Daily Archives: January 25, 2024

Arizona Republican U.S. senate candidate Kari Lake, arrives for an evening rally with Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump, during the New Hampshire Republican presidential primary on Tuesday. David Goldman/AP hide caption

Arizona Republican U.S. senate candidate Kari Lake, arrives for an evening rally with Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump, during the New Hampshire Republican presidential primary on Tuesday.

The head of the Arizona Republican Party resigned Wednesday following the release of a surreptitiously recorded conversation of him seemingly trying to bribe Kari Lake to stay out of this year's U.S. Senate race.

A 10-minute audio recording, published by the Daily Mail of London on Tuesday, revealed a conversation between Lake, a Trump loyalist who unsuccessfully ran for governor of Arizona in 2022, and Arizona Republican Party Chair Jeff DeWit. In it, DeWit appears to offers Lake various deals to be put on a company payroll, or financial compensation in exchange for taking "a pause for a couple of years" from running for public office.

"There are very powerful people who want to keep you out, and what they're willing to do is put their money where their mouth is in a big way," DeWit said.

It's not illegal, or unheard of, for top party officials to attempt to clear the field of unfavorable candidates in order to pave the way for a preferred alternative. In the audio recording, DeWit raised concerns about Lake's ability to fundraise enough money to win the U.S. Senate race, as well as former President Donald Trump's ability to win another election and by association, Lake's own electability.

"I'm not even sure Trump can win again," DeWit said. "I don't know that he can win."

But DeWit also appeared well aware of the optics of attempting to buy off Lake, a MAGA firebrand with a national profile. In the recording, he repeatedly cast himself as a messenger for powerful people "back East" and asked for Lake's discretion.

"This conversation never happened," DeWit said.

"If you say no, which is fine, it's your choice, don't tell people," he added.

In this file photo, former Arizona State Treasurer Jeff DeWit steps into an elevator at Trump Tower on Nov. 15, 2016, in New York. Arizona Republicans selected DeWit to be the party's chairman in 2023. On Wednesday, he resigned amid a seeming bribery scandal with Republican U.S. senate candidate Kari Lake. Carolyn Kaster/AP hide caption

In this file photo, former Arizona State Treasurer Jeff DeWit steps into an elevator at Trump Tower on Nov. 15, 2016, in New York. Arizona Republicans selected DeWit to be the party's chairman in 2023. On Wednesday, he resigned amid a seeming bribery scandal with Republican U.S. senate candidate Kari Lake.

In a statement released Wednesday, DeWit accused Lake of being the Daily Mail's unidentified source. He denied he attempted to bribe Lake, and instead characterized the conversation as "an open, unguarded exchange between friends" that Lake recorded in a violation of his trust.

DeWit also said the audio recording provided to the Daily Mail was "selectively edited." By his own characterization, DeWit was advising Lake to postpone her U.S. Senate campaign and instead focus on running for governor again in 2026.

"It was a suggestion made in good faith, believing it could benefit both her future prospects and the party's overall strategy," DeWit said. "The release of our conversation by Lake confirms a disturbing tendency to exploit private interactions for personal gain."

DeWit went on to raise concerns that Lake may have a trove of secret recordings from conversations with other GOP officials, including Trump.

In this file photo from 2022, then-Arizona Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake, right, speaks as former President Donald Trump listens during a rally in Oct. 2022, in Mesa, Ariz. Matt York/AP hide caption

In this file photo from 2022, then-Arizona Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake, right, speaks as former President Donald Trump listens during a rally in Oct. 2022, in Mesa, Ariz.

"I question how effective a United States Senator can be when they cannot be trusted to engage in private and confidential conversations," he said.

Lake made it clear she has more recordings of conversations with DeWit in his statement, DeWit said Lake issued an ultimatum for him to resign Wednesday or "face the release of new, more damaging recordings."

A spokesperson for Lake's U.S. Senate campaign could not immediately be reached for comment. Lake, who has denied that she was the Daily Mail's source, publicly called for DeWit's resignation on Tuesday, telling KTAR that the audio was "reprehensible."

