Former President Donald Trump has won Missouri’s Republican caucuses, according to the Associated Press, the first of three events held Saturday awarding delegates as Trump moves closer toward the party’s presidential nomination.
KEY FACTS
The Associated Press called Missouri’s Republican caucuses for Trump at 12:40 p.m. EST on Saturday, after the former president received 100% of the first tranche of fewer than 200 votes.
The caucus results will be used to award 51 of Missouri’s 54 delegates, while the remaining three delegates are the state’s Republican chair and Missouri’s Republican national committeeman and committeewoman, who can choose any candidate regardless of caucus results.
Missouri’s Republican caucuses require voters in the state to participate in a county or city event, in which participants sign a loyalty pledge before stating their support for any one candidate, who will receive that event’s nomination and by default all of its votes if they receive a majority of support from participants.
WHAT TO WATCH FOR
Republican delegates will also be awarded in Michigan and Idaho later Saturday. Trump won 12 of Michigan’s 55 delegates by winning the state’s Republican primary earlier this week, while the remaining 39 will be awarded by Republicans at a Grand Rapids-based convention. Idaho’s Republican caucuses—which opened at 2 p.m. EST—will award 32 delegates.
BIG NUMBER
1,215. That’s how many delegates are needed for a Republican candidate to win the party’s nomination. Trump’s campaign claims he will have enough by March 19, when Arizona, Florida, Illinois, Kansas and Ohio hold their primaries.
KEY BACKGROUND
Neither Trump nor Nikki Haley campaigned in Missouri prior to Saturday’s caucuses, though Trump received support from several Republican officials in the state, including Gov. Mike Parson. The state previously held primaries, though Parson signed a law in 2022 that canceled Missouri’s presidential primary.
Idaho also held primaries before seemingly inadvertently making the move to caucuses in 2022, after lawmakers approved a bill that canceled the event rather than pushed the vote to May to coincide with other state elections.
Michigan’s Republican delegation was split on the future of its presidential contest following the 2020 election, after the state’s Democratic party moved the state’s primary to February.
The Michigan GOP subsequently adopted a hybrid model in which delegates were awarded to candidates through a caucus and primary. Haley is still seeking her first election victory, after Trump won convincingly in Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina.
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