Honestly with Bari Weiss: Why Nikki Haley Is Running for President

I'm Barry Weiss, and this is Honestly.

It's fantastic. Thank you so much. It's a great day in South Carolina.

Thank you all for being here.

Last month, former South Carolina governor and Trump's ambassador to the United Nations,

Nikki Haley, announced that she is running for president.

For a strong America. For a proud America.

I am running for president of the United States of America.

Haley is someone who has consistently proven her doubters wrong.

She's never lost a race. She was the first female governor of South Carolina at the age of 38.

She's self-made, and perhaps most impressively, she survived a turbulent, chaotic,

those adjectives are understating the case, Trump White House, without so much as a scrape.

Now for this, some see her as savvy, a smart player of politics who played the game

better than most others in that White House.

But others see her as having dodged a profoundly important question.

Perhaps the most important question Republicans have faced in a very long time.

Having both allied herself with Trump enough to stay in his good graces,

but also distancing from him sufficiently to appease his critics.

Her position on Trump will be just one of many challenges that Haley will have to face

if she wants to become a serious contender in the Republican primaries.

The other big issue is that in a post-Trump political landscape,

in a Republican party that Trump has remade,

can Haley's old school worldview resonate with the base?

A base that's increasingly isolationist and populist,

and perhaps has moved on from Haley's brand of conservatism.

On the flip side, perhaps Haley could be a breath of fresh air for the Republican party.

One that, as the last round of midterms proved, voters might actually crave.

On today's show, a conversation with Nikki Haley about why she's running for president,

about who the Haley constituency actually is,

about what she says to her fiercest critics, Don Lemon, I'm looking at you,

on her vision for the future,

and why she thinks she has what it takes to be the next president of the United States.

Stay with us.

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Our society, even today, has been deeply shaped by its ideas and its text.

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The Good Faith Effort is a production of Soul Shop.

Niki Haley, welcome to Honestly.

Thanks so much, Barry. It's great to be with you.

I have a lot of important questions I want to ask you,

but I cannot help but start with some straight-up political drama.

This soul talk about age makes me uncomfortable.

I think it's a wrong road to go down.

She says people, you know, politicians are something that are not in their prime.

Niki Haley isn't in her prime. Sorry.

A woman is considered to be in her prime in her 20s and 30s and maybe 40s.

That's not according to me.

Prime for what?

It depends. It's just like prime. If you look it up,

if you Google, when is a woman in her prime,

it'll say 20s, 30s, and 40s.

Last week, Don Lemon, one of the many bruised heroes

of the anti-Trump left on CNN these days,

said that you were past your prime,

and it was one of those perfect television moments

where someone digs and they keep digging

and they just dig themselves further.

So I think she has to be careful about saying that, you know,

politicians aren't in their prime.

I think we need to qualify. Are you talking about prime for, like, child and prime?

Don't shoot the message or I'm just saying what the facts are.

Google it. Everybody at home, when is a woman in her prime?

It says 20s, 30s, and 40s.

And I'm just saying Niki Haley should be careful about saying

that politicians are not in their prime

and they need to be in their prime when they serve,

because she wouldn't be in her prime according to...

Google?

Google or whatever it is.

And I wonder, what do you want to say to Don Lemon?

I don't have anything to say.

I mean, look, it says more about him than it does about me.

These complaints or these criticisms

or whatever that come both ways.

I'm used to it. I've gotten it all my life, you know.

I always say when I was elected governor,

I had a white Republican who called me a rag head

and I had an African-American Democrat who said

she's not a minority, she's just a conservative with a tan.

So I have incredibly thick skin and it's okay.

I mean, it just goes to show that, you know,

when you're a threat, attacks come your way

and so it just motivates me more.

But look, it's his issue, not mine.

I'm very comfortable with who I am and what I am.

He clearly is not.

So maybe this counseling that CNN wants to do will help him.

Did people buy the beer koozies?

I saw that you threw up some beer koozies on your website

and made a joke about the past my prime statement

of people been buying them.

I mean, Barry, in the first day,

we sold $25,000 worth of koozies.

Because it was more than just about me, right?

It was something that we have seen this,

it's the hypocrisy of it all.

It's the fact that, you know, had a Republican

said this about a female Democrat,

people would have like asked for a headster role

and people to get fired.

And so I think people just, like it hit a nerve with everybody.

It wasn't just about me, it was kind of about

the craziness of our country.

Okay, so we're here not primarily to talk about Don Lemon,

although I want to get back to the kind of attacks you get

based on your identity from the right and the left

in a little bit.

Two weeks ago, you announced that you're running for president

of the United States, making you the second candidate

in your party to announce after former President Donald Trump.

At this point, I'm fairly convinced that the only people

willing to run for high office are masochists or sociopaths.

So I'm wondering which one you are.

Just kidding.

You don't strike me, frankly, as either one of those.

So I guess my question is simple.

Why are you doing this to yourself?

Why are you running for president?

Because I'm not going to wait for someone else

to fix this country.

I'm going to do it myself.

I don't want my children to grow up in the direction

this country is going in.

And as a mom, as a military wife,

as the daughter of immigrants who came here

because they believed in this country so much,

I feel like I owe it to my family

and I feel like I owe it to myself

to say don't complain about it, do something about it.

And so, you know, I'm very committed to this.

I'm very committed to the love I have of this country

and I think other Americans are too.

And I didn't see a reason to wait.

I'm not scared of anybody else that gets in.

I don't need any qualifications from other people

to say it's the time for me to get in.

So I was ready to get to work and that's what I'm going to do.

When you say the country is broken,

that's something that most politicians say

when they decide they're running.

