March 2 - 2024 campaign updates

Former President Donald Trump will win Missouri’s Republican presidential caucuses on Saturday, CNN projects, defeating former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley in the reliably red state. 

His win comes three days before Super Tuesday, when 15 states with 36% of the party’s delegates at stake hold their contests — the busiest day on the 2024 nominating calendar. 

Based on today's results, CNN estimates that Trump will win all 54 of the state’s delegates to the Republican National Convention.

Missouri’s county caucuses elected local delegates to state and congressional district conventions, where they’ll formally allocate the state’s national convention delegates later this spring.

Those local delegates will be bound to vote for presidential candidates based on Saturday’s results.

The state party only released the count of local delegates won by each candidate Saturday, not the number of raw votes each candidate received. A candidate who won a majority of the vote at a county caucus would win all of that county’s local delegates.

Missouri’s GOP caucuses were open to registered voters who signed pledges of allegiance to the Republican Party. 

The Show-Me State was long seen as a bellwether in presidential races. Democrat Bill Clinton carried its electoral votes twice, and Democrat Barack Obama lost the state to Republican John McCain by less than 4,000 votes in 2008. However, it has shifted to the right rapidly since then. Trump defeated Joe Biden by more than 15 points in 2020. 

Former President Donald Trump won all 39 delegates at stake at a Michigan Republican convention Saturday, as officials there sought to move past a leadership battle that has split the state party into rival factions.

The party chairman, former Ambassador and Congressman Pete Hoekstra, presided in Grand Rapids after days of disputes over where the convention would happen — and who would be in charge. 

Republican candidate JR Majewski has dropped out of the race for Ohio’s 9th Congressional District, providing a big boost to GOP leaders who are hoping to flip the seat held by longtime Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur this fall. 

Majewski, a controversial candidate and staunch Donald Trump ally, blamed the “deep state” in his announcement on X and insisted that the former president never asked him to get out of the race. 

Drama has been roiling the Republican primary for months. After GOP leaders backed former state Rep. Craig Riedel in the primary, the candidate was caught on tape criticizing Trump. Multiple Republicans then pulled their endorsement, including Ohio Rep. Max Miller and House GOP Conference Chair Elise Stefanik.

Party leaders scrambled to recruit a new candidate who was seen as both sufficiently pro-Trump and a viable general election candidate, and ultimately settled on state Rep. Derek Merin. House Speaker Mike Johnson endorsed Merin last month.

While Trump has not gotten involved in the 9th District primary so far, some of his allies have. Florida Reps. Matt Gaetz and Byron Donalds of Florida and Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance have all endorsed Majewski, who was the losing GOP nominee to Kaptur in 2022. 

House GOP leaders were worried that if Majewski won the primary, it would cost Republicans the seat again this fall. 

Former President Donald Trump on Saturday baselessly accused President Joe Biden of being part of a “conspiracy to overthrow the United States of America” as he railed against the president’s border policies. 

Trump, who faces federal criminal charges for trying to overturn the 2020 election, baselessly claimed, “Biden and his accomplices want to collapse the American system, nullify the will of the actual American voters and establish a new base power that gives them control for generations.” 

The former president, who faces 91 criminal charges across four cases against him, continued to claim without evidence that Biden was trying to “go after” him. The 2020 rivals are likely headed toward a rematch in this year's general election, and Trump has vowed to appoint a special prosecutor to “go after” Biden and his family if the former president wins in November. 

“But crooked Joe will not succeed with these plans, and he will not get away with these crimes,” Trump said. Biden, unlike Trump, has not been charged with any crimes.

Trump continued, “He’ll be tried at the ballot box this November, and he will be judged and convicted by the American people.”

Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley touted the results of a New York Times/Siena College poll released Saturday, which showed her defeating President Joe Biden in a hypothetical matchup by 10 points among registered voters nationally, a wider margin than former President Donald Trump’s lead over Biden in the same poll. 

Haley told reporters Saturday following a rally here that the new poll further cements her argument that she is more electable than Trump in a general election matchup against Biden. The Times survey showed her with the support of 45% of registered voters compared with Biden’s 35% in a potential general election. Trump, for his part, earned 48% in a hypothetical rematch against Biden, who received 43%. 

