Former President Donald J. Trump is poised to win in Saturday’s Republican presidential primary in South Carolina, where he squares off against Nikki Haley, the former governor of the Palmetto State.
According to the latest polls from aggregator FiveThirtyEight, Trump holds a commanding lead, clocking in at 61.6 percent to Haley’s 33.1 percent.
While Haley spent last week on a bus tour of her home state trying to drum up votes, even from Democrats, Trump spent a day in Michigan, the next state to host a Republican presidential primary.
The former president rallied last Saturday in Waterford Township, blasting his political foes and what he says are politically charged civil and criminal court cases.
The day before the rally, he was ordered to pay $355 million by a New York judge for what the court says was fraudulent activities related to his business dealings in the state.
“That decision yesterday in New York, you may have read about it. Crooked judge. Crooked judge,” Trump said at the rally. “The case is a complete and total sham. It’s a sham case.”
Trump has been operating his real estate business in New York City since the 1980s without ever being charged with fraud, civilly or criminally.
He also blasted Fulton County, Georgia, District Attorney Fani Willis, who is attempting to prosecute Trump and 18 others on alleged racketeering charges in relation to the outcome of the 2020 election.
Willis is facing trouble herself, as an ethics complaint claims she used $700,000 in taxpayer money to pay fellow attorney Nathan Wade to help prosecute Trump while maintaining a personal relationship with Wade. Trump’s attorneys claim that Willis and Wade’s relationship predates their $700,000 contract, which they say is a conflict of interest.
“These people. They’re not looking for justice,” Trump said at the Michigan rally. “They only care about how to stop crooked Joe Biden’s political opponent. That’s me.”
Trump is crushing Haley in the polls for the Tuesday Michigan primary, too.
According to FiveThirtyEight, he leads by an even larger margin than he does in South Carolina, 79.9 percent to Haley’s 18 percent.
A defiant Haley has vowed to remain in the race.
“Some of you — perhaps a few of you in the media — came here today to see if I’m dropping out of the race. Well, I’m not. Far from it, and I’m here to tell you why,” Nimrata “Nikki” Haley said at a campaign stop in Greenville on Tuesday. “I’m running for President because we have a country to save. Since the star of my campaign, I’ve been focused on the real issues our country faces. The ones that determine whether America will thrive or spiral out.”
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Pete D’Abrosca is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Follow Pete on Twitter/X.
Photo “Nikki Haley” by Gage Skidmore. CC BY-SA 2.0. Background Photo “Voting Booths” by Tim Evanson. CC BY-SA 2.0.
