In Nikki Haley's birthplace of Bamberg, those who know her are “completely on her side” in Saturday's South Carolina Republican primary, but former President Donald Trump is still likely to win a majority in her home district.
traveled to the rural town on Thursday for the final day of early voting before Saturday's crucial contest in which Trump is expected to defeat the former South Carolina governor in her home state.
Throughout the afternoon, a slow stream of voters showed up at an annex of the Bamberg County Courthouse — the majority said they supported Trump — but not those who knew Haley personally.
“I love Nikki like she was a daughter,” said 79-year-old Joyce McMillan. “She is the most honest, intelligent, quickest-learning person I have ever met,” she said of the Republican presidential candidate.
McMillan was an accountant for Haley's parents when they ran a business in downtown Bamberg and taught the former UN ambassador the trade as a young girl.
Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley is photographed at a campaign rally in her hometown of Bamberg, South Carolina, earlier this month. Most voters at the Bamberg County polling station said Thursday they would support former President Donald Trump
Several voters interviewed outside the Bamberg District Courthouse annex on Thursday had personal ties to Nikki Haley – and those who did supported her presidential candidacy
“I ended up teaching her all the spreadsheets and financial aspects of the store when she was just 13 years old,” McMillan told . “When I left the business, she took it over, just 13, and she’s just super smart.”
McMillan said her daughter and Haley were close friends – and lived together at Clemson.
“And she spent as much time at my house as she did at Nikki’s,” McMillan remembers.
The former accountant said she also helped Haley and her husband Michael “sort of get together” but wouldn't describe herself as a “matchmaker.”
“I’m just Nikki Haley through and through, Nikki Haley through and through,” McMillan said. “She is the most capable person I can imagine who could ever turn this country around.”
Mimbee Ray, a 71-year-old retired office manager who lives in nearby Denmark, South Carolina, told that she was voting for Haley “because I know her.”
“It's a wonderful small town story that people saw her in the store and she actually made a lot of books as a kid,” Ray remembers. “And so we followed her the whole time.”
A dilapidated building in downtown Bamberg, South Carolina, near where Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley held a rally earlier this month. The rural town lies between Charleston and Columbia
Nikki Haley (right) attended an “International Fest” in Bamberg, South Carolina as a child. Bamberg County voters who had personal ties to Haley voted for her during Thursday's early voting period
Ray called Haley a “great” governor of the state. “And then of course Trump thought she was great too,” she said with a laugh. “But now, no.”
The Denmark resident was among South Carolina voters upset by Trump's comments in the state about Haley's husband, who is deployed.
At a rally in Conway on February 10, Trump announced that Michael Haley was in Africa to escape his wife.
“What happened to her husband? What happened to her husband?' the former president asked. “Where is he?” He's gone. He knew. He knew.'
reported in January about two alleged affairs Haley had during her time as a state legislator, allegations the candidate had previously denied.
The story has since resulted in reporters being banned from its campaign events.
Nikki Haley (left in pink sweater) in a family photo from the late 70s. She is with her parents Ajit and Raj. Clockwise from her are older sister Simran, big brother Mitti and little brother Simmi. At the age of 13, she was already doing the bookkeeping for her parents' high street shop
Nikki Haley at elementary school in Bamberg, South Carolina. Haley sits in the second row, third from the right, in a striped polo. A voter who has known Haley since she was a child called her “the most honest, intelligent, quickest-learning person I have ever met.”
Ray called Trump “too vocal” and “too old” to get her vote.
“Especially like the criticism, ‘Where is your husband?’ He fights in our military. And then to say our military is stupid or whatever, that just wasn't good,” she said.
In a strategy call Friday, Haley's campaign manager said they would push through the Super Tuesday primary on March 5 and look at “key states in March after that,” but it would take massive upheaval in the race to beat Trump.
If this results in a rematch between Trump and Biden, she “probably won’t vote,” Ray said.
“I just wouldn’t vote for either one,” she said.
Erin Chassereau, a 43-year-old janitor and part-time welder from Ehrhardt, South Carolina, remembers the time Haley met one of her daughters during a tour of the local middle school.
“Right down there, Nikki came over for a tour and my daughter took a photo with her in the newspaper,” Chassereau remembers.
Outside the city there is a water tower bearing Bamberg's name. One voter suggested that the county's strong Trump support was due to the “older generation” as many young people left the area due to the lack of industry and jobs
Chassereau said she voted for her hometown candidate because “Trump is a little too right-wing.” [and] “Biden is way too far left.”
“I have nothing but high praise for everything she’s done,” she said of Haley. “I found out about her. I've seen their interviews. She has good words. She knows politics, she knows what she's doing. And the fact that she, as a woman, does that is great. She's gorgeous. She's smart. She's got it.'
Unlike Ray, Chassereau said she would vote for Trump in the general election if Haley was unsuccessful in the Republican primary.
“If Nikki doesn’t win, I have to win,” she said. 'I hope not. “I hope Nikki stays here, I really do.”
Chassereau said the majority of Trump support in the county is likely a product of the “older generation” of residents, given the area's lack of jobs and many homes and businesses in disrepair.
“The young people have left.” The churches are dying. The churches are dying!' She said. “I think that’s why most boomers are, and I hate to use that word, Trump through and through.”
Additionally, in Thursday's interviews, every man interviewed by supported Trump, while all but one of the women supported Haley.
Kathy, a 76-year-old Trump supporter who declined to give her last name, said she would vote for the ex-president because “there's really no one else.”
Her main theme is the “morality of the country,” she told .
'I believe in God. OK? I'll say it right at the beginning. I don't believe in abortion. I don't believe in homosexuality. If people want to do well. But I believe that Jesus is my savior and I will not offend him – I will vote the way he wants,” she said.
The thrice-married Trump didn't bother Kathy.
'So?' She asked. “I mean, we're all going to sin, but let's not say, 'Okay, that's OK.' We're not going to say it's OK to kill your babies.”
Kathy said she would never vote for Haley because “there's something wrong with her” and she doesn't like that Democrats are donating to the Haley campaign.
Her husband, 79-year-old Mike of Bamberg County, suggested that Haley's parents would be more permissive to mass migration because Haley's parents were immigrants and not originally American citizens.
Another Trump supporter disagreed with Haley's decision to remove the Confederate flag from the South Carolina statehouse – a decision she made as governor after the racially motivated mass shooting at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston in 2015.
“I thought about her a little. I am not a biased person. “I liked the battle flag that she took down because of its historical significance,” said Joshua Creech, 38, of Denmark, South Carolina.
He said a grandfather immigrated to the United States from Germany before the Civil War.
“He came here in 1851, joined the Confederate Army and fought for what he believed in,” Creech said. “And he promised God when he came here that if he prospered in the new land, he would build a church, and he did, and it's right there in Ehrhardt,” Creech added, referring on the town, which is directly on the street from Haley's Bambert.