For Haley, the rise in polls is increasing voters’ enthusiasm for rail

In a packed Opera House on Tuesday night in Derry, N.H., Hannah Kesselring had a pressing question for Nikki Haley, one that many voters in the room appear to have pondered now that Ms. Haley has risen in the 2024 Republican presidential primary.

A feisty 9-year-old wearing a red and navy Haley cap, Hannah had gone viral when she spoke at another Haley town hall before Thanksgiving. Since then, she had had the chance to watch Ron DeSantis and Vivek Ramaswamy punch in her state, she told Ms. Haley. Now she wanted to know three reasons why Mrs. Haley “felt she should be elected president of them.”

Ms. Haley, a former governor of South Carolina and former ambassador to the United Nations, didn’t skip a beat. She tapped into her leadership experience, her foreign policy credentials and her concern for the state of the country and the world.

“I’m a mother,” she said several times around the room. “And the truth is, I don’t want my kids to grow up like this.”

It was the kind of exchange that Ms. Haley has used to steadily build momentum — and it appears to be paying off.

At diners, gyms and event halls in New Hampshire and South Carolina, the state she led for six years, voters have recently shown increased interest in Ms. Haley’s campaign, with a palpable shift in energy. For some, hopes that she could consolidate the wing of her party looking for an alternative to former President Donald J. Trump have become less far-fetched.

At her town hall in Derry, where almost half the people in the audience raised their hands when she asked if this was the first time they had seen her speak, cheers grew louder beyond her usual applause lines. A day earlier in Bluffton, S.C., she had addressed an enthusiastic crowd of about 2,500 people — the largest yet in her home state — as she walked onstage to “Eye of the Tiger,” her standard opener, and chants of “Haley, Haley, Haley.”

“We have another guy to catch up,” she said at that event, referring to Mr. Trump.

In South Carolina, where her homecoming had the feel of a rally, Ms. Haley’s message seemed to resonate. Her campaign officials said they had to move the event to a larger location last week after so many people registered to attend.

But she still has a lot of convincing to do. Ms. Haley lags far behind the former president she served under, who continues to dominate in the national polls, as well as in surveys in every early voting state.

In Iowa, her biggest challenger for second place is Mr. DeSantis, the Florida governor, who has made the state crucial to his prospects. In New Hampshire, where she sits comfortably in second place, it is former Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey who is gaining ground in his do-or-die state.

At Ms Haley’s town hall in Derry, several voters were enthusiastic about her, but not necessarily convinced. Teri and Donald Synborski were still weighing in on Ms. Haley, Mr. DeSantis and Mr. Christie — everyone but Mr. Trump, they said. Mr. Synborski, 67, a corporate finance director, had caught wind of Ms. Haley’s momentum when she first saw her speak at a busy restaurant in Londonderry not long ago. The room was so packed, he recalled, that reporters were pressed against him.

Still, he said he probably wanted to see Mr. DeSantis again before making a decision. “He would really have to do something earth-shattering for me to be tempted to vote for him and Nikki,” he added. “I lean heavily in her direction, but I still call myself indecisive.”

That alone is progress for Ms. Haley. There was a time when political strategists and observers compared her path in New Hampshire to the steep and narrow road that led to New England’s highest peak, a feat that was emblazoned on a popular state bumper sticker: “This car climbed Mount Washington.”

But her rise there and beyond can be attributed to a breakneck pace in early voting states, a series of high-profile debate performances and new interest among powerful players in the Republican Party’s donor class after two contenders — former Vice President Mike Pence and Senator Tim Scott, a colleague from South Carolina, withdrew his bid this fall.

The political network founded by billionaire industrialist brothers Charles and David Koch backed her campaign on Tuesday, giving her another financial boost and access to a direct-mail operation, field workers to knock on doors and people to canvass potential voters . Kenneth G. Langone, the co-founder of the billionaire Home Depot who has donated to Ms. Haley’s campaign, is considering giving more and is expected to meet her in New York next week.

As she has risen, her rivals have taken notice. In recent national television interviews, Mr. Christie has continued his criticism of Ms. Haley over what he describes as “ her unwillingness to take on Mr. Trump — “Run him, or don’t run him” — and her comments at an event in Iowa before a conservative Christian audience, in which she said she would have signed a six-week abortion ban when she was governor.

“I want to be clear that there is no consensus on a national six-week abortion ban, and I wouldn’t even sign it if I were president,” he said. Mr. Christie told CNBC‘Squawk Box’, saying this would put such a decision ‘in the hands of politicians and not in the hands of people’.

In an interview, Austin McCubbin, the Trump campaign’s South Carolina state director, described Ms. Haley as a “paper tiger,” arguing that she had “absolutely no political operation in South Carolina,” nor any representatives who were actively present or were involved in the elections. local GOP rallies. Trump campaign officials say Trump has received 83 endorsements from state lawmakers — more than all other Republicans combined.

In response to a request for comment on the Trump campaign’s arguments, Olivia Perez-Cubas, a spokeswoman for Ms. Haley, said: “Americans are ready for a new-generation conservative leader who will leave the drama and chaos behind. ”

Pacing before New Hampshire voters at the Derry Opera House, Ms. Haley appeared to ignore her critics and made another case for herself, saying it was time for Republicans to “acknowledge some hard truths” — including her party in particular has lost its popular position. voting for president in seven of the last eight elections.

“This isn’t just about the presidency,” she said, arguing that her candidacy would be a windfall in the election. “This is about governorships up and down. This concerns the seats in the House of Representatives. It concerns the seats in the Senate. This is about really righting the ship to get us back to where we need to be.”