They know Haley's chances against Trump, but they vote for her anyway

Mike and Susan Strouse, Republicans who consider themselves die-hard Haley supporters, wore stickers that read “Trump is too chicken to debate” and said they had been following her rise ever since. They had voted for Trump twice but did not believe he would be a viable choice for president after his supporters stormed the US Capitol on January 6, 2021.

“I just feel in my heart that she is the best,” Mr. Strouse said.

Newberry Mayor Foster Senn recalled that in 2010, as now, Ms. Haley took on the establishment and challenged rivals no one thought she could beat. The state's current establishment, including the governor and two U.S. senators, have endorsed Trump over her. But while the opera house has a capacity of more than 1,000 people, Ms. Haley spoke outside, to an audience of about 150 people. On Monday, she spoke to about 50 people at a Harley-Davidson dealership in Elgin, S.C., and some of the seats that had been set up remained unfilled.

Her other visits included Bamberg, her rural hometown near Columbia, where people came who said they knew and liked Ms. Haley and her family growing up. The town's mayor, remembering Mrs. Haley's stories from her childhood, would not vote for her.

Meanwhile, her regular boasts about South Carolina's economy under her leadership, her personal story and her calls to imagine a different country “where there wasn't so much anger and division” took a back seat to her fiery attacks on the Mr Trump. .

In recent weeks, she has reframed her speech to attack the former president over his mental acuity, legal issues and his role in the collapse of a Republican-led deal in Congress to address the arrival of migrants at the southern border . She has tried to label Mr. Trump and President Biden as “grumpy old men.” She has chastised fellow members of her party for joining Trump's “chaos.”