When all the votes were counted, Haley had won 63% of the vote to Trump's 33% and won all delegates.
Haley campaign spokeswoman Olivia Perez-Cubas said in a statement that the former U.N. ambassador is the first woman in U.S. history to win a Republican primary.
“It's no surprise that the Republican Party closest to Washington's dysfunction rejects Donald Trump and all of his chaos,” Perez-Cuvas said in a statement.
Almost immediately after Haley's campaign call, Trump campaign spokeswoman Caroline Leavitt echoed Trump's constant claims that the nation's capital is a “swamp” filled with establishment Republicans. He mocked Republicans in Washington, D.C.
“Nicki has been roundly rejected across America and has just been crowned Queen of the Swamp by lobbyists and D.C. insiders seeking to protect the broken status quo,” Levitt said in a statement. Despite four years in the White House and the support of most Republicans in Congress, Trump has long maintained that Republicans in Washington, D.C., are hostile to him.
Unlike Trump, Haley campaigned in Washington ahead of the primary and visited the city on Friday.
Washington's primary was smaller than other states, with DC Republicans voting at the Madison Hotel. The election was administered by the DC Republican Party.
The D.C. Republican Party said the weekend election was held “at the earliest possible date in accordance with party regulations.” The Democratic Party will hold its own primary election in Washington, D.C., in June, and the Republican primary election will be held within 45 days before the convention is held on July 15th, with the purpose of allocating delegates to the Republican National Convention. That would violate national Republican Party rules that prohibit doing so. This means party branches must hold primaries by May 31st.
According to the district's Republican Party, 2,035 Republicans participated in the primary election.
The Washington campaign comes after Trump won three states over the weekend: Missouri, Michigan and Idaho.
Michigan Republican Party leaders and other preselected party members awarded all 39 candidates to Trump at a caucus in Grand Rapids. The former president also won most of the 16 delegates allotted to him based on Michigan's statewide primary election held earlier this week. Trump also won all delegates in the Idaho caucuses, and the Associated Press predicted a victory for Trump in Missouri, as Republican voters in both states chose their candidates in party-sponsored conventions.
Before Sunday's Washington primary, Trump had 244 delegates compared to 24 for Haley.
That's a daunting advantage as the two Republicans head into Super Tuesday, March 5, when 15 states will vote and a third of Republican delegates will be at stake. Haley has vowed to remain in the Republican primary at least through Super Tuesday, despite polls showing her heavily favoring Trump. It's unclear what she will do after that.
Haley did not come to Washington, D.C., to celebrate her victory Sunday, instead campaigning in Maine, one of the Super Tuesday states. On Friday, ahead of Tuesday's primary, she received the endorsement of longtime Maine Sen. Susan Collins, a Republican.
