Super Tuesday expected to boost Trump closer to clinching GOP nomination as Haley makes possible last stand

Donald Trump won’t clinch the 2024 Republican presidential nomination on Tuesday.

But with the former president likely to capture the lion’s share of the 854 Republican delegates up for grabs when 15 states hold GOP primaries or caucuses on what’s known as Super Tuesday, Trump is expected to move significantly closer to locking up his party’s presidential nomination over his last remaining rival – Nikki Haley.

“It’s big stuff and it’s the single most important primary day of the year,” Trump told his supporters in a video to supporters posted on social media ahead of Super Tuesday.

Trump has swept all but one of the first nine contests on the GOP nominating calendar, including North Dakota’s Republican presidential caucuses on the eve of Super Tuesday. 

TRUMP HEADS INTO SUPER TUESDAY ON A ROLL 

Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally Saturday, March 2, 2024, in Richmond, Va. (AP Photo/Steve Helber) (AP Photo/Steve Helber)

Another strong showing by the former president in Tuesday’s coast-to-coast primaries and caucuses will help him in his mission to completely pivot from a primary battle with Haley to a general election rematch with President Biden, who defeated Trump four years ago to win the White House.

“If every single conservative, Republican, and Trump supporter in these states shows up on Super Tuesday, we will be very close to finished with this primary contest,” Trump emphasized. “Republicans will then be able to focus all of our energy, time, and resources, on defeating crooked Joe Biden.”

WHERE THE 2024 REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARY RACE STANDS

Among the states holding nominating contests on Super Tuesday are delegate-rich California and Texas. Also holding primaries are Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Vermont and Virginia. Two states, Alaska and Utah, are holding caucuses. 

The scant public opinion polling conducted in some of these states indicates the former president holds formidable leads over Haley, a former two-term South Carolina governor who later served as U.N. ambassador in the Trump administration.

Former U.N. Ambassador and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley and former President Donald Trump. (Getty Images)

Some of the states – including California with 169 delegates at stake – have winner-take-all rules to varying degrees, which should boost Trump’s delegate haul.

With more large states like Georgia, Florida, Illinois and Ohio among the eight holding primaries on March 12 and 19, Trump is expected to reach the 1,215 delegates needed to clinch the nomination by the middle of this month.

Trump’s campaign predicted in a memo last month that even under the most favorable modeling for Haley, the former president would clinch the nomination by March 19.

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Trump for nearly a year has dominated the GOP nomination race, which last summer peaked with over a dozen challengers taking on the former president. Helping to boost Trump among the Republican base – his history-making indictments last year in four different criminal cases – including charges in two cases that he tried to overturn his 2020 presidential election loss. 

The former president kicked off the nominating calendar with double-digit wins in the Iowa caucuses and in the New Hampshire, South Carolina, and Michigan primaries. He also grabbed landslide victories in the Nevada and U.S. Virgin Islands GOP caucuses.

Trump rolled into Super Tuesday with plenty of momentum, after securing the 39 delegates up for grabs Saturday at Michigan’s GOP’s party convention.

A few hours later, the former president was victorious in the Missouri caucuses, and he closed out Saturday evening by scoring a win in the Idaho caucuses.

“We’ve been launching like a rocket to the Republican nomination,” Trump touted Saturday night at a rally in Richmond, Virginia, as he pointed to his ballot box victories in Michigan, Missouri and Idaho.

Heading into Super Tuesday, Trump was well more than 200 delegates ahead of Haley, following his North Dakota victory on Monday night.

“Republican voters have delivered resounding wins for President Trump in every single primary contest and this race is over,” Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung said in a recent statement. “Our focus is now on Joe Biden and the general election.”

The former president also won a major court victory on Monday, as the Supreme Court sided unanimously with Trump in his legal challenge to the state of Colorado’s attempt to kick him off the 2024 primary ballot. 

Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley speaks at a rally during the District of Columbia’s Republican presidential primary at the Madison Hotel in Washington, D.C., on Friday, March 1, 2024. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)

But Haley, who remains in the GOP nomination race at least through Super Tuesday despite the extremely long odds she faces, on Sunday enjoyed victory for the first time in the 2024 race.

Haley topped Trump by roughly 30 points in Washington D.C.’s Republican primary. She captured 19 delegates and made history as the first woman to win a GOP presidential primary or caucus.

“Republicans closest to Washington’s dysfunction know that Donald Trump has brought nothing but chaos and division for the past 8 years. It’s time to start winning again and move our nation forward!,” Haley wrote on social media Sunday night.

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In the past few days, Haley landed the endorsements of two GOP senators from Super Tuesday states – Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.

Haley, who has garnered strong support in the GOP primaries from independents and whose fundraising has remained formidable, has stayed in the race as an option for voters dissatisfied with a likely Biden-Trump rematch. 

But while Trump plans to make comments Tuesday evening from his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida, Haley has no public events or election night gatherings scheduled for Super Tuesday evening and remains mum on any plans going forward.

Haley reiterated in an interview on Saturday with Fox News’ Bill Melugin that “we’re going to go as long as we’re competitive,” but she did not specifically define what competitive means.

President Joe Biden gestures to the audience after speaking at a campaign event in North Las Vegas, Nev., Sunday, Feb. 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)

One U.S. territory – American Samoa – also holds nominating contests on Tuesday.

CHECK OUT THE LATEST DEMOCRATIC DELEGATE COUNT HERE

Except for Alaska, all the states holding GOP primaries or caucuses on Tuesday are also conducting Democratic ones as well. And Iowa Democrats will announce the results of a vote-by-mail caucus they’ve been holding since mid-January.

The president, who faces nominal challenges from Rep. Dean Phillips of Minnesota and best-selling author and spiritual adviser Marianne Williamson, is likely to romp in the Democratic contests.

Biden is expected to win the vast majority of the 1,420 Democratic delegates up for grabs on Tuesday, and move much closer to the 1,968 needed to lock up renomination.

Get the latest updates from the 2024 campaign trail, exclusive interviews and more at our Fox News Digital election hub.