Former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, sounding like a 2024 presidential candidate, ripped into President Joe Biden and his team Thursday night, claiming their policies will stall growth and institute sweeping socialism that will cripple democracy.
In a speech at South Carolina’s Citadel, where she was the first woman to receive the Citadel Republican Society’s Nathan Hale Patriot Award, Haley warned that if Biden continues to dismantle policies former President Donald Trump put in place, the country will be unrecognizable.
“In Washington, D.C., we have a president and a Congress who are leading the greatest nation in history toward ruin,” she warned, adding, “Joe Biden and today’s Democratic Party doesn’t even believe in America.”
The speech was Haley’s latest and most forceful criticism of Democratic control of Washington. She touched on all the hot political issues driving Washington debates and embraced those that voters seized on in dumping Democrats in Virginia and almost in New Jersey in last month’s elections.
“The American people said enough is enough. And what started last month will continue next year. We’ll win back Congress in 2022. We’ll win back the country in 2024,” said Haley.
There has been speculation that Haley is positioning to run in the 2024 GOP presidential primaries. Some have been skeptical because she clashed with Trump over the Jan. 6 Capitol protest, but Secrets is told that the two are on good terms and even huddled together last week.
If Trump makes good on his months of teasing and decides to run against Biden again, there are many GOP fans of a Trump-Haley ticket if he wins the nomination.
At the Citadel, she joined Trump and former Vice President Mike Pence as past winners of the award and the symbolic musket that comes with it.
A former South Carolina governor, she opened her address talking about her love for the Palmetto State and its place in American history. “I can’t imagine being from anywhere else. Can you?” she said.
As she ticked off the problems she sees with Biden, she also hit Vice President Kamala Harris and other top Democratic leaders.
For example, she blasted Biden’s open border policies that have resulted in historic levels of illegal immigration. The president has put Harris in charge of fixing the issue, but Haley noted that the vice president has failed.
“Right now our southern border might as well not exist,” she said. “That’s called a crisis. Yet, Kamala Harris is nowhere to be found,” she added.
She also compared Biden to former Democratic President Jimmy Carter, known for governing during high inflation and the Iran hostage crisis. “Joe Biden is the greatest gift to America’s enemies since Jimmy Carter. And just like Carter, we’re gonna make Joe a one-term president,” said Haley.
And she tackled the so-called “woke” movement and attacks on the United States as a racist country. “Is America perfect? Of course not. But the principles at the heart of America are perfect. Now is no time to replace them. Now is the time to apply them more fully — to make our country freer, fairer, and better for all,” she said, according to a copy of her speech provided to Secrets.
“As governor, I saw our state move beyond hate and violence and show our nation a better way. And as ambassador, I saw that America is still the standard,” she concluded, adding, “The Republican Party was made for this moment. We’re the only ones who can unite our country. Who can rescue our cities from anarchy and anger. Who can move America forward and upward.”
