Nikki Haley announces 2024 presidential bid

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Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley mocked the collection of GOP politicians who are still considering a bid for the presidency but haven't yet announced they're running.

"Don't wait around for the guys who are sitting on the sidelines unable to make up their mind," she said Saturday at an exclusive donor retreat in Palm Beach, Florida, where the Club for Growth, a conservative group, is holding a donor retreat with multiple potential presidential candidates.

"Once I decided I was going to run, I didn't see the point in waiting. When it comes to saving America, being decisive matters," she said at the beginning of her remarks.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis spoke on Thursday at the retreat, while former Vice President Mike Pence addressed the gathering on Friday. Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, whom Haley first appointed to the position in 2012, is also speaking on Saturday.

New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu and biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy also spoke at the retreat. Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin were both invited to the Club for Growth retreat but couldn't attend, according to a source familiar with the planning.

But Haley's focus on Republicans didn't stop at her potential primary opponents. She also took issue with "the last two Republican presidents" who, she noted, both added to the national debt, though she didn't explicitly name former presidents Donald Trump and George W. Bush.

"Lots of Republican politicians love spending and wasting taxpayer money almost as much as Democrats. The last two Republican presidents added more than $10 trillion to the national debt. Think about that. A third of our debt happened under just two Republicans," she said.

"If we nominate another big spender in 2024, we're going to lose," she added.

In her remarks, Haley also suggested Club donors look at supporting primary challengers against the 158 House Republicans who voted for the recent omnibus spending bill. She derided them as "squishy Republicans" and criticized them and blamed them for getting "the ball rolling" for "trillion-dollar pandemic blowouts."

"Don't let the media tell you Republicans and Democrats can't work together. They always seem to work just fine when they're spending your money," she said.

Haley also said she's "not afraid" to talk about "saving" Social Security and Medicare. The question of whether the two programs should be reformed has exposed some rifts in the 2024 field, with Haley and Pence arguing changes are needed to keep the programs alive in the long term.

She will surely be denounced as a traitor to Trump. And, she isn't exactly White enough for the Repugs' White Nationalist base.

Black voters remember her standing by the confederate flag. when she was elected and her recent attack on a african american democrat candidate saying he should be deported (consider the irony and audacity for her to say the latter).

And she is not a dude. Plenty of antidotal evidence that there is a gender double standard when it comes to judging candidates. I was listening to podcast where the guest a long time political advisor was Republican candidates. He said she does not believe in anything and has a reputation in the party of being ruthless. Those qualities especially the last one are viewed as positives for male candidates.

The double standard is not a MAGA thing, it is universal. That does not mean a women candidate can not win, they can and do. It means they start out with a disadvantage.

She got the legislature to have the flag taken down after black parishioners were massacred in their church by a terrorist who posted photos of the flag before the attack. She later said the flag represents “service, sacrifice and heritage” to some South Carolinians but the terrorist hijacked it, thus the flag had to come down..

Republican 2024 presidential candidate Nikki Haley said the United States should change the retirement age for citizens currently in their 20s.

Haley, former United Nations ambassador and former governor of South Carolina, also expressed interest in limiting Social Security and Medicare benefits for wealthier residents of the U.S. in an interview on Thursday. Haley's position on reform follows weeks of President Joe Biden and Democrats attacking Republicans for trying to gut the programs.

“What you would do is, for those in their 20s coming into the system, we would change the retirement age so that it matches life expectancy,” Haley said on Fox News.

Haley did not specify what the new age for the younger U.S. residents would be, only saying it would be "the new ones coming in."

"It’s those in their 20s that are coming in," she said. "You’re coming to them, and you’re saying the game has changed. We’re going to do this completely differently.”

The earliest age a person can retire to start receiving monthly Social Security payments in the U.S. is 62. The amount of these payments will vary depending on when a person decides to retire, with those who choose to retire at a later age receiving higher payments than those who retire earlier, according to the Social Security Administration.

The fundraising numbers Republican presidential hopeful Nikki Haley's campaign filed for the first three months of 2023 came in lower than the numbers her campaign touted in a press release last week.

Her campaign had claimed she raised $11 million since she announced she was running for president in mid-February — and had made it a central point in slamming her most prominent GOP primary opponent, former President Donald Trump.

But according to financial disclosure forms publicly released on Saturday, Haley's campaign raised $3.3 million in contributions. Another $1.8 million was transferred from her joint fundraising committee, for a total of $5.1 million in receipts.

Haley's joint committee, Team Stand For America, is a combination of three separate entities: her presidential campaign; her leadership PAC Stand for America, and a super PAC that supports her candidacy, SFA Inc.

Stand for America, the leadership PAC, raised about $600,000, and received a transfer from the joint committee of $886,000, for a total of nearly $1.5 million. There are limitations to the way these funds can be used — money raised for Haley's leadership PAC may be spent to help other candidates, but it cannot be spent on her own presidential candidacy.

