South Carolina primary 2024: Trump projected to win, Haley vows to stay in the race
What can we take away from Trump's big Palmetto State victory?
Former President Donald Trump has won the South Carolina Republican primary, ABC News projects. It was a swift and embarrassing defeat for former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, who rose to political prominence as South Carolina’s governor. Nevertheless, in her concession speech, Haley vowed to continue her campaign into Super Tuesday on March 5.
Throughout the evening, 538 reporters, analysts and contributors broke down the results as they came in with live updates, analysis and commentary. Read our full live blog below.
Latest headlines:
South Carolina winners historically do well overall
Of the three longstanding early state contests — Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina — the last of that group may actually be the best at indicating the eventual winner of the GOP nomination.
In the eight contested GOP primaries since 1980, when the state transitioned from a convention system to a primary, the winner of the election has gone on to win the nomination all but once. That aberration came in the topsy-turvy 2012 primary that saw three different Republicans win the first three early states; Southerner Newt Gingrich won South Carolina that year with 40 percent.
It makes sense that South Carolina has a stronger track record than Iowa (three of the eight) and New Hampshire (six of eight). (Nevada joined the early-voting lineup in 2008 and has picked the nominee in two of the three competitive GOP races since.) For starters, it has the advantage of sifting through a significantly winnowed field. It's not uncommon for a half-dozen or more candidates to seriously contest Iowa and New Hampshire, but by the time South Carolina rolls around, it's only the most viable contenders who remain.
But there's also something to be said for South Carolina being more representative of the GOP electorate as a whole. After all, it's the first solidly Republican state to vote — while Iowa and New Hampshire are historically swing states, South Carolina has voted Republican in every presidential election since 1980, when the primary began.
—Jacob Rubashkin, Inside Elections
Independent South Carolina voters split on Haley support
Independent voters in South Carolina are much more likely to support Haley than those that identify as Republicans, according to an early February poll conducted by Winthrop University. Among likely GOP primary voters, those who identify as independent were split between Trump and Haley, with 43 percent saying they planned to vote for Trump and 42 percent saying they planned to vote for Haley. Among those who identify as Republicans, 72 percent said they planned to vote for Trump and 24 percent said they planned to vote for Haley.
—Mary Radcliffe, 538
South Carolina’s solidly Republican, conservative and religious electorate will help Trump
Despite being Haley's home state, South Carolina is demographically much friendlier turf for Trump than Haley. Exit polls dating back to the 2012 Republican nomination race suggest that South Carolina's electorate will likely be more heavily Republican, more conservative and more religious than New Hampshire's.
In recent GOP primaries, at least 7 in 10 South Carolina voters identified as Republican and about a quarter called themselves independent. By contrast, only around half of New Hampshire's GOP primary voters called themselves Republicans, while more than 40 percent said they were independent. This should help Trump, who performs best among self-described Republicans. In New Hampshire last month, the exit poll found Trump attracted 74 percent of the vote among Republicans while Haley won 58 percent of independents. Recent South Carolina polls have found similar splits, with Trump surpassing 70 percent among Republicans and Haley narrowly ahead among independents.
Beyond party identification, Trump also stands to benefit from South Carolina's larger share of conservative-minded voters. More than 35 percent identified as "very conservative" in South Carolina's 2012 and 2016 GOP primaries, whereas New Hampshire's primary electorate didn't surpass 26 percent in that category in 2012, 2016 or 2024. And Trump does best among the most conservative voters in the polls: For instance, a Monmouth University/Washington Post poll of South Carolina in late January found Trump garnering 80 percent support among very conservative voters, compared with 59 percent among somewhat conservative voters and just 33 percent among moderate or liberal voters.
Trump's greater appeal among conservatives is connected to his increased support among white evangelical Christian voters. Voters who fall in that category tend to identify as more conservative than non-evangelicals, and they will likely make up a majority of South Carolina's GOP primary electorate. In 2012 and 2016, about two-thirds of GOP primary voters there identified as white born-again Christians, whereas less than a quarter said the same in New Hampshire. The late January Monmouth University/Washington Post poll found Trump attracting support from 69 percent of white evangelicals, compared with 46 percent of other voters.
—Geoffrey Skelley, 538
South Carolina GOP politicians are supporting Trump
Haley may have come up through South Carolina politics, but her old colleagues are mostly supporting Trump. Both of the state's senators, its governor, its lieutenant governor, its attorney general, its secretary of state, its treasurer, its agriculture commissioner and five of its six Republican U.S. representatives have endorsed Trump. In fact, many of them announced their endorsement quite early in the campaign, when Trump visited South Carolina in January 2023 — a coordinated show of early strength in a rival's home state. By contrast, Rep. Ralph Norman is the only major South Carolina politician who is supporting Haley.
—Nathaniel Rakich, 538
That's a wrap!
As of 9:20 p.m., 70 percent of the expected vote is reporting in South Carolina, and Trump is leading Haley by 20 points. It’s a decisive victory for the former president, as expected, though a somewhat smaller margin than his average lead in the polls heading into today (around 28 points).
Haley’s margin of defeat, though, looks even larger when it comes to delegates: Under South Carolina’s delegate allocation system, over half the state’s 50 delegates are awarded to the statewide winner, while the rest are awarded by congressional district. It looks like the maximum delegates Haley could walk away with in her home state tonight is three, if she holds onto her lead in the 1st District.
Despite this, Haley proclaimed in her speech that tonight’s result demonstrated her home state’s frustration with the country’s direction and reiterated her promise to stay in the race.
And on that note ... We hope to see you back here for our Super Tuesday live blog on March 5! We're gearing up for an eventful night tracking not only the presidential race in 15 states (and one territory) but a slew of down-ballot primaries in Senate, House and gubernatorial races as well.
—Tia Yang, 538