New Hampshire Primary - PBS News Special Report

[Music] good evening and welcome to live special coverage of the 20124 New Hampshire Republican and Democratic primaries former president Donald Trump has won New Hampshire a week after his decisive victory in Iowa there you have the latest results as they're coming in Donald Trump with 55 % of the vo New Hampshire to Nikki Haley his lone Republican Challenger at the moment with just 44% of that vote that is wi of the expected vote in so far those numbers May shift over the course of the evening and President Biden has been declared the winner on the Democrat side that's despite his name not appearing on the ballot at President Biden's request the Democratic National Committee decided that South Caroli not New Hampshire should be the firs primary contest this year but New Hampshire held its primary today and anyway and as a result Presiden did not file to put his name on the ballot and New Hampshire's race count toward the delegate total the president still won the most votes though because of a strong wri and we are joined here in Studio by our panel for full analysis that is Jonathan Kart associate editor for the Washington Post Amy Walter of the cook political Report with Amy Walter Democratic strategist V Shakir who was the campaign manager for Bernie Sanders presidential campaign and Republic strategist Kevin Madden who advised Mitt Romney's presidential campaign plus with Ne w York Times columnist David Brooks who's joining us from Iowa and of cours our very own Lisa de jardan is in conquered New Hampshire at Nikki Haley' watch party which looks like it has since ended but Lisa you have be talking to campaign sources on the haly campaign tell us what you're hearing from them now that she said she is staying in the race and what supporters are saying on w next that's right the music is now turned down they're about to take down the stage behind me in a few th ere aren't many reporters Ni kki Haley's campaign says it is ind moving on to South Carolina her home state now that that will be a bigger challenge for her no doubt because many of the votes she received here in New Hampshire were Independents or Democrats that we've been speaking for the past few days wh Donald Trump to be the Republican nominee and some of them s did they want Joe Biden on the ballot so she will not have those same kinds of Independence uh that group of them South Carolina her campaign knows it but they still say they think the Open primary there there could voters and they sent out a memo today saying that they believe that super Tuesday uh with I believe 11 of st ates on super Tuesday of the 16 als have open primaries the bigger question here is of course she has money money issues or money questions and they've already they are stressing that th feel like they do have enoug get through uh the next few fact just a $4 million ad by uh pa st couple of days in South Carolina so when you think about Nikki Haley and her group of supporters of course it was independent Democrats and Republicans when you asked them the reactions tonight they were just equal mixed I'm disappointed that she congratulated Trump I think it's still early you think she should stay in even though this oh absolutely what's her path what's her path got me I think she just proved how weak uh Donald Trump is and what trouble he's in for the fall I think she did an incredible job with what she did here she knocke different other candidates uh to get what 46 where she at 45 46% that's what a that's a huge Victory you know another Factor here tonight to think about is what the re the the supporters think will happen next and some of them say they th ink she can do well in future Stat but others say they're already thinking about 2028 and Nikki Haley Lisa what is the Trump campaign saying about how their win in New Hampshire tonigh affects their strategy moving forward right Chris levita one of the senior advisers to president Trump former president Trump said th expect to end the night with a di gigit lead over Nikki Hale as I've pointed out to them that is roughly half of what Donald Trump got in 2016 when he had a 20-point lead here in New Hampshire nonetheless they say it was record Republican turnout they're on track for that tonight the fact that Donald Trump is the leader by digits in their estimation is is blowout win for them they actually also think that they're they're going to say more and more about th between Trump and Biden they the Democrats didn't show up in the same way for Biden as Republicans did for Trump so in that way they're feeling good about it but there is no this was the closest race that Donald Trump has seen since April of 2016 uh when he lost to Ted Cruz in Wisconsin so this is a kind of margin that Donald Trump hasn't been used to for a while Lisa de jardan reporting from the Haley headquarters in conquered New Hampsh tonight Lisa thanks so much for re porting over the cours evening let's bring back in our panel Kevin Donald Trump has done what no other non-incumbent Republican has been able to do in modern history and that's when Iowa and New Hampshire and the campaign would have us believe that the primary is effectively over in is it well you know those are two very big decisive wins and the other thing that you also have to concede is that the momentum is now with him so if y look at that and the fact that he's it's a it's a campaign that is in a be tter position for a one-on-one more much more so than Nikki Haley's um all of the trend lines are are going in the right direction for him so and the fact that he's going to be abl his resources an campaign apparatus and F focus it and concentrate it on Nikki Haley ri it's just very hard to see where she can find a win and you saw it even with some of the verbatims from her strongest supporters where's she don't know and so until you definiti answer that question all of th in Donald Trump's Direction David Brooks what about you what what do you make of Nikki Haley's path forward now sh e