HALEY REALLY RUNNING FOR VICE PRESIDENT?
Nikki Haley starts the 2024 presidential race as an underdog. But as she likes to remind her audiences, it’s wrong to underestimate a woman who has never lost a campaign. Her path to the GOP nomination is narrow, but it’s real.
Haley would be a formidable candidate in a typical presidential primary. She earned considerable national attention during her time as South Carolina’s governor and as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. She built on that foundation over the past few years, keeping her name in the public eye with a series of well-publicized speeches. A recent Monmouth poll found she has a higher net favorable rating than former Vice President Mike Pence, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin. She won’t be the favorite among GOP candidates, but she’s clearly in the top tier.
But this is not a genuinely open contest. Former President Donald Trump remains popular among Republicans. And Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has skyrocketed as Trump’s top challenger in national polls. The Monmouth poll found DeSantis is even more popular than Trump with Republicans, and the RealClearPolitics polling average shows him far ahead of other potential Trump challengers. So Haley has to go through two elephants to win the nomination.
Her journey is further complicated by the emerging factional makeup of the GOP electorate. She will not appeal to Trump loyalists so long as the former president is in the race, and the small Never Trump fringe prefers candidates such as former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan or former Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney. That means Haley needs to become the favorite of the other two wings: the Reagan-Bush-leaning Old Guard and the Trump-leaning MAGA Lite crowd. The first group likes oldstyle Republican themes and demeanor whereas the latter wants fighters who hit hard on hot-button issues such as immigration and culture. Knitting both groups together will be difficult.
In her announcement video and speech, she touched on cultural issues such as the left’s attacks on U.S. history as racist. And because she is a child of Indian immigrants, as she never fails to mention at public events, critics will have difficulty painting her as a bigot when she argues that “America isn’t perfect, but the principles at America’s core are perfect.”
Her kickoff contains many provocations that invite Trump to lash out. She says the country is ready for a new generation of leadership and that the GOP has lost the popular vote in seven of the last eight presidential elections — subtle digs against Trump. She also proposes requiring mental competency tests for politicians 75 or older. That applies as much to the 76-year-old Trump as the 80-year-old Biden.
Some pundits say Haley is really running for vice president, given her long odds of success. Her rally provides a tantalizing clue that she might recognize that. The person who introduced her, Rep. Ralph Norman, R-S.C., ended his remarks by referring to her as the “future president of the United States.” Future, not “next”?
This was likely intentional phrasing, given that Norman has known Haley for nearly 20 years. It doesn’t discount the possibility that she might win the nomination, but it also recognizes that becoming DeSantis’s running mate, should he win, would make the 51-yearold Haley the GOP’s heir apparent whether the ticket wins or loses.
That’s the sort of smart, ruthless thinking that has typified Haley’s career. Smarts like that bode well for her long-term prospects — regardless of the short-term result.