Haley said during her remarks at Saturday’s rally that a double-digit victory in a general election would be a “mandate” for Republicans in Washington and around the country. 

“You win by that much, that's bigger than the presidency. That's House, that’s Senate, that's governorships, that’s school boards, that's finally turning our country around,” Haley said.

Also during her remarks, Haley condemned the Biden administration’s partnering with Jordan to airdrop humanitarian aid into Gaza, criticizing the president for “doing things on his own” and “going against Israel.” She continued to call for the release of hostages in Gaza and for increased focus on Iran’s role in propping up terrorist groups in the region. 

“Now he’s doing things on his own, without standing with the partner that he’s supposed to, is not helping the situation,” she said. 

Pro-Palestinian protesters interrupted first lady Jill Biden at least four times during a Saturday campaign speech in Arizona. The first lady is touring the battleground states of Georgia, Arizona, Nevada and Wisconsin as part of the Biden campaign’s “Women for Biden-Harris” initiative. 

The interruptions happened during an event hosted by Arizona List, a group dedicated to electing “more pro-choice, Democratic women,” according to its website. Biden was the closing speaker at the event.

She was first interrupted after she had been introduced. The first lady did not engage with the protesters, and the crowd appeared to cheer to drown them out. 

The first lady was then interrupted on three other occasions, by CNN’s count, in which protesters can be heard yelling about “genocide” and the “Palestinian people.” 

The interruptions during Biden’s speech on Saturday are just the most recent example of the tense political climate at play for Democrats as protesters seek to show their disapproval of how President Joe Biden and his administration have handled the Israel-Hamas war.

In January, the president was interrupted about a dozen times by people protesting the war; they were eventually drowned out by supporters cheering him on.

Tensions over competing GOP conventions were on display Saturday at the Grand Rapids Michigan Republican Party convention hosted by Pete Hoekstra, the chairman backed by former President Donald Trump and the Republican National Committee.

Flyers reading “Kristina KARAMO is our Chair” and “Pete Hoekstra is an Imposter” floated around the convention. The flyers said they were “paid for by Patriots who believe in THE TRUTH!” 

Hoekstra ticked off to reporters the backing he had as Michigan Republican Party chairman. 

“No. 1, the state committee acted. The RNC certified that what the state committee did was legitimate. Donald Trump has endorsed me. The congressional delegation has endorsed me. The state House and Senate leaders have endorsed me. And now you have the court making their determination; the appeals court making their determination,” Hoekstra said.

Hoekstra acknowledged some Michigan donors have “stepped away from giving to the Michigan Republican Party. But they’ve been very active in forming other groups to carry out the functions that they normally would have expected the MIGOP to do.” 

Clark Harrington, a delegate for Michigan’s 2nd Congressional District, described the chairmanship of the GOP as “kind of in disarray” but said “the vote for Trump is unanimous.”

Leadership frustrations aside, support for the former president dominated the Grand Rapids convention, with delegates sporting “Make America Great Again” hats and candidates for committee spots touting their history of support for the former president.

The presidential ad wars have largely fallen silent in the wake of the South Carolina and Michigan primaries, after campaigns and outside groups spent about $230 million dollars competing across the first nominating contests.

Nikki Haley remains in the race, but she’s not competing on the airwaves across the 15 states and one US territory that will be voting in the Super Tuesday primaries next week.

And with President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump comfortable with their paths to their respective nominations, neither campaign nor their allies have ad time reserved for the upcoming contests.

Below the top of the ticket, however, several dynamic congressional primaries are taking place next week that offer a preview of the major debates and messaging strategies that will shape the 2024 election.

In these races, Democrats are heavily emphasizing their commitment to abortion rights, and laying out plans to cut health care costs and lower the cost of living. Republicans, meanwhile, are slamming the Biden administration on immigration and crime, and competing with each other to most closely align with former President Trump.

Former President Donald Trump on Friday encouraged supporters to turn out and vote in the Super Tuesday primary contests, arguing Republicans would then be able to turn their full attention to trying to defeat President Joe Biden in November. 

Trump said, “Republicans will then be able to focus all of our energy, time and resources on defeating crooked Joe Biden, the worst president in the history of our country. That will take place on November 5.”