Haley is winning over some Democrats. Enough ‘to make a difference? Probably not.’

MYRTLE BEACH, South Carolina — Nikki Haley and her allies are leaning on Democrats to lessen what’s poised to be a lopsided defeat in her home state’s primary.

But even among the smattering of Democrats who turned out to her rallies here this week, there was heavy skepticism the effort would amount to much.

“To make a difference? Probably not,” Joel Gibson, a Horry County Democrat, said at a Haley campaign event in Myrtle Beach. “But there’s no chance if we don’t come out. And it doesn’t cost me anything but my time.”

Leery of alienating Republicans, Haley’s campaign insists she’s not courting Democrats. Her campaign manager, Betsy Ankney, told reporters Haley is working to expand the Republican electorate and to engage independents.

But as Haley scrambles to avoid disaster in a state where she’s never lost a race, her allies’ overtures to those most motivated to defeat the former president — Democrats — have been extensive and explicit. Haley’s issue advocacy group and a super PAC supporting the former South Carolina governor’s candidacy have each sent mailers targeting people who did not vote in the state’s low-turnout Feb. 3 Democratic primary and encouraging them to cast ballots for her on Saturday. At least two organizations are conducting similar outreach efforts to Democrats and independents with the explicit aim of stopping Trump.

Longtime operatives in both parties cast the scale of these efforts as “hyper-elevated,” if not unprecedented, even in a state where some crossover voting is the norm. The push has infuriated many Republicans and some Democrats — and has reignited the debate over whether South Carolina, which does not require voter registration, should limit its primaries to party members.

And there are other factors working against those trying to draw Democrats into the GOP primary. The state Democratic Party has threatened retaliation against Democrats who cast ballots in the Republican contest. And Haley’s relationship with Black South Carolinians — who make up the bulk of the state’s Democratic voters — has been fraught since her days in the governor’s office.

Antjuan Seawright, a South Carolina-based Democratic strategist, said Haley and her allies are trying to show they can cobble together a broader coalition — and “lower the severity of the blow” she’s expected to sustain today.

But “I don’t think she’s going to get a lot of Democrats to participate,” he said.

Haley-aligned groups and outside organizations believe they have a large pool of Democratic-leaning voters to pull from. Just 131,000 people voted in the Democratic primary earlier this month, down substantially from the nearly 540,000 people who voted in the same contest in 2020. If even a small percentage of those people vote in the Republican primary, strategists behind Democratic voter outreach efforts argue, it could make a difference for Haley.

A mailer sent by Haley’s issue advocacy group, Stand for America Inc., reminds voters that they “do not need to be a registered Republican” to participate in the GOP primary. “Democracy counts on your participation,” the mailer obtained by POLITICO reads. “It is not too late to make your voice heard.”

Meanwhile, SFA Fund Inc., a pro-Haley super PAC, is explicitly urging voters who sat out the Democratic contest to cast ballots for Haley, according to a mailer first reported by NBC News.

And at least two groups unaligned with Haley, Progressive Source PAC and Primary Pivot, are trying to sway voters to cast ballots for her as a protest of Trump.

Progressive Source PAC has spent nearly $10,000 on digital ads targeted toward South Carolina’s blue districts encouraging Democrats and independents to cast ballots for Haley in the GOP primary — and reminding them they can then vote for President Joe Biden in November. The group’s YouTube video had racked up more than 360,000 views as of primary eve.

“Haley’s Democratic and independent voters are the wild card in this race,” said Jonathan Greenberg, the California-based journalist and prominent Trump critic who founded the political action committee. “We do feel that what we’re doing will make an impact and can help her narrow her predicted loss.”

Primary Pivot has blasted out two rounds of text messages to roughly 207,000 Democrats and independents urging them to cast ballots in the GOP primary, one ahead of the Democratic primary and another on the eve of the Republican contest. The group is running ads on Facebook and on Instagram, and on Thursday placed a $15,000 ad buy targeting suburban Democrats on major radio stations in Columbia, Charleston and Greenville, according to one of its co-founders, liberal activist Robert Schwartz.

Still, Schwartz said, those efforts are at best likely to nudge Haley only a few points closer to Trump.

“We’re just trying to help Nikki Haley do a little better,” Schwartz said. “But we’re realistic that she’s going to lose to Trump by a pretty wide margin.”

Haley trails Trump by some 30 points in polls of likely South Carolina GOP voters. A Suffolk University/USA TODAY survey from earlier this month showed her trouncing him among Democrats who were likely to vote in the Republican primary, but still losing to her former boss 63 percent to 35 percent overall.

The former U.N. ambassador is not overtly appealing to Democrats herself. But she did remind voters in at least one speech this week that "anybody" could pull a Republican ballot so long as they hadn't already voted in the Democratic contest. Her campaign declined to comment.

But the South Carolina Democratic Party is actively discouraging crossover voting and warning that Democrats who cast ballots in the Republican primary will be ineligible to participate in the state party’s county conventions.

Jay Parmley, the state Democratic Party’s executive director, said in an interview that he “personally went all across the state saying, ‘Do not vote for Nikki Haley. Vote in our primary.’”

There are also signs that the text messages and mailers Haley’s allies are sending are not as targeted as the groups behind them say. Case in point: Parmley has been among the voters receiving them.

“We had our voter history data very quickly after our primary,” Parmley said. “They could have easily pulled out the people who voted in the Democratic primary, but they didn't.”

Parmley and other Democrats who are no strangers to Haley say the concept of her apparatus appealing to Democrats makes little sense — and will likely make little difference, even at the margins.

“I find it cringe that this is how she's closing out her campaign and trying to depend on Democrats to save her,” Parmley said. “And it's not going to work. It's just not going to work. We have zero interest in saving Nikki Haley.”

Seawright, the Democratic activist, who is Black, cast the efforts by Haley’s allied groups as “disrespectful” to Black people who he said have been hurt by policies she pushed as governor, including voter identification requirements.

Democrats, and particularly Black Democrats, were hard to find amid the overwhelmingly white and conservative-leaning crowds that gathered to see Haley in the days leading up to the primary. But the few who did show up for her expressed enthusiasm.

There was the man in Camden who declined to give his name but said he decided weeks ago that he would cast a ballot for the former U.N. ambassador because she’s “energetic” and “intelligent.” There was the woman in Beaufort, Liz Sims, who said she’d reached out to Haley’s campaign to volunteer.

And in Myrtle Beach there was Gibson, the Horry County Democrat, and his wife, Trish, both of whom said they were planning to vote for Haley — or at least against Trump.

“I support Nikki. I think she was a pretty good governor, especially based on what we’ve had since her,” Joel Gibson said. “But it’s more of an anti-Trump vote, to be fair. I think every little bit that she gets keeps her in the race a little bit longer.”

Natalie Allison contributed to this report.