Nikki Haley Escalates Attacks Against Trump and His ‘Baggage’: ‘The Past is Catching Up With Him’

Nikki Haley leveled some of her harshest criticisms yet of her old boss and 2024 opponent, former president Donald Trump, in an interview with RealClearPolitics’ Philip Wegmann on Friday.

Haley, who had previously said she would not run for the Republican presidential nomination if Trump sought to reprise his role atop the ticket, declared her candidacy in February. Prior to the release of her interview with Wegmann, Haley had refrained from launching harsh attacks on Trump, although critiques she had made at donor events and campaign memos had leaked.

“He’s living in the past, and the past is catching up with him in a way that it is causing drama,” Haley told Wegmann. “We have to move forward. We can’t deal with the drama that’s following him. We can’t deal with the baggage.”

The former South Carolina governor and U.S. ambassador to the United Nations under Trump was careful to qualify her criticism with an acknowledgment of what she perceives to be Trump’s unfair treatment.

“He’s been abused – the way that he has been treated in office and out of office is wrong,” said Haley. “But the American people need to move forward.”

Haley had supported Trump in his 2020 reelection bid but rebuked him after his repeated efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election culminated in the January 6 Capitol riot.

“We need to acknowledge he let us down,” declared Haley in February 2021. “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.”

Two months later, however, Haley said she would not run against Trump if he ran in 2024; the former president declared his candidacy for the White House in November 2022.

During her interview with Wegmann, Haley also knocked Trump for not supporting a measure to mandate employers’ use of E-Verify, a government database that allows them to confirm whether prospective employees can work in the U.S. legally. At the time, Trump explained the decision by calling such a mandate too “tough.”

“It’s not about whether it’s tough or not,” said Haley. “This is about making sure that we only have people hired in this country that are legal.”

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