Former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations and possible GOP 2024 nominee Nikki Haley blasted former President Donald Trump during an exclusive sit-down with Politico, telling them that Trump “let us down.”
“We need to acknowledge he let us down,” Haley said. “He went down a path he shouldn’t have, and we shouldn’t have followed him, and we shouldn’t have listened to him. And we can’t let that ever happen again.”
Haley’s scathing remarks stem from her anger at Trump for not conceding the 2020 election to President Joe Biden. She told Politico that she has not spoken to the former president since the riot on Jan. 6. Part of her anger stems from Trump’s comments about former Vice President Mike Pence.
“When I tell you I’m angry, it’s an understatement,” Haley said. “Mike [Pence] has been nothing but loyal to that man. He’s been nothing but a good friend of that man. … I am so disappointed in the fact that [despite] the loyalty and friendship he had with Mike Pence, that he would do that to him. Like, I’m disgusted by it.”
Haley’s comments come as Trump’s legal team is set to defend him Friday during his second Senate impeachment trial. Haley claimed that this impeachment was a “waste of time,” but did assert Trump will never run for office again.
“I don’t think he’s going to be in the picture,” she said. “I don’t think he can. He’s fallen so far.”
Haley gave the keynote speech to the Republican National Committee’s winter meeting shortly after Jan. 6, where she first hinted at breaking from Trump.
“President Trump has not always chosen the right words. He was wrong with his words in Charlottesville, and I told him so at the time,” Haley reportedly said. “He was badly wrong with his words yesterday … and it wasn’t just his words. His actions since Election Day will be judged harshly by history.”
Politico claims Haley is positioning herself for a 2024 presidential run. She recently announced a new political action committee named after her Stand for America advocacy group.
Haley urged the GOP to move on from Trump so they can go back to being a “good, valuable, effective party.”
“I don’t think it should. I think what we need to do is take the good that he built, leave the bad that he did, and get back to a place where we can be a good, valuable, effective party. But at the same time, it’s bigger than the party. I hope our country can come together and figure out how we pull this back,” Haley said.
Haley claimed Trump had radically changed by the end of his term.
“I mean, I’m deeply disturbed by what’s happened to him,” she said.
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