Meet the Liberals Howling About Nikki Haley’s Indian Name and Heritage
Nikki Haley is now a candidate for the GOP nomination for president, and the press is wasting no time in putting her through the unsubstantiated smears that have become a rite of passage for Republicans office-seekers.
Haley, elected to two terms as the governor of South Carolina before serving as the American ambassador to the United Nations, made her heritage a focal point of her campaign announcement, noting that she was raised as “the proud daughter of Indian immigrants, not Black, not White — I was different.”
“But my mom would always say: ‘Your job is not to focus on the differences, but the similarities’” declared Haley.
With great urgency, Politico dispatched not one, not two, not three, but six reporters to discredit the candidate’s story, resulting in a disastrous “newsletter” about “Nikki Haley’s complicated racial dance,” in which Haley is charged with having a “fraught” relationship with race. Together, the sextet came up with three pieces of evidence for such a claim.
One, Haley indicated that she was “White” on a 2001 voter registration card (Politico neglects to mention that the only options available to her were “White, Black/African American, Asian, Hispanic, and Other.” Two, someone — Milan Vaishnov of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace — offered a critical quote about Haley having an “on-again, off-again” with her race. Three, she stumped for Herschel Walker, the Black Republican who fell short in a challenge to the incumbent Black Democrat Raphael Warnock in a 2022 Senate contest. Ta-da! Thus ends the case for Nikki Haley’s purportedly complicated and fraught racial dance.
Others are incensed by the fact that the candidate, born Nimarata Nikki Randhawa, goes by her Punjabi middle name, as she has since childhood. Jemele Hill, sports-shouter turned political commentator at The Atlantic wonders how Haley can argue that America is not a racist country after she supposedly changed her given name. Columnist Wajahat Ali boasts that he has “submitted a piece on Nikki Nimrata Haley shamefully using her Indian heritage to launder White supremacy and GOP talking points.” Failed cable news host Tiffany Cross joined in with a “Carry on, Nimrata.”
Mary Trump, a certifiable expert on how to use one’s name to their advantage, showed off a striking resemblance to her uncle in a particularly unhinged rant.
First of all, fuck you Nimrata Haley. Second, you are a racist, anti-American sell-out. Third, my friend @DeeTwoCents has more integrity, intelligence, passion, and decency in one fingernail than you have in your entire being. Finally, @NikkiHaley, you will never be president.
— Mary L Trump (@MaryLTrump) February 15, 2023
MSNBC’s Mehdi Hasan, under the mistaken impression that he had discovered a contradiction, mocked Haley for calling herself the “proud” daughter of Indian immigrants while supporting efforts to secure the southern border.
The proud daughter of Indian immigrants opens her GOP presidential campaign by demanding more border control officers.
— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) February 15, 2023
The progressive instinct to launch flimsy attacks Haley on the basis of her race is incongruent with their professed principles, and reflects the sad truth that for many in the political sphere, race is not a serious issue they care deeply about, but a weapon to be brandished in the pursuit of political power. Haley, by her very existence — and especially by her rejection of totalizing claims about racism in America in spite of her encounters with it — undermines that weapon.
By tilting their heads back and screeching “Nimrata!” into the sky like a pack of howling wolves, these liberals seem to think they’re revealing something unknown about Haley. But really, they’re only telling on themselves.
This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.
