By Natasha Korecki —
NBC News
Nikki Haley claimed for months that only she could beat Joe Biden in the general election.
And to argue it she cited her 17-point lead over the president in a Wall Street Journal poll.
Even in recent weeks, he argued that former President Donald Trump would lose to Biden in November or, at the very least, had a strong chance of losing.
This argument became the center of his theory that he could defeat the former president.
But in addition to being unable to chart a path to primary victory, Haley ran into another problem: In poll after poll, Trump was leading Biden.
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As time passed, the arguments of Haley, who is the daughter of Indian immigrants, disintegrated.
And although she still led Trump in some polls at times, she failed to gain traction among Republican voters.
This Wednesday, after her disappointing performance on Super Tuesday, Haley ended her candidacy.
In brief statements, the former ambassador to the UN did not endorse Trump, indicating that the ball was now in her court and that she must show that she could seal the divisions within the party.
Nikki Haley during a campaign event at Sawyer Park Icehouse in Spring, Texas, on March 4, 2024.Mark Felix / Bloomberg via Getty Images
“Now it is Donald Trump's turn to win the votes of those in our party and outside of it who did not support him.
And I hope he does,” Haley said.
“At its best, politics is about attracting people to your cause, not rejecting it.
And our conservative cause urgently needs more people.”
Haley left open the possibility of running again in four years, noting that the support she garnered was a reflection of discontent with the
establishment
.
In recent months, Haley has demonstrated great fundraising ability, which has allowed her to stay in the race despite losing primaries across the country.
She could use the money she has left to boost her candidacy in 2028 or move it to a political action committee or another, for future use.
His announcement ended nearly a year of campaigning, with the implicit admission that his efforts were not enough.
Sarah Longwell, a Republican strategist who regularly organizes focus groups and opposes Trump, said that not only have polls shown that he could win in a hypothetical matchup with Biden in the general election, but that voters in the Party's primary Republicans simply didn't buy the argument that Biden could pose a threat in November.
“It was a miscalculation,” Longwell said of Haley's efforts.
“Most Republican voters believe that Biden is very weak, that he has dementia — that's what they believe — so why wouldn't Trump beat him?”
Haley argued for months that she was more electable than Trump.
However, when she ended her campaign it was she who had an electability problem, with a significant deficit against Trump in the dispute for delegates.
It became increasingly
clear that her coalition was made up of independents
and even Democrats, and that she was losing support from Republicans.
A campaign “built on sand”
NBC News exit polls in Super Tuesday states showed Trump dominating among conservatives, and in many cases they decided to back the former president even before the race became a two-way contest.
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All along, signs underscored Trump's dominance over the Republican Party.
In a December New York Times/Siena College poll, Trump led Biden in five of the six swing states and exceeded the margin of error in four of them.
In January, an NBC News poll showed Trump leading Biden by 5 points.
In February, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and CBS News were some of the media that published polls with Trump in the lead.
Another Monmouth University poll of South Carolina voters released in February showed that Haley's electability argument didn't stick.
Of those surveyed, 71% of Republicans indicated that they believed Trump would definitely or probably defeat Biden, while 63% said the same regarding Haley.
“He built the foundation of his campaign on sand
,” said Republican strategist Gregg Keller.
“You can't make polls the only support for your campaign, because they change constantly.”
Keller added that a portion of the Republican electorate does not believe in the results of past elections, much less the results of polls.
Although Haley relied heavily on the polls, she also tried to position herself as the candidate who would bring generational change.
She promised a balanced budget, federal gas and diesel tax cuts and, more broadly, bringing sanity — not chaos — to the White House.
His speeches focused on foreign policy, where he emphasized the importance of defending NATO allies and preventing the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Haley was the last one standing against Trump, and as that one-on-one dispute took shape, she attacked the former president more aggressively.
But that only seemed to cause an increase in her unfavorable ratings.
While some Republicans, like Longwell, have blamed Haley for not being more aggressive against Trump sooner, Keller argued that would have made little difference.
The criminal cases against him have failed to repel Republican voters anyway, she added.
Ultimately, she failed to build a coalition of voters large enough to defeat Trump and faltered in the primaries in state after state.
But the biggest failure, Longwell argued, was that he
failed to capitalize on Trump's real weaknesses
and instead went soft on him on some of the most serious allegations against him, including the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol and the multiple felony charges he faces.
“This has always been a collective problem within the Republican Party, it is not just about Haley,” he said.
“When you defend a guy who is accused of multiple crimes and you build a permit structure for voters to support him, don't be surprised when they do.”