The leak of the conversation, which the Daily Mail reported took place in March 2023, comes ahead of a crucial juncture for the Arizona Republican Party. Trump will headline a fundraising rally for the Arizona GOP on Friday, the eve of the party's annual organizing meeting on Saturday.

The party will now have to choose a successor for DeWit, whose tenure as party chair has been marred by financial struggles following repeated statewide losses for the Republican Party under the previous chair, Kelli Ward.

Lake is the leading candidate to win the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate in Arizona, having already secured Trump's endorsement when she announced her candidacy last fall. Democratic Congressman Ruben Gallego is vying for his own party's nomination, while it remains unclear if incumbent Sen. Krysten Sinema a former Democrat turned independent will run for reelection.

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Kari Lake is running for U.S. Senate from Arizona. The AZGOP tried to stop her. - NPR

Former President Donald Trump acknowledges supporters at the end of a campaign rally on Jan. 14 in Concord, N.H. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images hide caption

Former President Donald Trump acknowledges supporters at the end of a campaign rally on Jan. 14 in Concord, N.H.

MANCHESTER, N.H. When New Hampshire voters head to the polls Tuesday, they will not only be picking a nominee.

Their choice between former President Donald Trump and his former U.N. ambassador, Nikki Haley, will also send a big signal about their feelings on the future of the party.

Luke Rose, a 26-year-old casino dealer, was bowling with co-workers at Yankee Lanes, a downtown Manchester bowling alley. Between turns, he described the way he views the conflict as being between what he calls the "MAGA idealism" of Trump and traditional conservative values of Haley.

He's convinced Trump's way will win out.

"The message that will be sent [on Tuesday] is that Trump has officially been chosen. He's the one," Rose predicted. "And beyond that, we have to prepare ourselves, whether we like it or not, for a MAGA America or a Biden America."

Luke Rose, 26, spends evening bowling with some friends in Manchester, NH on Jan. 21, 2024. Franco Ordoez /National Public Radio hide caption

Luke Rose, 26, spends evening bowling with some friends in Manchester, NH on Jan. 21, 2024.

The tightening race has thrown a spotlight on the identity crisis within the Republican party and the debate between populism and small-government conservatism.

Ever since Donald Trump rode down the escalator in Trump Tower, the Republican party has been struggling to figure out what it stood for.

The more establishment, anti-Trump, forces within the party have long been clamoring for this choice, said Alex Conant, who helped lead Senator Marco Rubio's presidential campaign in 2016.

The choice is between Trump who is the embodiment of the new wave of conservative populism and Haley who more represents the limited government wing of the party that also supports strong foreign policy.

Conant acknowledges the party has already moved so far away from its traditional values since Trump's rise.

"The New Hampshire primary is the last hurdle for Donald Trump to demonstrate that the Republican Party is a populist party now," Conant said. "And that the limited government, traditional conservatives that Nikki Haley represents do not have any real power within the party."

Former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley speaks to potential voters during a campaign stop in Hooksett, New Hampshire. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images hide caption

Former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley speaks to potential voters during a campaign stop in Hooksett, New Hampshire.

The Trump campaign says there was never any doubt whose party it is.

Jason Miller, a senior advisor on the campaign says Trump has not only unified the base behind him, but he's also brought in new coalition of voters and expanded the party.

"What President Trump has done to show that the populism and working class Americans now side with the Republican Party," Miller said.

Phil Palker says he's one of those Americans. The 59-year-transportation worker, and former Coast Guard navigator, says Trump changed the party and he evolved with the former president.

Trump connects with voters like him in a way that no other politicians have before, Palker said.

"You know, I was pretty stagnant Republican," he said. "But ever since Donald Trump started running in 2015, I think his message is revealing to who the party is."

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NH primary plays outsized role in determining future of the Republican Party - NPR

After former President Trump secured a win in the GOP primary in New Hampshire on Tuesday night, President Biden set his sights on a 2020 presidential rematch.

“It is now clear that Donald Trump will be the Republican nominee. And my message to the country is the stakes could not be higher. Our Democracy. Our personal freedoms — from the right to choose to the right to vote. Our economy — which has seen the strongest recovery in the world since COVID. All are at stake,” Biden said in a Tuesday message to voters.