hinted in Her speech after the results came in that uh you know she said the next two months millions of people are going to be voting make sure they all have a we igh in she seems to think she pa th forward Lisa reported this $4 million adby in South Carolina wh at do you see as her chances moving forward minimal I don't think she has a path forward uh there's two groups she has trouble winning the first is Republicans uh and the second is workingclass folks I mean New Hampshire was her perfect state if there was ever going to be a perfect State amon voters half of them were Republican half of them self-identified as Independents and she could wi n there uh so it's it's just to see any way forward and look I mean the pass time is not on the side of Underdog candidacies like Nikki Haley's what realistically could she do to increase her standing between now in South Carolina because she's not even contesting the rac which is a whole another story we won't get into because we don't have enough time for all of that um and all ru les around that look I'll just say this what I find really fascinating about the fact that this down to these two candidat beginning of 2023 the conventional thinking was this race was going to come down to new version of Donal of new Maga in the form of Florida Governor Rhonda santis versus the older version in Donald Trump and instead what we're looking at is Donald Trump versus basically the Old Guard I mean she represents the kind of candidate that that Republicans nominated in 2000 in 2008 and 2012 notably only one of those candidates won um and this is I think part of the reason why Donald Trump has been able to even as she says over and over again he can't win he's been you know he's he has uh lost our party has lost ever since he's been around part of the reason that's not getting traction is that s is the kind of candidate that Republicans nominated in those times who would go on to lose the kind of candidate who was sold as a candidate who's better for the general election who would appeal to modera appeal to SW appeal to swing voters McCain loses Mitt Romney loses George W bush he loses the popular vote uh and narly wins The Electoral College so that is it it feels like this race right now it's sort of like Nikki Haley representing the last gasp o Guard uh versus it being this debate between what version of trump are we gonna of trumpism and magism are we GNA get there was Jonathan this this Theory I'll call it now going back to earlier in the primary season on the Republican side when you heard from a number of people everyone should get in who wants to get in as long as enough people get out and coales around someone else to able to present a viable alternative to Mr Trump well it came down to New Hampshire which was the fi head-to-head con had cleared out of the race the difference was t Trump yes so what does this say to you about the party right now well the maybe we should just stop calling it The Republican party a it Donald Trump's party or the magga party um it's not the Republican grew up watching under two terms of Reagan a term of HW a two terms of w it's a completely different party now and it's not even a party it's a movement now and you know the th ings that would apply to someone like Nikki Haley with a month between now South Carolina it would be she should go on the attack she she should Hammer him on all the things she's hammering him on his his felony um uh counts his mental Fitness all those things the only problem is the more you attack him the stronger he gets so she's in a in a sorry like a lose lose situation she might have money to last her through um and as James Pendle of Boston Globe told me on Sunday that people don't get out of the race because they lost so I don't expect her to get out of the race because she lost New H also says they get out of the be cause they're broke and the moment s either runs out of money or her major donors tell her you know what it's o I I would expect her to stay in but again like her like the her um su said when Lisa asked what's her pass said beats me beats me well fast President Biden is looking ahead to the general election and he' Donald Trump is going to be the Republican nominee I'll read statement um that he put out says it is now clear that Donald Trump will be the Republican nominee and my message to the country is could not be higher our pe rsonal freedoms from the right to choose to the right to v stake that's the the clear campaign message how good a job do you think the campaign has been has done so far in terms of conveying it well it's it's been a slow throttled campaign thus f they haven't really turned the heat on but now I think they're se opportunity and announced a little bit of uh so called a shakeup I would call it a buildup of a campaign yet had a full-on structure Jennifer Ali Dylan being dispatched from the White House cck to the to Ca campaign Michael Donald and a few joining that campaign but there's two major things the by campai has to do that they haven't yet done is you don't even know what campaigning on f supreme State of the Union Address coming in early March we got to get policies IDE ideas out there to start setting up the contrast between Donald Trump so I think that's the ag number one on the start organizing in some of these key States got to have som the ground in Michigan and Pennsylvan and Wisconsin and we got to start talking to that small workingclass Voters who I think are going to determine this haven't yet made up their mi or Trump which is hard to believe because I think most people there's going to be a small s an d we got to go and talk to understand their lives and and ma good persuasive case that the Biden approach on the economy is working them it's it's worth i years into how does a general election looking at you know across the Horizon how do they stack up right now in terms of polling uh well it close race it again this was the Nikki Haley message was you know if you look at a a state like New Hampshire for example