by Prominent Democratic donors, concerned about Donald J. Trump’s increasingly authoritarian language, have been calling on Democratic and independent voters to thwart the former president’s comeback by voting for Nikki Haley in the open Republican primary.
But Haley’s political gaffe Wednesday night, when the presidential hopeful and former South Carolina governor stumbled over the causes of the Civil War without mentioning slavery, may make that appeal considerably more difficult just as she It is getting closer and closer to slavery. striking distance from Mr. Trump in New Hampshire.
On Thursday, Ms. Haley backtracked on her answer about the causes of the Civil War, telling a New Hampshire interviewer: “Of course, the Civil War had to do with slavery.”
His withdrawal came about 12 hours after a public meeting in Berlin, NH, a state central to his presidential ambitions, where he was asked about the origins of the Civil War. His response focused on government overreach and “the freedoms of what people could and couldn’t do,” after he jokingly told the questioner that he had asked a difficult question. He then noticed that she had not uttered the word “slavery.”
“What do you want me to say about slavery?” Mrs. Haley responded. “Next question.”
Democrats savagely attacked his response. The Democratic National Committee called his comments “vile” and his cleanup efforts “pathetic.” Late Wednesday night, even President Biden rebuked her: “It was about slavery.” wrote on social media.
All of this occurred a month after Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JPMorgan Chase and a prominent democratic donorthrew his support behind Ms. Haley and implored other donors at the New York Times’ DealBook Summit: “Even if you’re a very liberal Democrat, I urge you to help Nikki Haley, too.”
Reid Hoffman, the billionaire co-founder of LinkedIn and a major Democratic donor, donated $250,000 to a super PAC supporting Ms. Haley.
With recent polls showing Ms. Haley rising to second place In New Hampshire, his crossover appeal is becoming more relevant, both to independents and Democrats who might have registered as independents to vote in the Jan. 23 Republican primary, the first in the country. To win the Granite State race, he will most likely need those voters, just as Sen. John McCain of Arizona did when he defeated George W. Bush in the state’s 2000 primary.
“If Democrats believe Republicans should hold their noses and vote for Joe Biden for the sake of democracy, they can model that in New Hampshire by crossing over and holding their noses to vote for Haley in the GOP primary,” said Ian Bassin , a defender of democracy. advocate who recently won a MacArthur Foundation award “Genius” scholarship for his work. “Not because he is a good candidate (she is not), but because Donald Trump is an existential threat to the United States and any vote to stop him is a service to the country.”
Ms. Haley didn’t help that cause this week. Speech on the radio show “The Pulse of New HampshireOn Thursday morning, Haley, who removed the famous Confederate battle flag from the South Carolina Capitol grounds in Columbia, attempted to make amends: “Yes, I know it was about slavery. “I’m from the South.”
But he also suggested that the question had not come from a Republican voter but from a political detractor, accusing Biden and Democrats of “sending plants” to their town hall events.
“Why are they hitting me? See this for what it is,” she said, adding, “They want to run against Trump.”
His comments on the Civil War did not disappear. By Thursday afternoon, the campaigns of all of his rivals for the Republican nomination, including Trump and Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, had criticized his gaffe. DeSantis, who clashed with rivals over the summer over Florida’s educational standards for teaching slavery, accused her of having “some problems with some basic aspects of American history.”
He said, “It is not that difficult to identify and recognize the role that slavery played in the Civil War.”
The campaign of former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, Trump’s most outspoken critic in the field, vowed to keep his response to the Civil War at the forefront. “She didn’t say what she said last night and today about this because she’s stupid,” Christie said Thursday night at a campaign event in Epping, NH. “She’s not, she’s smart and she knows better.” He added: “The reason she did it is just as bad, if not worse, and she made everyone worry about her candidacy. She did it because she is not willing to offend anyone by telling the truth.”
Ms. Haley’s allies rushed to her defense. Tom Davis, a Haley surrogate and a Republican state senator in South Carolina, said he understood that “harsh nudges and tough questions” were part of any presidential campaign, but argued that his critics had no place educating Ms. Haley, an Indian-American woman raised in the rural South, about racial division, racism and slavery.
“This space here is where Nikki Haley needs no defense,” she said, noting her historic victory as the first woman of color to lead the state.
Haley’s comments echoed a 150-year-old argument by segregationists that the Civil War was fundamentally a question of states’ rights and economics, not about ending slavery. “I think the cause of the Civil War was basically how the government was going to function.” she said Wednesday night“the freedoms and what people could and could not do.”
On Thursday he attempted to walk back that interpretation, asking: “What’s the lesson in all this? That freedom matters. And individual rights and freedoms are important for all people. That is the blessing of America. That was a stain on America when we had slavery. But what we want is to never relive it again. Never let anyone take those freedoms away from you again.”
Some Democrats implored potential crossover voters to stick with Haley as the most plausible alternative to Trump. On Thursday, the Trump campaign launched new TV ad with the kind of violent and fear-mongering images that Democrats promoting Ms. Haley have denounced, warning of “the possibility of a Hamas attack” against the United States.
“The 2024 election revolves around Donald Trump, whose promised governing strategy is political violence and retaliation,” said Dmitri Mehlhorn, a prominent Democratic donor and financial executive with close ties to Hoffman. “If we really want to stop him and his MAGA allies who instigated and are still defending January 6, we have to swallow hard and join anyone who can beat them.”
Haley’s appeal as a moderation candidate is mixed. As governor of South Carolina, she signed some of the toughest immigration and anti-abortion laws in the country at the time, as well as a strict voter ID law that required photo ID at the polls.
But he also blocked a bill to prevent transgender youth from using bathrooms that corresponded to their gender identity and won national praise for his push to lower the Confederate battle flag after a white supremacist opened fire, killing nine black worshipers. at a Charleston church, including a beloved state senator, in 2015.
Now, on the campaign trail, she has tried to put a softer tone on her record and some of the thornier issues facing her party, trying to thread the abortion needle and presenting herself as a mother and daughter of immigrants who is willing to help. turn the page in the country’s era of divisive politics.
“Haley’s refusal to speak honestly about slavery or race in America is a sad betrayal of her own history,” said Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif.
Still, several Democratic state lawmakers who worked with her on the effort to remove the flag said they saw parallels between her comments this week and those she made in a 2010 interview with leaders of Confederate heritage groups, in which she argued that the Confederate flag was “not a racist thing” but about tradition and heritage. In that exchange, she also said that she could leverage her identity as a minority woman to defend herself against calls to boycott the flag.
After the church shooting shook South Carolina, Ms. Haley took advantage of new political will among state lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, prompting accusations from some that the heavy lifting to remove the flag had taken place in the state Legislature.
“If she hadn’t supported lowering the flag, yes, it would have been a lot harder to lower it; I think that’s true,” said Vincent Sheheen, a former Democratic state senator in South Carolina who ran unsuccessfully against Haley. in 2010 and 2014. “But the key was putting her in a box where she had to support a club.”
Davis, the Haley ally who was elected in 2008 and was serving in the state Legislature at the time, argued that it was Haley who helped frame the debate as a matter of “reciprocal grace,” telling him and others that the forgiveness that The families of the victims had shown the murderer it was an act that had to be reciprocated.
“To say this would have happened without her, to minimize her role, that is not correct,” he said, recalling the political blowback he faced over the decision. “It was not a safe political position for her, especially in the Republican Party.”
Nicolas Nehamas and Christopher Cameron contributed reports.
