Nikki Haley tries to have it both ways on Donald Trump. Again.
Confusing.
Nikki Haley doesn’t think Donald Trump has a chance in hell of winning the White House in 2024.
But she’s going to support him nonetheless — because she can’t let Democrats win.
Huh?
Let’s walk through her quotes — in an interview with CNBC on Monday.
“We can’t have, as Republicans, him as the nominee. He can’t win a general election. That’s the problem. We’ve got to go and have someone who can actually win.”
This is a solid point! I have written time and time again that Trump is the weakest Republican that the party could nominate because of his demonstrated problems among independents, women and suburban voters.
I am not sure I would go as far as Haley and say Trump can’t win a general election but there is a solid case — backed by data — to be made to Republicans that nominating Trump is a massive risk because of his weaknesses with the general electorate — not to mention the fact he is already under two criminal indictments with a third possibly coming as soon as this week.
But, of course, Haley wasn’t done talking.
“I would support him because I am not going to have a President Kamala Harris. We can’t afford that. That is not going to happen.”
This is where she and logic really part ways. Remember that Haley has JUST said that Trump can’t win a general election. Now she is saying that she will be supporting Trump because she can’t let Kamala Harris be president.
(Haley has repeatedly said that President Joe Biden will die in office and that the vice president will take over.)
But but but….she just said that Trump can’t win a general election. Which would mean that nominating Trump would ensure that Democrats would win. Meaning that supporting Trump would make no sense if the ultimate goal is to keep Biden (and Harris) away from a 2nd term.
Again, if you think about it for more than 5 seconds, what Haley is saying makes no sense.
But, it’s far from the first time that she has tried to have it both ways on Trump.
Remember that Haley broke with the former president in a MAJOR way back in February 2021.
“We need to acknowledge he let us down,” she told Politico’s Tim Alberta. “He went down a path he shouldn’t have, and we shouldn’t have followed him, and we shouldn’t have listened to him. And we can’t let that ever happen again.”
She also predicted, wrongly, that Trump wouldn’t run again. “He’s not going to run for federal office again,” she said. “I don’t think he’s going to be in the picture. I don’t think he can. He’s fallen so far.”
Which, ok! At the time, I wrote that Haley was making her move to distance herself from Trump in advance of a likely presidential bid. Which was a strategy!
But, months later, Haley had totally flip flopped.
In April 2021, she said she would not run for president if Trump did. She also said she would back his candidacy if he ran.
It was — and is — a stunning flip flop.
And, Haley still seems to be caught between her belief that Trump can’t win (and shouldn’t have run) and her loyalty to him and/or fear of his supporters.
It’s a very weird place to be — especially when you consider that Haley is, you know, trying to beat Trump for the Republican nomination.
Former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele made that very point in an interview on MSNBC Monday night.
Dismissing Haley’s quotes as “bubblegum speak,” Steele said that Haley needed to “stop wasting our time” and either go after Trump or get out of the race.
“Everyone’s hunkering down around protecting Trump as opposed to taking him out because they’re afraid of what,” added Steele. “So … it’s almost to the point where you get tired of answering the question about what are these people doing? They have no clue what they’re doing.”
It’s hard to say he’s wrong. With the exception of longshot candidates like Chris Christie and Asa Hutchinson, no one has engaged in any sort of sustained attack on Trump in the race.
Ron DeSantis, in theory his most serious challenger, has expressly said that he will talk about Trump when asked but isn’t going to center his campaign on making the case against Trump. Which, ok.
Haley is the leader of a brigade of candidates who seem to be undecided about what they really want in the race. Do they want to try and win or are they angling to either be Trump’s vice presidential pick or a member of his Cabinet?
Haley and her ilk would do well to follow the advice of New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, who once considered running in the Republican race himself.
“All of these candidates have to start hitting this guy,” he said over the weekend. “You can’t run against somebody and be 20 points down but not be willing to talk about him.”
Added Sununu:
“Either you’re willing to swing, you’re willing to give the punch and take the punch and show leadership or or you’re kowtowing. I don’t understand the politics of it, because you’re not going to get a Trump voter. Right? They’re with Trump.”
Yes, that. Exactly.
Haley would do well to heed that advice. No one ever won a nomination by trying to play both sides.
"Kowtowing" is the best word to describe Haley. I once respected here and thought she could be a reasonable Republican president. Not any more. Her desperation for power and adulation is embarrassing.
She's absolutely irrelevant in this campaign. She is barely mentioned, and even anti-Trumpers like Christie are polling ahead of her. That speaks volumes about what her fellow Republicans think of her as a candidate.