Marist College just came with a poll of New Hampshire general election Biden beats Trump in even as his approval ratings are in the 30s in New Hampshire he wins by eight points Nikki Haley on the other hand would beat Biden by three points you see that same number in Virginia Michigan where Haley is either leading by a bigger margin than Trump or wi nning and Trump's not and so um look this election is going to feel very much like 2020 that it's going to be very close that it's going to come down to the same handful of stat always has and and the challenge for um Biden has always been getting that anti-trump Coalition back together not making sure that they don't either Splinter off to third partie home because they're feeling unenthusiast break that ceiling of his support and as we saw tonight um where he really focused his speech not on moving forward but again going backwards about how basically he really did win in 2020 he doesn't like Nikki Haley uh instead of saying using that as a pivot point to say thank you New Hampshire can't wait to come back here and win your votes the fall a Haley Aid in th at speech said if he's in such great shape why is he so angry getting to this electability issue which we know has been core part of of the Haley campaign message Kevin I wanted get your take on something she me in her remarks after the results came out she conceded that she'd lost New Hampshire and and she had sort an attack at both President Biden and former president Trump you know part her argument has been about for the next generation of he re's a part of what she had ea rlier now I've long called for mental competency tests for politicians over the age of 75 politicians Trump claims he' do better than me in one of those tests maybe he would maybe he wouldn't but if he thinks that then he should have no problem standing on a debate stage with me most Americans do not want a rematch betwee Biden and Trump the first party to retire is 80-year-old candidate is going to be the party that wins this election Kevin we know this has been a concern among Democratic voters when it comes to President Biden will it be more of a concern for Republican voters as well if Trump is the nominee well think it's a concern um I don't think it's as compelling a message when Nik Haley's making it for some re ally hasn't moved the dial fo inside the the primary but I think ultimately in a general election I think I think I thin right I think the biggest challenge right now for the Biden Admini is that this is going to about a handful of States it's going to come down to five or six s 400,000 voters that have their mind about this election and they have to make this race more of a choice election than a referendum and that's the big challenge for them particularly at a time where you still have opinions about the economy you have questions about the administration's competence on things like th they have to answer those fo r for Trump I think the thre this is not necessarily about age I think he's going to he's he basically wants to say I'm the alternat Biden on the economy on the border and in a in a race that is that's going to come down to the wire I'm just a little bit better on all these issues and he's three years younger so um I really think that um that fa makes the best point about this really coming down to that small univers vers of Voters i about five regions around the country um where you essentially draw 30 mile radius around places like Atlanta Milwaukee Detroit and Philadel that's going to be the whole ball game David Brooks taking stock of this m the fact that Donald Trump as he faces 91 uh criminal charges against four cases his authoritarian impulses his stated support for strong men like uh Russia's Putin and hungary's Orban uh his role in in inciting the January 6th Insurrection given that the Republican electorate was provided other choices provided Alternatives and they said no Donald Trump is still our guy wh that say about where the Republican party is right now and what it means for our country well first he's ce rtainly going to be the first person in a long long time to win his party's nomination three times in a ro that's just rare in American politics as Jonathan said this is Donald Trump's party he did it by Breakin Rules he did it despite lots of Republican politicians wishing he would simply vanish like Mitch McConnell and governors like so it's formidable uh and and I think Republicans want somebody strong we've talked about you know this i working-class party on the othe he's got a lot of weaknesses too I mean I think I saw one exit poll today 43% of Haley voters said they vo te for Trump and that may number go may go down as the general campaign goes in the election goes further along but that's a lot of people who vot in a Republican primary who say they vo te for a republican nominee just a lot the second thin happening is consumer confidence is beginning to rise and presumably that'll eventually end up benefiting violent uh Biden uh and so the two ways to look at it one they've become they have become a strong workingclass party uh with who knows who their enemies are and who are very well organized and have found their leader on the other hand I go forth back and forth thinking who's who's like ahead in the general election and like a week ago I was pretty convinced Trump was ahea the polls in the g Midwestern states you think if the election were held today Trump would win it on the other hand you look boundary that wall that we've noticed that the the anti- Maga wall uh I think the election results tonight especially the number of Republicans who Ha ley voters who say they wouldn't support him that suggests the st ill there uh and that there's be a majority who just do not like Donald Trump is selling and Jonathan meantime tonight the Democrats held their first joint campai Northern Virginia President Biden vi president Harris their spouses they were focused on uh Reproductive ab ortion rights which they see as a resonant issue uh because