Nikki Haley is inadvertently boosting Donald Trump by refusing to drop out of the presidential race, giving him a much-needed primary opponent and allowing him to rack up victories.
Haley staying in the race – despite her expected embarrassing home state loss on Saturday in South Carolina – will make Trump a stronger general election candidate in the end, despite Haley’s strong criticism of the former president.
The former South Carolina governor has become a pawn of Democrats over the last few months, as she’s escalated her delusional crusade to defeat Trump. She has also galvanized the MAGA crowd and allowed Trump to claim he’s racking up huge primary victories.
When he finally wins the nomination, it will be an earned nomination.
But as a result of her harsh attacks on Trump, she has no chance of winning even if Trump should be forced to withdraw because of bankruptcy or going to jail.
MAGA is never going to embrace her. She’ll be more hated than Liz Cheney.
Haley is Mitt Romney in a skirt. She could be auditioning now for a Cabinet role in the Biden White House or at the least a job as a CNN analyst.
But she’s proven useful to Trump as a foil as he looks to gain momentum for his bid to reclaim the White House.
The former U.N. ambassador is right when she says that voters “deserve a real choice, not a Soviet-style election where there’s only one candidate and he gets 99% of the vote.”
That’s exactly what’s happening on the Democratic side, where President Biden has no serious opponent and yet is watching his approval ratings plummet.
Without a real opponent, voters have instead been focusing on issues like the immigration crisis, inflation and Biden’s age and frailty.
It is pretty bad to lose your home state – as Elizabeth Warren knows.
But Haley is vowing to stick it out even with a landslide loss in South Carolina. She will probably be in the race through at least Super Tuesday, when Trump is expected to rack up nearly enough delegates to clinch the GOP nomination.
No way Haley will ever be Trump’s vice presidential choice or even take his place if something legally prevents Trump from running.
Haley is not viewed as pro-MAGA enough to attract Trump delegates, so it likely would be someone else who takes the mantle should something happen to Trump.
Even if Democrats stop Trump by putting him in jail or bankrupting him, MAGA still wins because Republicans will end up nominating a Trump-like conservative.