Nikki Haley has beaten Donald Trump in Vermont’s Republican primary in a close fight that came down to the wire, a surprise on what was otherwise a dominant Super Tuesday for the front-runner in which he is projected to have won more than a dozen primaries, including such large states as California and Texas.
Declaring victory at his Mar-a-Lago home in Florida on Tuesday night, Mr Trump said: “They call it Super Tuesday for a reason. This is a big one.
“They tell me the pundits and otherwise that there’s never been one like this… has never been anything so conclusive.”
As it stands, Mr Trump looks all but certain to be the Republican Party’s presidential candidate having already chalked up big wins in Iowa, the US Virgin Islands, North Dakota, New Hampshire, Nevada, South Carolina, Michigan, Idaho, and Missouri.
Despite adding to her win on Washington DC on Sunday, Ms Haley is widely expected to drop out imminently.
President Joe Biden also dominated the Democratic race as expected but there was an upset in the US territory of American Samoa, where he was beaten by little-known entrepreneur Jason Palmer.
Fellow Democrat Adam Schiff was also targeted by protesters on the issue as he gave his victory speech in California – and handled it pretty well, all things considered.
Voices: ‘I wrote the Nikki Haley campaign song being trashed all over the internet. How embarrassing’
“As a white, middle-aged, gay New York musician, my voting record is very liberal. The only time I’ve ever voted for a Republican candidate was for New York City mayor Rudi Giuliani. We have all seen how that turned out,” writes Larry Dvoskin for Indy Voices.
“So, when legendary investor Tim Draper asked me to write a song to his lyrics in support of Republican Nikki Haley’s presidential run, I hesitated. Tim, a libertarian iconoclast in the field of finance, was one of the first investors in Hotmail, Twitch, Skype, Coinbase, and even Tesla before Elon Musk. He helped launch companies that are now worth over ten billion dollars. In other words, he has a good track record of knowing what he’s talking about.
“As we all know, Nikki Haley is a fighter and she didn’t fold to Trump like all the other candidates. People who have directly opposed Trump for any reason run a great political risk.
“I didn’t know much about Nikki Haley when the request came through — just that she was the former US Ambassador to the United Nations under Trump, and her husband is a major in the National Guard. But I felt strongly that it was good for someone to stand up to Trump, especially a female candidate of color. I also have my own reservations, like many voters from both political parties, about re-electing older past presidents like Biden and Trump. We need younger leaders and a fresh start to bridge the divides in this country.”