The joint committee received $4.4 million — but that total included the funds that were transferred — $1.8 million to her campaign, and $886,000 to her leadership PAC.

The FEC filings show Haley received about $8.3 million in contributions across all three affiliated campaign entities, rather than the $11 million in the press release.

Her campaign told CBS News that it stands firm on the dollar figure it originally reported, claiming there are multiple entities allowed to fundraise in a political campaign, and it's standard procedure in other campaigns to consolidate fundraising figures.

But Haley's campaign did not address the $2.7 million it appears to have double-counted in arriving at its $11 million total.

Haley's campaign had used her inflated fundraising to mock Trump, bragging that her $11 million was "more than Donald Trump raised in his first quarter in this race, and more than nearly all the Republican presidential candidates in 2016 raised in their first quarter."

While Haley is one of only a few candidates so far to declare she is running, the race for major donors has already begun — and fundraising numbers are often cited as signs of enthusiasm for a candidate long before any votes are cast. And the more money raised overall, the campaign can use for travel, events and staff hires.

GOP presidential candidate Nikki Haley took aim at President Joe Biden's age in a bid to undermine his campaign on Wednesday, predicting that he won't live until the end of a second term.

"I think we can all be very clear and say with a matter of fact that if you vote for Joe Biden, you really are counting on a President Harris," Haley said in an interview on the Fox News show "America Reports."

"Because the idea that he would make it until 86 years old is not something that I think is likely," she told hosts Sandra Smith and John Roberts.

Haley, 51, previously called for mandatory "mental competency tests" for politicians older than 75, also taking a swipe at former President Donald Trump's age.

Nikki Haley mocked Joe Biden for his age, predicting that he'll die in 5 years and won't live to see the end of a second term

This candidate is ageist as f**k.

Breaking with Trump and DeSantis, Haley makes the case for Ukraine
While Trump and DeSantis have made headlines with their wobbly positions on the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Haley made a clear case for continued American involvement in the war, arguing that victory for Russia would set off an even more deadly global crisis.

“This is bigger than Ukraine,” Haley said during the CNN town hall, “this is a war about freedom and it’s one we have to win.

Haley’s comments represented a clear break from Trump, who appointed her ambassador to the United Nations, who has often touted his good relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin – a man she labeled a tyrant.

“For them to sit there and say this is just a territorial dispute, that’s just not the case,” Haley added in a barb aimed for DeSantis who initially labeled the war that way before backtracking.

Haley explains federal role on abortion
Haley said she believes there is a “federal role” in restricting abortion rights. But she wouldn’t directly answer questions about at what point in pregnancies she would seek to outlaw abortion.

Instead, Haley said she would seek a consensus that could clear the House and the Senate’s 60-vote threshold to end a filibuster.

She said she believes such a consensus measure would include banning late-term abortions, encouraging adoptions, making contraceptives more widely available and making clear that women who have abortions would not be jailed.

“Can’t we start there? Because what the politicos and what the media have done is they’ve made you demonize the situation when it’s so personal that we have to humanize the situation,” Haley said. “Our goal should always be, how do we save as many babies as we can, and support as many mothers as we do it.”

She said she is “unapologetically pro-life” because her husband was adopted and she “had trouble having both of my children.”

But, Haley added, “I don’t judge anyone for being pro-choice any more than I want them to judge me for being pro-life.”

Haley comes out against ‘red flag’ gun laws
Haley for the first time on the trail came out against gun restrictions known as “red flag” laws, which allow officials to temporarily take away firearms from people determined by a judge to be a threat to themselves or others.

“I don’t trust the government to deal with red flag laws. I don’t trust that they won’t take them away from people who rightfully deserve to have them,” Haley said. “Because you’ve got someone else judging whether someone else should have a gun or not.”

Haley questions GOP frontrunners over Social Security and Medicare promises
Haley accused Trump and DeSantis of failing to level with Americans about the sustainability of popular programs like Medicare and Social Security, arguing that big changes need to be made to keep both solvent.

“I think they’re not being honest with the American people,” Haley said of her GOP primary rivals, who have both promised not to touch entitlements.

On the trail, Haley has called for raising the retirement age for people currently in their 20s and limiting Social Security and Medicare benefits for wealthier Americans.

In a statement, the Democratic National Committee’s rapid response team accused Haley of “shamelessly campaigning to end Social Security and Medicare as we know it — which would hurt hard working families and seniors across the country.”

‘I think it was a terrible day’
Haley said her former boss, Trump, is wrong to defend the events of January 6, 2021, when his supporters rioted at the US Capitol as Congress counted electoral college votes.

“He thinks it was a beautiful day; I think it was a terrible day. I’ll always stand by that,” she said.

Haley did not repeat the wild conspiracy theories that Trump and his supporters have spread about the 2020 election, and she acknowledged that “President Biden is the president.”

