That happened even though Haley dropped out following Super Tuesday, when Trump captured 14 of the 15 states that held a primary election that day.
Georgia was still an easy win for Trump, who garnered 84.5% of the Republican vote. Haley’s vote total could serve as a warning sign for his campaign, though, as those people who voted for Haley could end up siding with President Joe Biden come November.
On the same day that Trump secured enough delegates to win the GOP nomination, Biden did the same in the Democratic Party — all but officially setting up the head-to-head rematch between the two in eight months.
Following Tuesday’s vote in Georgia, Trump’s campaign took to the social media platform X to celebrate, posting a video in which Trump said:
“It’s your favorite president speaking to you on a really great day of victory. One week ago, we had something called Super Tuesday and it was indeed super, because we won at numbers that nobody has ever seen before, records in virtually every state.”
But, the fact that Haley won so many votes — and actually a few delegates — in Georgia overshadowed the night for Trump. It’s something that was foreshadowed from exit polls that were taken on Super Tuesday.
In Virginia, North Carolina and California, for instance, anywhere from 80% to 95% of people who voted for Haley said they’d be “dissatisfied” if Trump ended up winning the GOP nomination.
In early March, Emerson College conducted a survey that found that 63% of people who supported Haley actually preferred BIden over Trump in a head-to-head matchup, compared to just 27% who said they preferred Trump.
That’s not altogether surprising, as many Haley backers don’t even really consider themselves to be Republican. Only about half of people who voted for her identify as Republicans, with most saying they were independents, according to data from exit polls.
That has played out in the primary election thus far. Trump has had great success in the GOP primary, crushing the competition in just about every state that has held a primary thus far.
That success won’t necessarily carry over to the General Election in November, though, especially in the key battleground swing states that are likely to decide who wins the White House.
Georgia is one of those states, and if Trump isn’t able to convince enough people who don’t consider themselves staunch Republicans — or even staunch Trumpers — then he could end up struggling against Biden.
