The former South Carolina governor’s presidential campaign is caught between two competing versions of the Republican Party.
Nikki Haley announced her presidential campaign from no man’s land on Wednesday. This wasn’t her geographical location — she rolled out her campaign in Charleston, South Carolina, with the usual fanfare and introductory speakers befitting a presidential hopeful. There was a cheering crowd, freshly printed campaign signs, and a blaring soundtrack of ’70s and ’80s rock music. But Haley’s announcement came from an almost existential space as she tried to bridge the Reaganite Republican Party of the past with the Trumpist party of the present.
Before the rise of Trump, Haley’s brand of politics was considered the future of the Republican Party. A former two-term governor of South Carolina, Haley won the 2010 primary as an underdog at the height of the Tea Party movement with the endorsement of Sarah Palin. In office, she seemed the personification of the political id of the moment within the GOP. An ardent fiscal conservative, she also made gestures toward a truce on culture war issues by veering toward the middle. Most notably, Haley pushed to end the display of the Confederate flag at South Carolina’s state capitol after the mass shooting at Mother Emanuel AME church in 2015.
With Trump’s rise, Haley has been left in a sort of limbo. Infamously, she has ping-ponged back and forth over her support for the former president, whom she served as UN ambassador until stepping down at the end of 2018. Shortly after the January 6 attack on the Capitol, she said of Trump, “His actions since Election Day will be judged harshly by history.
