Nikki Haley presidential plans could jump-start the 2024 GOP primary
Katherine Doyle
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Former South Carolina Gov. and U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley’s entry into the 2024 presidential race could be the tipping point for a swell of Republicans sizing up their prospects.
Haley would be the first Republican candidate to venture into the field since former President Donald Trump announced his bid late last year, a move viewed as an attempt to stifle a bubbling swell of potential challengers. For months, the tactic has held.
But a forthcoming announcement by Haley may soon upend this dynamic.
“The other potential candidates are going to be watching very carefully to see whether Trump goes after her aggressively,” said Dan Schnur, a former Republican strategist who is now a politics professor at the University of California, Berkeley and the University of Southern California. “If he doesn’t, then this could end up keying a lot of other entries into the race.”
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After teasing a run for weeks, Haley is expected to formalize her intentions at a Feb. 15 event in Charleston hosted by her political action committee, according to an invitation obtained by the Washington Examiner. Haley will then head to New Hampshire before arriving in Iowa for events beginning on Feb. 20, a source familiar confirmed.
Details of Haley’s plans began to leak as Trump teed up visits to two of the three Republican nominating states last weekend, rolling out his leadership team in South Carolina after a stop in New Hampshire. The former president revealed how Haley had called him to say she was considering entering the race and noted her one-time promise not to run against him.
Yet in an interview with Hugh Hewitt on Thursday, Trump appeared to offer Haley his encouragement despite her pledge. “She’s a very ambitious person. She just couldn’t stay in a seat. I said, ‘You know what, Nikki, if you want to run, you go ahead and run,’” Trump told the radio talk show host.
The tone marks a shift for the former president, who has gone on the offensive against other potential rivals, lately stepping up his criticism of Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL).
Haley’s prospects are still coming into view after notching third place in a poll of Republican primary voters in New Hampshire last week, with 8%. In the same University of New Hampshire survey, DeSantis outpaced the former president by 12 percentage points, 42% to 30%.
Nationally, Haley is polling at about 3%, a factor that is prompting questions about her base of support as other Republicans gear up for their own runs.
Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) is headed to South Carolina and Iowa this month on a listening tour. Scott is polling a slim 2 percentage points above Haley in a recent survey of voters in their home state.
Other potential rivals are stepping up their attacks.
Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo alleged that Haley sought to oust former Vice President Mike Pence from Trump’s 2020 reelection ticket in a plan to replace him.
As U.N. ambassador, Haley frustrated senior Trump administration officials by meeting with Trump directly, bypassing the chain of command, a former adviser told the Washington Examiner. Others questioned her decision to step down from the post before the end of Trump’s term.
Scrutiny of Haley’s tenure is unlikely to slow, with rivals seizing on her criticism of Trump, including in the days after Jan. 6.
“It looks like she’s trying to straddle between two lanes,” Schnur said, attempting to appease both “the pro-Trump party” and the “pre-Trump party.”
Haley’s experience lends her another potential advantage, he said: “It gives her a level of credibility on foreign policy. But it also might establish her credentials more broadly.”
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Haley has hinted at leveraging other parts of her background.
In a recent interview with Sean Hannity, the Fox News host ticked through a list of Republicans expected to face off in the race for the nomination.
Haley added, “Most of them are my friends.” She then quipped, “Let the best woman win.”