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Former President Donald Trump has won Michigan’s Republican primary, NBC News projects.
The victory continues Trump’s dominant run through this year’s presidential primaries and caucuses, despite the lingering candidacy of former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley.
Michigan is a two-part nominating contest for the GOP. Only 16 of the state’s 55 delegates to the Republican National Convention will be awarded based on Tuesday’s primary results. The remaining delegates will be decided at a state party convention Saturday.
Trump called into a Michigan GOP watch party in Grand Rapids shortly after the race was called to thank supporters.
“We have a very simple task — we have to win on Nov. 5,” Trump, referring to the general election, told the crowd by phone. “We win Michigan, we win the whole thing.”
Trump’s influence in the state remains deep. He was heavily involved in the 2022 midterms, endorsing a slate of statewide candidates who won their primaries with his help — but all of whom all lost in the general election.
During a Feb. 17 rally in Waterford Township, his only pre-primary rally in Michigan, Trump largely looked past the contest and focused on a November rematch with President Joe Biden.
“We want to send a signal, but we want to win Nov. 5,” he added. “Nov. 5, we’re gonna get this guy out. We’re going to change our country. We’re going to bring our country back.”
Haley campaigned Sunday in the Detroit suburb of Troy and Monday in Grand Rapids. Winless in every primary and caucus ahead of Tuesday — including in her home state of South Carolina — Haley has been focusing more on what she sees as Trump’s lack of electability this fall.
“He’s not going to get the 40% if he is not willing to change and do something that acknowledges the 40%,” Haley said Sunday in Troy, referring to the share of the vote she received in the South Carolina primary. “And why should the 40% have to cave to him?”
Michigan — won narrowly by Trump in 2016 and narrowly by Biden in 2020 — is expected to be one of the most competitive electoral battlegrounds this fall.
The primary and Saturday’s convention come amid major turmoil for the Michigan Republican Party. A judge on Tuesday intervened in a long-building dispute between former Rep. Pete Hoekstra, whom the Republican National Committee has recognized as the new state party chair, and Kristina Karamo, who was ousted from that role by activists unhappy with her management.
Karamo had refused to give up the post. She also had vowed to go ahead with plans for a rival GOP convention Saturday in Detroit — Hoekstra is holding his convention in Grand Rapids — but Tuesday’s court order prohibits her from conducting party business.
Trump had endorsed Hoekstra, his former ambassador to the Netherlands. The former president congratulated Hoekstra on his court victory during the call to the watch party Tuesday night.
“When we finally get access to all of the information from the previous leadership of the Republican Party, we’re not going to find a campaign plan,” Hoekstra said last week in an interview with NBC News. “And I’m expecting we’re not going to find any financial resources. And so, yeah … we’ve got eight months to do what a political party normally does in 18 to 20 months.”
Jillian Frankel and Sarah Dean contributed.
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