Op-ed by Alex Caldwell | Photo: Alamy
As the nation continues voting in the first contests for the 2024 GOP primary, it is clear that only one of the candidates in the race believes in putting “America First,” and it’s not Nikki Haley.
With Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis bowing out of the race, the primaries now come down to President Trump and the former South Carolina governor turned U.N. Ambassador, who previously claimed she “would not run” if the president did.
While Haley’s chances of defeating the president are seemingly non-existent, many voters still may remain undecided as to whether they should support a typical politician like Nikki Haley.
However, a Haley presidency would be disastrous for Americans, and a step back into an establishment Republican Party of old seen during the days of George Bush and Dick Cheney, for the following reasons:
1) On Social Security: “Change the retirement age…”
Nikki Haley has received criticism from Americans on both sides of the political aisle because of her promises to overhaul Social Security and Medicare minimum age requirements, particularly for younger Americans.
While participating in one presidential primary debate in Des Moines, Iowa, on Jan. 10, Haley promised that if elected, she would “change the retirement age to reflect life expectancy” in order to reduce spending on Social Security.
After CNN’s Jake Tapper asked for clarification on whether this meant voters should “plan on having to work until they’re 70,” Haley said that Americans, specifically younger ones, “should plan on their retirement age being increased” because they can likely expect to work longer than current workers.
“They should plan on their retirement age being increased,” claimed Haley. “Yes, we’re going to change it to reflect more black life expectancy should be.”
According to the CDC, U.S. life expectancy averages 73.5 years for men and 79.3 for women. Americans born in 1960 or after must also wait until they are the age of 67 to collect their full retirement benefits, U.S. law dictates.
While Haley has not explicitly stated which age she would raise for eligibility to Social Security, Americans still would not have access to their benefits until reaching at least the age of 68, or possibly older, according to her non-specific plan.
During a rally in Manchester, New Hampshire, on Saturday, President Trump vocalized harsh criticisms towards his former U.N. Ambassador over her supposed plans for Social Security, claiming that if she raised the retirement age to match life expectancy, Americans would have to work their “entire life.”
The Trump campaign also released a new radio ad on Friday, where Haley is heard arguing that “65 is way too low” of an age to be receiving benefits for Social Security and Medicare.
The commercial also claimed that “Haley’s plan raises the age for collecting Social Security all the way to 75.”
2) A Republican’s Democrat-funded presidential campaign
President Trump has repeatedly accused the Haley campaign of receiving donations from Democrat-funded groups with ties to “globalists” and individuals like George Soros.
Trump claimed she made an “unholy alliance with the RINOs” and “Never Trumpers,” accusing her campaign of tunneling their funds in order to “turn out liberal voters” in a Republican primary.
Additionally, Haley’s candidacy has not exactly seen a culmination of conservative support, with nearly half of her caucusgoers from Iowa indicating that they would rather support Joe Biden instead of Trump in 2024.
An NBC News/Des Moines Register/Mediacom poll published one day before the state’s caucus reported that 43 percent of Haley supporters would back Biden if Trump won the primaries.
Furthermore, Tyler Clark, the Haley campaign’s state director in New Hampshire, allegedly worked for a group called the Sixteen Thirty Fund, a dark money group that provided $410 million in funds to Biden and Democrats in 2020, according to a report from the Washington Examiner.
Millions of dollars in grants toward the liberal group came from an organization called Open Society Foundations, whose founder is none other than George Soros.
Per New York Post, Sixteen Thirty Fund also launched a group called Demand Justice, which supposedly spent $5 million in 2018 to block the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to the U.S. Supreme Court.
While speaking in Manchester on Friday, President Trump suggested that “Radical Left Democrats” are supporting Haley because “they know she’s easy to beat.”
Trump argued, “All you need to know about Nikki Haley is that every corrupt and sinister group that we’ve been fighting for the past seven years is on her side…we can’t take a chance!”
3) Flip-Flops and America Last
Nikki Haley’s policies have seemingly sought to fulfill the interests of other countries rather than of the United States.
For instance, one criticism against the former governor, particularly from President Trump, is her opposition to his 2017 travel ban of citizens from seven nations in the Middle East for their “repeatedly provided support for acts of international terrorism,” per the law previously signed by then-President Obama.
In 2015, Haley came out against what she dubbed Trump’s “Muslim Ban,” calling it “an embarrassment.” However, she switched gears three years later while serving in the president’s administration and supported a travel ban.
On taxation, Haley supported a slew of tax hikes during her tenure as governor, including increasing South Carolina’s gas tax by 10 cents per gallon over the course of three years.
However, Haley seemingly switched her position on a gas tax and told audience members during a campaign event at St. Anselm College in New Hampshire, telling audience members that she would “completely eliminate” a national gas tax.
Haley also supported the Fair Tax Act in 2012, a bill that would have created a national sales tax of 23 percent in 2025.
Regarding her foreign policy vision, Haley has vehemently supported the mass spending of money and resources for the Ukrainians in their prolonged war against Russia, saying the war “should matter to Americans.”
“This war is bigger than Ukraine. This war is about freedom, and it’s one we have to win,” Haley stated during a town hall with CNN in June.
Haley added, “To say that we should stay neutral, it is in the best interest of America, it is the best interest of our national security for Ukraine to win. We have to see this through. We have to finish it.”
Haley’s response has been met with staunch opposition and chagrin from other candidates, particularly President Trump and businessman and former contender Vivek Ramaswamy.
During an exclusive interview with RSBN in February 2023, Trump said he could negotiate an end to the war “within 24 hours” and that “it would have never started” if he were president.
“It can be negotiated, I think, within 24 hours,” said Trump. “It really has to be done from the office of the president, and you have to get [Volodymyr Zelensky and Vladimir Putin] in a room.”
Ramaswamy, meanwhile, accused Haley of supporting a continuation of war efforts, claiming that she would “send your kids to die so she can buy a bigger house.”
Following Ramaswamy’s accusation during a presidential debate, Haley stared with a blank expression, which prompted further criticism from her opponent.
“I mean, she has no idea what the hell the names of those provinces are that you want to send our sons, daughters, and our military equipment to go and fight,” said Ramaswamy.
“Somebody had a cup of coffee, sat in the U.N., and made 8 million bucks after having real foreign experience. It takes an outsider to see—look at that blank expression,” he concluded.
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