Haley attacks Trump’s morals, age and wealth as she looks to stave off home state loss
Nikki Haley now says Donald Trump is too old, too confused, too chaotic, and too tantrum-prone to be president — and in a jab likely to especially infuriate her rival, warns he even lacks the money to mount a proper White House run.
The former South Carolina governor — the former president’s last opponent standing in the GOP nominating race — is turning up the heat as she battles to prevent a career-besmirching shellacking in her home state primary. Haley laid out a stinging character study of the former president in an interview with Jake Tapper on Thursday.
Grouping Trump with President Joe Biden, she said it was “absurd” that the country would be stuck with two 80-year-old candidates. (Biden is 81 and Trump is 77.) She warned that Trump has had some “confused moments” in recent days, and she rebuked the ex-president for a “temper tantrum” on the night of his New Hampshire primary win when he tried to push her out of the race. In recent campaign events, Haley has also questioned Trump’s morality and capacity to tell right from wrong.
Her harsh turn against the boss she once served as US ambassador to the United Nations begs the question of why, after months of dancing around Trump’s character issues, legal quagmire and assault on democracy, she’s finally getting tough.
Has Haley found her voice, located a sweet spot where she can target the former president or decided to commit to a new hardline strategy that she thinks might bring down the overwhelming favorite for his third straight nomination?
Or is Haley simply joining the long and inglorious tradition of Republican candidates who lash out at Trump only when they’ve already been effectively crushed by him, including the unhappy Florida trio of former Gov. Jeb Bush and Sen. Marco Rubio in 2016 and current Gov. Ron DeSantis at the end of his misfiring 2024 race? DeSantis struggled with how to deal with Trump for his entire campaign and he only let loose with searing attacks against his former mentor when his cause already seemed hopeless ahead of his second place finish in Iowa last month.
DeSantis criticized Trump for not showing up to debates and claimed that the conservative media acted as a “Praetorian guard” to protect him. “You can be the most worthless Republican in America, but if you kiss the ring, he’ll say you are wonderful,” DeSantis said. Ironically, the comments by DeSantis directly predicted how the ex-president behaved toward him when DeSantis pulled out and promptly endorsed a man who had subjected him to the cruelest of character attacks for months.
Haley is insisting that her campaign is, unlike that of DeSantis, built for a prolonged delegate fight against Trump and is pledging to stay in the race long after her home state’s Republican primary on February 24.
“Why is the political elite pushing us to name a nominee when only two states have voted? There are 48 states and more territories that haven’t voted. In the delegate count you need 1,215 delegates. Donald Trump has 32. I have 17. Why would we stop now?” Haley asked a crowd in Hilton Head on Thursday.
Haley goes after Trump — up to a point
Haley, while noticeably sharpening her tone, has not adopted the full-on, point of no return attacks on Trump over his perceived unfitness for office or his assault on democracy like those fired off by her former Republican primary rival Chris Christie or from ex-Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney. Such rhetoric offers a fast one-way ticket out of Republican politics and there’s no sign yet Haley wants to risk any future presidential prospects, assuming that she doesn’t pull off a massive upset this year.
But taking on Trump directly is risky. Few Republicans emerge unscathed from a direct confrontation with the former president given his extraordinary hold over the party’s base voters and acidic tongue. The plain truth is that Trump is willing and able to hit far lower than any candidate who attacks him. But can Haley, in a losing cause, draw a line that will allow her to tell voters in a future presidential race that she predicted an eventual Trump loss to Biden or his chaotic and lawless second term? Or will her new willingness to face down the ex-president so enrage him and alienate his supporters that she hurts her future viability?
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