Former President Donald Trump continued his march toward the GOP nomination on Saturday, winning caucuses in Idaho and Missouri and sweeping the delegate haul at a party convention in Michigan.
Trump earned every delegate at stake on Saturday, bringing his count to 244 compared to 24 for former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley. A candidate needs to secure 1,215 delegates to clinch the Republican nomination.
Trump's super Saturday: Donald wins clean sweep of Idaho, Michigan and Missouri as he blows Nikki Haley out of the water in Republican caucuses… inching closer to rematch with Biden #Trump2024 https://t.co/1X4u6PabyR
— Laura Loomer (@LauraLoomer) March 3, 2024
The next event on the Republican calendar is Sunday in the District of Columbia. Two days later is Super Tuesday, when 16 states will hold primaries on the most significant day of voting of the year outside of the November election. Trump is on track to lock up the nomination days later.
Haley is fast running out of time to alter the course of the Republican nominating race.
With victories in Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, the US Virgin Islands, South Carolina, and now Michigan, Missouri, and Idaho under his belt, Trump is far and away the frontrunner in the race, with Haley hanging on thanks to support from donors keen for an alternative to the former president.
For this election cycle, Michigan Republicans devised a hybrid nominating system, split between a primary and a caucus.
Trump won the primary convincingly on Tuesday, securing 12 of 16 delegates up for grabs. He took all of Michigan’s remaining 39 delegates at stake on Saturday.
At one of the 13 caucus meetings, the participants, knowing Trump would win easily, decided to save time by simply asking anyone who backed Haley to stand up. In a room of 185 voting delegates, 25-year-old Carter Houtman was the only person who rose to his feet.
“It was a little lonely,” Houtman told the Reuters news agency in an interview afterward.
Houtman said he would likely vote for Trump in November’s general election if he is the nominee but felt it was important to stand up for his beliefs on Saturday.
Dennis Milosch, 87, a Trump supporter, said the former president’s dominating win on Saturday underscored how the party has been transformed from one aligned with big business to one focused on the working class.
Trump is likely to face President Joe Biden, a Democrat, in the November elections, pitting the two against each other for the second time since 2020.