since ov erturned every time abortion has appeared on the ballot anti-abo Advocates and Republicans have lost right um because I think one you can't take away a five decade old constitutional right and not think that there would be repercussions uh I think Republicans who thought that um they had this great Victory came in for a ever since Kansas and I think the other thing that gives this the the abortion um I was about to say angle but the abortion issue um Powe Harris ticket is what the Dos decision also said and I'm thinking of Justice Thomas's concurring opinion where he said says in his concurring opinion once we're done with once we're done with row we should go for a Burell which is um same-sex marriage and we should go for Griswald which is uh access to contraception there's one more that I can't that I can't remember i driving me crazy I can't remember third one but that's why I Biden Harris ticket will will morph this from just talking about abortion rights to freedom freedom is at stake and when you when people start to realize that they starte abortion but they don't want to stop there it gets people to think and I think this will be a choice electi I think the choice will be no w as Joe Biden likes to say don't compare me to the almighty compare me t the alternative well the al looks like he's about to have could no be more of an alternative that uh argument about defense of democracy and threats to your rights as a woman and all of that is absolutely targeted at former Donald Trump we actually have a little bit of sound from what earlier today in New Hampshire she didn't win she lost and you know last last week we h of a problem and if you remember Ron was very upset because she ran up and she pretended she won Iowa and I looked around I said didn't she come in third yeah she came in third we've won almost every single poll in the last three months against crooked Joe Biden almost every Po and she doesn't win those balls Fez Shakir when you look at the way Donald Trump is handling this so far and it's no the Biden campaign is saying this is who we're going to be running against wh should they be changing about their campaign the re-election campaign if anything moving forward well we al Donald Trump plays dirty and I think that they are no dummies and understand that he probably faces tough odds to tr to try to win the presidency again what does he need to have happen he needs a lot of people to stay home he's got to have some third party votes come in and I can imagine you're going to have some skull dog re by a a a a trump campaign that's going to try to depress an elector make this ugly you're check out we already know omna that there are a number in the Democratic ranks what's going on in the Middle East and a desire to push Biden on ceasefir to find a way to minimize casualties on Palestinian lives what do you think Trump's going to do with going to take that and play ab out black voters who right no shown high amounts of enthusiasm for this president what do you think Trump' going to do with that you to uh maybe try to call West onto the debate stage these are the kinds of things I think they're tr y to to try the Biden campaign strategy the Biden campaign strategy however gues laser focused I mean have for all the stuff that nonsense that Trump is going to do it is the stuff that plays does play well with the majority of the elector and they hav themselves of th strategy that has helped him once before and I think he's got a record to run on and as long as he's got some to also bring to the table thi around he should be in g Kevin the Trump campaign i is far more disciplined and professional as compared to what it was back in 2016 when it was just really marked by infighting and chaos and then th campaign is raising a ton of money this is set to be the longest general election in history how we both of these campaigns for the Long Haul yeah they're they the T campaign I mean like I look I critical of the 2016 and 2020 an d this operation the 2024 operation is very different it's much more professional Chris lov who are essentially the heads of of the of the campaign are very experienced operatives and I think FaZe is right in the sense that this is going t campaign that from the beginning from day one is going to really set the tone and tenor of the campaign they're going to be incredibly aggress going to be the challenge for the Biden Administration and the to stay disciplined and sort of ma tch that without really being into the uh the sort of hand toand combat that the Trump campaign loves um so that'll be that'll be quite a challenge and like we al single campaign we've always or covered the campaign th offense the campaign that is the aggressor is usually t wins so you know I think we can ex lot of fireworks from here through November Amy minute or so we have GL with that to say I think all of that is correct and yet the people who are going to decide this election are not go tune into this election probably until the fall and so a lot of the issues that we are going to be talking about they are they matter a lot the stat economy immigration how people but there are things that are going to happen maybe in the fall that voters are going to be focusing on and how those campaigns respond to that will be reall important and Amy also they're not pro they're not professional partisans right the folks who are going to make up make or break this el professional partisans Jonathan Kart Amy Walter F Shir David Brooks out there in Iowa thank you all for joining us tonight this has been live special coverage of the 2024 New Hampshire primary and as always there's more politics coverage online on socia media and every night here on the NewsHour including tomorrow we 'll have more on the 2024 election for all of us here at the PBS NewsHour thank you for joining us have a great night this program was made possible by The Corporation for Public Broadcasting and by contributions to your PBS station from viewers like you thank you you're watching PBS