Presidential hopeful Nikki Haley on Monday night held the first of two town halls in Iowa this week where she said Hawkeye State residents should vote for her over Trump because she doesn’t think ‘you have to be 80 to be in D.C.’
Since throwing her name into the 2024 GOP primary last week, Haley has been asked during cable news appearances – and now a town hall – to differentiate herself from the only other candidate in the race so far: former President Trump.
Each time the former ambassador and South Carolina governor’s answer has been light on policy differences and focused on the fact that she is a younger, fresher face who can help move the party forward.
‘Because I don’t think you have to be 80 to be in D.C.,’ Haley, a 51-year-old mother of two, responded Monday evening to a question from the crowd just outside Des Moines, Iowa.
And again on Monday, Trump’s United Nations ambassador showed no daylight between herself and her former boss from a policy perspective.
‘President Trump is my friend. I think he was the right president at the right time,’ she said. ‘I was proud to serve in his Cabinet.’
‘All the media and everybody wants to talk about is the past. We need to leave the status quo in the past and we’ve got work to do.’
Presidential hopeful Nikki Haley on Monday night held the first of two town halls in Iowa this week where she said Hawkeye State residents should vote for her over Trump because she doesn’t think ‘you have to be 80 to be in D.C’
Haley insisted she was the right age for the presidency after CNN’s Don Lemon was suspended for insinuating she was ‘past her prime’ as a woman and The View’s Whoopi Goldberg said she was ‘not a new generation.’
Haley made waves in her campaign announcement speech last week when she called for term limits and mental competency tests for lawmakers who are older than 75.
‘That’s not being disrespectful, that’s transparency,’ Haley said.
‘Bernie Sanders lost his mind yesterday, for those that are defensive about it you are exactly the reason we need it,’ she continued. Sanders, 81, called the idea of such tests ‘absurd.’
Iowa GOP Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks, who appeared at the event, told DailyMail.com Haley’s call for competency tests was a ‘source of marital discord.’
‘I think term limits are called when people vote people out of office,’ she said.
Miller-Meeks did not endorse Haley but said she would offer a candidate her endorsement after she sees how the full field shakes out.
Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds introduced Haley, calling the South Carolina governor a ‘really good friend’ and said it would be a ‘really big mistake’ to underestimate her.
And in what could have been a veiled shot at another potential rival – Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis – Haley repeatedly called Reynolds the ‘best governor in the country – hands down.’
Haley did mock the outrage over DeSantis’ so-called ‘Don’t say gay’ bill, which forbids talk of sexual orientation before fourth grade in Florida public schools.
Haley insisted she was the right age for the presidency after CNN’s Don Lemon was suspended for insinuating she was ‘past her prime’ as a woman and The View’s Whoopi Goldberg said she was ‘not a new generation’
Haley speaks to voters at town hall event in Urbandale, Iowa
‘I don’t even think it goes far enough,’ Haley said of the bill.
She told a story about how her dad would not sign her permission slip to have sex education in the seventh grade. ‘I was the uncool kid in the classroom next door.’
The ex-ambassador and governor took aim at both parties in Congress for bringing back earmarks, pet projects that they can get funded through appropriations bills.
‘Earmarks are now the norm – Republicans and Democrats both did that.’
Haley decried what she described as a ‘national self-loathing’ and called the Chinese spy balloon debacle an ’embarrassment’ that she traced back to the Afghanistan withdrawal, as she did with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
‘If we would not have had that debacle in Afghanistan none of this would’ve happened,’ Haley said. ‘The idea that we would leave Bagram Air Force base in the middle of the night … think about what that told our friends.’
Haley said she was ‘disappointed’ India, where her parents emigrated from was not with the U.S. in supporting Ukraine. ‘The reason India isn’t with us they don’t trust that we’ll win. They don’t trust that we have the spirit to finish it.’
‘We have to finish this,’ she said of the U.S.’s support for Ukraine, while making clear she didn’t support U.S. boots on the ground or a ‘blank check.’
‘I am never for giving money – I am for giving military equipment.’
And in remarks that harken back to the Trump era, she said: ‘We’ve got to get all those other NATO countries and say what are you giving? What are you getting? Because this is not just us.’
Haley told of the time Trump called and asked her to represent the U.S. before the United Nations. ‘I said I don’t even know what the United Nations does I just know that everybody hates it.’
‘You can’t buy a nation that says death to America – quit giving them money,’ she said, boasting that she pushed Trump to cut off aid to Pakistan.
Iowa appearances are key for presidential hopefuls due to the state’s first-in-the-nation caucuses.
Haley’s only formal rival in the race so far, former President Trump, has not planned any appearances in Iowa, though he announced the hiring of his key campaign staff in the Hawkeye State on Monday.
Instead Trump is heading to East Palestine, Ohio – the site of a train derailment that led to the town’s evacuation – where he’ll pay a visit before even President Biden and Transportation Sec. Pete Buttigieg.
The former president hired state Rep. Bobby Kaufman and Eric Branstad, the son of his former China ambassador Terry Branstad, as senior advisers and Marshall Moreau as his state director.
He named Alex Latcham as his early states director, leading operations in the states with early primaries – Iowa, South Carolina, New Hampshire and Nevada.
Branstad worked on Trump’s last two campaigns and was a senior adviser in the Commerce Department under Trump. Latcham worked for Trump as a deputy White House political director.
‘As Democrats destroy decades of tradition, we must always protect Iowa’s First-in-the-Nation Caucuses,’ Trump said in a statement issued through his campaign.
‘I’m the one who did it this time and you will always be first with me. It was my great honor to get $28 billion for our farmers, as China took advantage of them for years. And don’t forget the USMCA, replacement to the horrible NAFTA. With this incredible team of skilled professionals and their deep ties to Iowa, we will earn a dominant victory in the caucuses next year.’
Trump, unlike his rival and other speculative rivals, has in the three months since announcing a bid for the presidency in 2024 not stepped foot in Iowa, the site where his claim on GOP dominance will first be tested next year.
Last week Mike Pence was in Cedar Rapids, Iowa to talk about parents’ rights in transgender policies and this week Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., will kick off his Faith in America listening tour in Des Moines and speak at the Polk County Republicans’ Lincoln Dinner.
Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, also believed to be mulling a run for the presidency, visited Iowa in January and met last week with Republicans in the state legislature in Des Moines.
Instead of Iowa, meanwhile, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis made appearances in New York City, Philadelphia and Chicago on Monday where he accused the city’s liberal lawmakers of trying to ‘out-woke each other’ in part of what his team describes as a pro-police tour.
Haley officially launched her campaign last week where she lives in Charleston, South Carolina.
Haley didn’t mention 76-year-old former President Donald Trump by name as she called for term limits and ‘mandatory mental competency tests’ for politicians over the age of 75.
Haley had a ‘particular message’ for her fellow Republicans.
‘We’ve lost the popular vote in seven of the last eight presidential elections,’ she pointed out. ‘Our cause is right – but we have failed to win the confidence of a majority of Americans.’