While Biden didn’t appear on the ballot in the Granite State, he nonetheless won the Democratic primary, with more than half of the state’s voters writing in his name on their ballots. He thanked voters for the “historic demonstration” of commitment to democracy and urged independent voters and Republicans to “join us as Americans.”

“Let’s remember. We are the United States of America. And there is nothing — nothing — we can’t do if we do it together,” Biden’s message said.

The Hill/Decision Desk HQ called the GOP race in Trump’s favor just after polls closed around 8 p.m. local time. With more than 170,000 votes pledged to him, Trump earned 54.6 percent support, beating out the only remaining GOP challenger, Nikki Haley, who earned 43.4 percent support.

Following his win, the Trump campaign emailed a statement that claimed “this race is over!” He thanked voters for their support throughout “every single witch hunt, raid, indictment and arrest.” In a celebratory speech after his win, Trump mocked Haley for her post-primary speech in which she said the race wasn’t over yet.

In an interview with Fox News Digital, Trump urged the former South Carolina governor to suspend her campaign, because if she stays in, “We have to keep wasting money instead of spending on Biden.”

Despite losing to Trump in both Iowa and New Hampshire, Haley said she wasn’t giving up yet.

“New Hampshire is first in the nation. It is not the last in the nation,” she said Tuesday. “This race is far from over. There are dozens of states left to go.”

According to national polling averages, Trump has a 1.3-percent lead over Biden in a hypothetical general election match-up.

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Biden: Its clear Trump will be Republican nominee - The Hill

Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina, on Tuesday defied calls to drop out of the race for the Republican nomination, vowing to fight on after a second straight defeat at the hands of former President Donald J. Trump.

In rousing remarks, Ms. Haley painted a picture of a country and a world in disarray, casting herself as the choice for voters dissatisfied with both President Biden and Mr. Trump. She set up an epic showdown with Mr. Trump in South Carolina, where she is lagging far behind Mr. Trump in polls despite a home-state advantage.

New Hampshire is first in the nation it is not the last in the nation, she said as a loud wave of cheers and applause broke out across the room. She added that the race was far from over.

She added, Were going home to South Carolina.

Borrowing signature lines from her stump speeches, Ms. Haley, a United Nations ambassador under Mr. Trump, noted how far she had come since the race opened, when she was polling at just over 2 percent. She congratulated Mr. Trump on what she described as a well-earned victory and declared that politics was not personal to her, but she also called herself a fighter.

And Im scrappy and now were the last ones standing next to Donald Trump, she added. Painting herself as an outsider, despite her insider rsum, she pledged to take on Mr. Trump and the political class behind him. She also took shots at the media, who she said saw his glide to the nomination as a foregone conclusion.

With the new urgency she has been flashing on the trail in the past week, Ms. Haley turned up the heat on the former president, the dominant front-runner in the Republican race, who is fighting 91 felony charges. Another Trump presidency would be just as bad for the country as another four years of Mr. Biden, she said.

She also took another dig at Mr. Trumps mental fitness and his 77 years of age, reminding voters how he had confused her for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and accused her of not providing security at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Someone in her rambunctious audience, which occasionally shouted encouraging interruptions, yelled, Geriatric!

With Donald Trump, you have one bout of chaos after another, she said. This court case, that controversy, this tweet, that senior moment. You cant fix Joe Bidens chaos with Republican chaos.

In her final Granite State appearances before polls closed, Ms. Haley had rejected the suggestion that Republican voters had already solidly united behind the former president, and pledged not to end her bid no matter the result.

I didnt get here because of luck, she said at a polling site in Hampton, N.H., while flanked by supporters, including Gov. Chris Sununu, her top surrogate in the state. I got here because I outworked and outsmarted all the rest of those fellas. So Im running against Donald Trump, and Im not going to talk about an obituary.

Mr. Trump, speaking to supporters at his victory party, mocked Ms. Haley for speaking like she won. But she didnt win she lost, he added.

