Haley said her priorities as a voter are supporting a president who would back America’s allies and hold its enemies accountable, secure the border, support “capitalism and freedom,” and lower the national debt.
Nikki Haley said Wednesday that she will vote for Donald Trump, despite maintaining he has “not been perfect” on many policies.
During an event at the Hudson Institute in Washington, her first public speaking event since exiting the presidential race in March, Haley said her priorities as a voter are supporting a president who would back America’s allies and hold its enemies accountable, who would secure the border, support “capitalism and freedom,” and who would lower the national debt.
“Trump has not been perfect on these policies. I’ve made that clear many, many times,” Haley said. “But Biden has been a catastrophe.”
“So I will be voting for Trump. Having said that, I stand by what I said in my suspension speech.”
When she announced over two months ago that she was ending her presidential bid, Haley declined to endorse Trump, saying he must work to “earn the votes of those in our party and beyond who did not support him.”
And Haley’s announcement Wednesday of her plans to vote for him this fall hardly amounted to a full-throated endorsement.
“Trump would be smart to reach out to the millions of people who voted for me and continue to support me and not assume that they’re just going to be with him,” she said.
The news came as Haley made her public debut as the Walter P. Stern chair at the conservative Hudson Institute think tank, delivering a blistering rebuke of the growing isolationist wing of her Republican Party, while also slamming President Joe Biden’s foreign policy.
The Biden campaign has sought to pick up Haley’s supporters in key battleground states, particularly as Republican primary voters have continued to cast what amounts to protest votes against Trump by supporting Haley’s now-defunct bid for president.
Throughout her speech Wednesday, Haley offered criticism of both parties, however.
“A loud part of each party wants us to abandon our allies, appease our enemies, and focus only on the problems we have at home,” Haley said. “This worldview has already put America in great danger — and the threat is mounting by the day.”
Biden’s campaign was quick to diminish Haley’s comments, saying there is still a segment of GOP voters who are “rejecting the chaos, division and violence that Donald Trump embodies.”
“Nothing has changed for the millions of Republican voters who continue to cast their ballots against Donald Trump in the primaries and care deeply about the future of our democracy, standing strong with our allies against foreign adversaries, and working across the aisle to get things done for the American people,” said Biden spokesperson Michael Tyler.
Haley’s speech Wednesday served as something of a preview of her place in the run-up to the November election — with the former U.N. ambassador blasting Biden but also advancing an interventionist foreign policy at odds with much of the Republican Party’s base. Haley said she plans to make a trip to Israel soon to show her support for the Israeli people.
Haley praised House Speaker Mike Johnson for securing military aid for Ukraine, while accusing other Republicans of trying “to push Ukraine off a cliff” or, in an implicit criticism of Trump, fixating on border security.
“Republicans are wrong when they say we have to fix the border before doing anything else,” Haley said. “We shouldn’t pretend we can only solve one problem at a time.”