January 17 – 2024 campaign updates

With the Iowa caucuses in the rearview mirror, the 2024 presidential election continued on Wednesday with GOP candidates hitting the trail in New Hampshire ahead of the state’s primary election Tuesday.

Donald Trump won Iowa by a wide margin Monday and the two other remaining GOP candidates – former Gov. Nikki Haley and Gov. Ron DeSantis – are looking to blunt some of the former president’s momentum.

Here is what happened so far today:

Trump ups his attacks on Haley: Trump went after Haley while referring to her by her first name, Nimarata, in the latest example of Trump using racist dog whistles to attack his GOP presidential rival. He misspelled Nimarata as “Nimrada” as he attacked her in a new post on his social media platform Truth Social. Those comments came after he recently amplified a post that falsely claimed Haley was ineligible to run for president because her parents were not US citizens at the time of her birth.

Haley town hall: CNN will host a GOP presidential town hall with Haley tomorrow at 9 p.m. ET from New England College in Henniker, New Hampshire, hosted by CNN’s Jake Tapper. She was set to host a rally this evening in Rochester alongside Gov. Chris Sununu, who has endorsed her. She had flown to South Carolina last night to visit her hospitalized father, who has since been released and is doing well, a source close to Haley told CNN.

DeSantis super-PAC lays off some staff: Never Back Down, the super PAC supporting DeSantis, let go of an undisclosed number of paid staff, a source with knowledge of the political operation told CNN. The layoffs include the organization’s Super Tuesday operation, some key senior staff and the team focused on Nevada, according to a source close to the group.  

DeSantis focuses on South Carolina: The DeSantis campaign is moving a majority of its staff to South Carolina, according to a senior campaign official, reflecting the campaign’s increased focus on the state. He planned to fly back to Florida Wednesday night, return to New Hampshire on Friday, and campaign in South Carolina on Saturday and Sunday.

Trump busy in court: Trump, meanwhile, was in New York attending the contentious second day of his civil defamation trial to determine how much, if any, damages the former president must pay to E. Jean Carroll for his 2019 defamatory statements about Carroll’s sexual assault allegations. He was expected to fly to New Hampshire for a rally later this evening.

The post was updated with details about Haley’s trip last night back to South Carolina.