On Wednesday morning, Ms. Haley is expected to speak during a Republican State Committee meeting in the Virgin Islands, which holds its contest on Feb. 8. She is then anticipated at a homecoming rally in Charleston, S.C., where her campaign has its headquarters.

A number of people close to Ms. Haley are encouraging her to keep going, many of whom are deeply opposed to Mr. Trumps becoming the nominee again.

Betsy Ankney, her campaign manager, released a memo early Tuesday morning shooting down suggestions that Mr. Trumps path to the nomination was inevitable. She pointed to the 11 of the 16 states that vote on Super Tuesday that have open or semi-open primaries that can include independent voters and are fertile ground for Nikki. Rushing through the departing crowds on Tuesday, Ms. Ankney said the campaign had also already assembled more staff members in place, though she declined to discuss further details.

Nevada will host a Republican caucus on Feb. 8, but Ms. Haley is not competing in that contest, instead participating in a Republican primary in the state two days earlier that awards no delegates.

Her campaign has bought over $1 million in television advertising from Tuesday through Feb. 6 in South Carolina, according to AdImpact, a media-tracking firm. It is part of what the campaign has announced will be a $4 million ad buy in the state.

And officials at her allied super PAC, Stand for America, said they, too, planned to forge ahead.

Mark Harris, the lead strategist for the PAC, said it was prepping television, mail and digital advertising in a get-out-the-vote effort that would look similar to the programs it had taken on in Iowa and New Hampshire, though as of Tuesday it had not yet made those investments.

Were running the outsider candidacy, so this was never going to happen all magically in one day, and so were going to keep pushing ahead, Mr. Harris said.

Since the summer, Ms. Haley has predicted that the Republican nominating contest would result in a showdown between her and Mr. Trump in her home state. Her outward confidence in that scenario has not faltered not after she failed to place second in Iowa, not after her top rival for No. 2, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, dropped out and endorsed Mr. Trump, not after a slate of South Carolina legislators this week joined Mr. Trump on the stump in the final days of the New Hampshire race.

Her message to his allies and the news media: She has been here before.

I won South Carolina twice as governor, she told reporters Friday at a retro diner in Amherst. I think I know what favorable territory is in South Carolina.

But it has been 10 years since she was last on the ballot, and her state and her party have changed. Mr. Trump has solidified a loyal base there since he won South Carolina in the 2016 Republican primary over Ms. Haleys endorsement of his opponent, Senator Marco Rubio of Florida. Although Ms. Haleys affluent and more moderate Republican base along the coast and in Charleston remains intact, her grip on the Midlands has loosened. In the more conservative Upstate around Greenville, she is likely to have an even steeper uphill climb.

The daunting path ahead did not damp the enthusiasm among her supporters who gathered at her election watch party Tuesday at a hotel in Concord. Many were not from New Hampshire. Almost 100 students hailed from New York.

Despite the results, many described feeling exhilarated, optimistic and hopeful, believing that as the last Trump challenger standing in the Republican race, she would now have a greater chance to spread her message.

When the election results flashed on the television screens scattered throughout the room, few had been paying attention.

Im happy to hear that she is still going, said Allie Cable, 26, a department supervisor in the health care industry in Concord. Anything could happen.

Richard and Wendy Clymer, a Republican couple also from Concord, had missed the moment entirely. They had rushed into the event late after spending the day rallying support for Ms. Haley and encouraging voters to get to the polls. He saw the result as encouraging, even though the state went to Mr. Trumps column.

Mr. Clymer, 63, an engineer who had held a Haley sign outside a polling place for seven hours, recalled the moment when the results of his polling location were read aloud: Trump 467, Haley 739.

There was an audible gasp in the gymnasium like, Wow, this guy can be beaten, Mr. Clymer said.

Maggie Haberman and Kellen Browning contributed reporting.

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Election 2024: Haley Heads Home to Keep Up Fight as Trump and Biden Look to Rematch - The New York Times

It was definitely not a good night for Donald Trump, Mike Madrid, a California GOP strategist and co-founder of the anti-Trump Lincoln Project, said.

By most metrics, the path to [stopping Trump] has become much clearer, Madrid said. The anti-Trump lane is discernible. Its palpable. Its big. Its something that we can work with in a real, meaningful way.