She said, though, that while it wouldn’t have changed the outcome of the 2020 election, efforts to expand voting access during the pandemic in 2020 were problematic. And she endorsed “election integrity” laws such as voter identification requirements that many Republican-led states have enacted since then. Many critics have said those laws will make it more difficult for some people, especially marginalized groups, to cast ballots.

Haley slams DeSantis over Disney row
As DeSantis’ clash with Disney heads to a courtroom, Haley described the Florida governor’s fight with the entertainment company as a sign of “hypocrisy” and criticized him using public funds to pursue a private grudge.

Noting DeSantis’ once-clubby relationship with Disney and its top executives, Haley said his sudden reversal – following Disney’s opposition to his so-called “Don’t Say Gay” legislation – was petty and a waste of resources.

“Because they went and criticized him, now he’s going to spend taxpayer dollars on a lawsuit,” Haley said, before adding a jab that might as well have been aimed at Trump too. “All this vendetta stuff, we’ve been down that road,” she said, “we can’t go down that (road).”

“Pick up the phone, settle it the way you should,” Haley said.

The former South Carolina governor did not fault DeSantis over the law itself, saying she would have gone further than Florida Republicans did in the original bill, which forbade “classroom discussion about sexual orientation or gender identity (for young students),” as its authors wrote in a preamble.

“They should not be talking to our kids about gender, period,” Haley said of educators. “That’s what parents talk to our kids about.”

Haley says she would end tech exports to China
Haley staked out a tough approach to China, saying the country “without question is our No. 1 national security threat.”

She said she would not seek to restrict trade with China on consumer goods and agricultural products. But she said she would seek to stop U.S. exports of tech equipment to China.

She also said the coronavirus pandemic revealed the United States’ over-reliance on Chinese goods.

“What I will focus on is when I become president, the very first day you look at it and say, if China pulls the rug out from us tomorrow, would we be ready? Would we be safe?” Haley said.

Haley said she would sanction China for its role in supplying fentanyl that arrives in the United States, often via Mexican cartels.

“There’s nothing that they dislike more than when we hit their wallet,” she said.

She stopped short, though, of endorsing President Joe Biden’s position that US forces would defend Taiwan if China invades.

“No, what I will tell you is, we are going to make sure they have the equipment, the ammunition and the training to win themselves,” Haley said.

Republican 2024 presidential contender Nikki Haley suggested Sunday night that transgender girls in sports are leading to suicidal ideation in teenage girls.

Haley, a former South Carolina governor and ambassador to the United Nations, made the comment during a CNN town hall event in Iowa when host Jake Tapper asked her how she would define "woke."

"There’s a lot of things. I mean, you want to start with biological boys playing in girl sports. That’s one thing," Haley said. "The fact that we have gender pronoun classes in the military now, I mean, all of these things that are pushing what a small minority want on the majority of Americans, it’s too much. It’s too much."

Haley continued by saying, "The women's issue of our time" is "the idea that we have biological boys playing in girls’ sports."

"My daughter ran track in high school. I don’t even know how I would have that conversation with her," she added. "How are we supposed to get our girls used to the fact that biological boys are in their locker rooms? And then we wonder why a third of our teenage girls seriously contemplated suicide last year. We should be growing strong girls, confident girls."

In a statement to NBC News, Haley doubled-down on her comments.

"We have to grow strong girls, and that is being threatened right now," she said. "Whether it’s biological boys going into girls’ locker rooms or playing in girls’ sports, women are being told their voices don’t matter. If you think this kind of aggressive bullying isn’t part of the problem, you’re not paying attention."

Tyler Black, a child and adolescent psychiatrist who studies suicide and mental health at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, tweeted, "If there is one thing that I can promise in this world, and stake my entire knowledge and expertise as a suicidologist on, it’s that young teenaged girls are not made more suicidal by the presence of trans people."

Dr. Anne Marie Albano, a clinical psychologist and founder of Columbia University's clinic for anxiety and related disorders, tweeted, "If Nikki Haley cared about kids, she’d state that surveys show teens are worried about violence & hate being perpetrated against their peers, about gun violence, climate & political unrest in the US. And, she’d do something about all that & not tell lies."

Albano shared a graphic showing issues that young people have worried about, including school shootings, climate change and technology.

"Clinical psychologist here," Heather O’Beirne Kelly, a clinical psychologist and suicide prevention advocate, tweeted. "Nikki Haley’s suggestion that trans youth are responsible for girls’ elevated suicide risks is disgusting. Let’s also be clear that the suicide rate for trans youth is sky high — they need support, not blame from a politician seeking the presidency."

Chasten Buttigieg, husband of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, tweeted, "Nikki Haley suggesting that 1/3 of American teenage girls are contemplating suicide because of the existence of trans people is an unserious, untrue, and hateful thing to say. But hate is the point, isn’t it?"

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has released comprehensive studies about a rise in suicidal ideation in teenage girls and LGBTQ+ students, but no connection was drawn between the presence of transgender youth and those thoughts in teenage girls.

And she is not a dude. Plenty of antidotal evidence