by Nikki Haley walked into a seafood shack in Seabrook, NH, on Sunday afternoon with some news for the crowd: Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida, was no longer running for president.
“We just learned that Ron DeSantis dropped out of the race,” Haley, the former governor of South Carolina, said to applause from the several dozen attendees. “And I want to tell Ron that he had a great career, he has been a good governor and we wish him the best.”
“That being said, there is now one guy and one lady left,” he continued, raising two fingers, to more applause. And he added: “For now I leave you with this: may the best one win.”
Haley and her allies have long tried to frame the presidential race between her and former President Donald J. Trump, even when she finished third in the Iowa caucuses. With DeSantis now out of the race, that argument became much more salient. , although recent polling averages put her 15 percentage points behind Trump in New Hampshire.
He expanded on that argument in a statement issued by his campaign, in which he noted that “only one state has voted” and that “half of its votes were for Donald Trump and the other half were not.” (Trump received 51 percent of the vote in the Iowa caucuses.)
“Voters deserve a say in whether we go back down the path of Trump and Biden or down a new conservative path,” Haley said in the statement. “New Hampshire voters will weigh in Tuesday”.
Ms. Haley also pledged to stay in the race through the South Carolina primary and Super Tuesday on March 5, regardless of what happens in the New Hampshire primary on Tuesday.
Instead of making comments at Seabrook, as she has at recent retail stops, Haley went straight to taking selfies and talking one-on-one with her followers, a little victory lap of sorts.
Speaking with CNN’s Dana Bash after the event, Haley escalated her attacks on Trump, whom she has hit harder in recent days, as well as President Biden. She said they were “equally bad” for the country.
“If any of them were good, I wouldn’t run,” he added.
Haley told CNN that DeSantis, who endorsed Trump in his announcement to leave the race, had not called her to inform her of his departure.
He also said that Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina did not tell him he was endorsing Trump earlier this week, although Scott told CNN that he had texted him the day before endorsing Trump. “He didn’t tell me he was going to do this,” Ms. Haley said.