On the surface, the results from Iowa and New Hampshire look just plain bad for the anti-Trump movement. A former president facing 91 criminal charges and splitting his time between the courtroom and the campaign trail won over 50 percent of the vote in both states. In New Hampshire, where the GOP field quickly shrunk to two, independent voters, whose exit polls showed broke overwhelmingly for Haley, were trumped by Trumps GOP base.

The next two contests offer even less hope for impeding Trumps march toward the nomination. Haley is not competing for delegates in Nevada. And Trump leads her by double digits in polls of her home state of South Carolina.

Leaders of the effort to warn voters about a second Trump term say that focusing on the primary is a lost cause. They argue that Trumps nomination is inevitable and that the focus should shift now to trying to defeat him in the general election.

Its all doom and gloom in the primary, said Charlie Sykes, a conservative Wisconsin political commentator. But this has been predictable for a long time now.

Trumps detractors point to data from Iowa and New Hampshire that show some warning signs for Trump, particularly among independents and more moderate Republicans. In New Hampshire, 64 percent of undeclared voters sided with Haley, according to exit polls.

Exit polls showed four out of 10 people who cast a ballot for Nikki Haley in New Hampshire said they did so out of distaste for Donald Trump. | Jamie Kelter Davis for POLITICO

A pre-caucus NBC News/Des Moines Register/Mediacom poll of voters in Iowa found that 43 percent of Haley supporters said they would back President Joe Biden over Trump.

And in New Hampshire, 46 percent of GOP primary voters said they would be dissatisfied if Trump became the GOP nominee, and 35 percent said they would not vote for him in November.

Exit polls also showed four out of 10 people who cast a ballot for Haley in New Hampshire said they did so out of distaste for Trump. And 94 percent of Haleys voters said they would be dissatisfied if Trump won the nomination.

Fully half of Iowas Republican caucusgoers said they did not identify as part of Trumps Make America Great Again movement. Even more 63 percent said the same in New Hampshire.

That significant chunks of voters from two disparate (though still overwhelmingly white) electorates showed similar resistance to Trump is encouraging to both Sykes and Madrid.

Looking at these numbers and Trumps general approval [ratings] amongst Republicans and also election results from the last three elections, they are all pointing in a direction of getting worse for Trump not better, Madrid said.

Fergus Cullen, a Never Trump Republican and former New Hampshire Republican Party chair who voted for Haley on Tuesday, called those statistics the best result from yesterday.

Citing the 35 percent of voters who said they wouldnt vote for Trump in the general election, Cullen said, Imagine if 35 percent of GOP elected officials said the same thing. Those of us who oppose Trump may not be able to prevent his renomination, but we should be able to prevent him from winning a general.

Still, Trump has defied political gravity before, and many Trump critics after he left office once believed he was unlikely to win renomination. Cullen said Trump does have some ability to find new voters and expand the electorate.

Even though Biden and Trump have declared the general election effectively underway, Haley has not. The former South Carolina governor has vowed to continue through Super Tuesday, where her campaign argues a slate of open and semi-open primaries will give her a fighting chance.

And some Never Trumpers arent ready to look ahead to the general election yet. They want her to keep going.

Theres tons and tons of ammunition for her to make the case that [Trump] is unfit to be president, said Gordon Humphrey, a former U.S. senator from New Hampshire who left the party after Trump won the nomination in 2016 and supported Haley in Tuesdays primary.

Yet Sean Van Anglen, a New Hampshire political consultant who was an early supporter of Trump in 2016 but voted for Haley this time, is already moving on. Van Anglen, who said hed consider leaving the presidential line blank on his November ballot rather than vote for Trump or Biden, is looking to put together an effort to aid down-ballot Republicans who he believes could suffer with Trump again at the top of the ticket.

We need to let the toddler run his temper tantrum out, Van Anglen said. Then let the adults come back into the room and take back control of our party and our country.

Jessica Piper and Steve Shepard contributed to this report.

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Why Trump's critics see his New Hampshire win as a positive sign for 2024 - POLITICO - POLITICO