What are the three things that most concern you

that motivate you to step into the race?

Well, I think if you look at our national debt,

$31 trillion in debt, but more than that,

look at it from an American family.

I mean, it costs more money to go to the grocery store.

It costs more money at the gas station.

That's how they get to work.

But one in six Americans can't pay their utility bill.

60% of Americans are in credit card debt

and half of Americans say they're not as well off

as they were a year ago.

And our kids are not going to forgive us

for the fact that they've opened up earmarks.

They're spending like drunken sailors

and they're going to have to pay for it.

So the debt, I think, is huge in spending.

That's happened under Republican and Democrat swatch

and we need to stop it.

The second thing is you look at our children's education.

I mean, pre-COVID,

70% of eighth graders in our country

were not proficient in reading.

66% of eighth graders were not proficient in math.

You add two years of lockdowns

and our kids are so far behind,

every parent's worried about

whether they're going to be able to make this up.

We have to make sure that we're focused on that.

And then you go and you look at the fact that,

you know, whether it's open borders

that are allowing lawlessness and terrorists to come in,

whether it's crime on our streets,

I mean, every parent should feel like

if their child rides their bike down the street,

they're going to be safe.

And then finally, you look at the foreign policy situation.

I don't know that America has ever looked as weak.

The idea that an American child

or American would look to the sky

and see a Chinese spy balloon looking back at them

is a national embarrassment.

And so, you know, those are just a few things

I think we need to write,

but I'll tell you the overarching theme.

And this, I don't care what party you're in,

everybody will say this.

This self-loathing that has happened in our country

has got to stop.

The idea that we're saying America is bad

or that America is racist

or that America is rotten, it's not.

It's not.

My parents came here.

And at the time that they came in the late 60s,

America was growing in confidence.

America was growing in strength.

America was growing in opportunity.

And they came here because they saw

what this country could be.

And there was never a day my parents didn't remind

my brothers, my sister and me how blessed we were to live here.

And I want my kids to feel that.

I want people's grandkids to feel that.

I want them to love America.

And America deserves their love.

When I hear you speak, I don't hear a politician past her prime,

but I do feel like I'm hearing a politician,

you know, an old-school Republican.

What do I mean by that?

I mean, Foreign Policy Hawk, you know, a fiscal conservative,

someone that is sort of unabashedly patriotic,

still believes in the American promise.

And when I hear a lot of Republicans these days,

they sound very different from that.

They sound isolationist, questioning whether or not

we should be supporting Ukraine in its war against Russia.

They sound populist in a way that I think often you don't.

They sound, frankly, nihilistic a lot of them about America,

sometimes even referring in parts of the new right,

to the American government as a regime.

And I'm curious about your understanding of where the base,

where the energy of the Republican Party is right now,

and whether or not you and your message are speaking to that base.

Well, we've had packed standing room only rooms in Iowa and New Hampshire.

We had thousands of people at our announcement in South Carolina.

What people know about me and what those that don't know me will find out is,

I stand for what I believe and I fight for it.

I don't care about labels.

What I do care is about Americans.

Populism isn't a bad thing.

When you want to make sure that America is wrong,

it's not a bad thing when you want to make sure that America takes care of herself

before it takes care of anybody else.

You know, what we want to do is make sure that we understand

that we fight for what we believe in.

But more than that, we don't do it with faint hearts.

We don't do it with water down compromises.

We do it with a national purpose.

We do it with the idea that we are going to make America better today

than we did yesterday.

And we're going to bring others with us to do that.

This is a story about addition.

And so, I don't worry about the type of Republicans or, you know,

whether they're right or whether they're moderate.

What I do care about is that we put a strong person forward

who can win a general.

And even more than that, lead our country to a place where all Americans can be proud.

And I know I can do that.

Let's talk about a few of the issues and where you stand versus where I think

many in the Republican Party stand.

Let's start with Ukraine and foreign policy.

You believe, as many believe, that America needs to play its role in the world stage

as the policeman, you know, and enforcing that with force, if necessary.

And many in the GOP base seem to be asking, why?

Right?

A majority of registered Republicans said they oppose funding Ukraine any further.

And they see, and I think this is very understandable,

a president going to visit Zelensky rather than going to East Palestine, Ohio.

What do you say to the Republicans or the independents or even the Democrats

that you meet on the campaign trail and certainly the ones you've met over your political career

that have sort of said, why aren't we putting America first, right?

What do you say to a Republican base that's sort of pivoting back, I would say,

away from the neo-conservative consensus back to its more isolationist roots?

Well, that's a lot. So let's unpack it.

First, I will tell you, I do think that Biden needed to be in East Palestine.

And the reason is I have dealt with my share of crises in South Carolina.

And when your people are hurting, you drop everything and you are there with them.

So I do think he needed to do that.

When you look at the foreign policy situation, I don't think that we need to be the policeman of the world.

I don't. What I do think, though, is you have the backs of your allies and you hold your enemies to account.

And so what that means is we don't need to be all things to everybody in the world,

but our leadership matters when we speak the world listens, when we act the world follows,

who we are the world wants to be, and that is a responsibility that comes.

So when you look at the situation with Ukraine, you are actually thinking about America's national security, right?

This is about what do we need to do to make sure we're protecting Americans?

Protecting Americans means you protect freedom.

And when you look at the Ukraine situation, the idea that these Ukrainians,

it's so inspirational that they would go and everybody gave them five days before they fell.

But they cared so much about their country. They cared so much about freedom

that those men went to the front lines to fight for their country.

They left their women and children and the women said, I'm not going to stand back and not do anything.

They made Molotov cocktails to help them.

They have gone and they have made such inroads.

I mean, look at the fact, you know how desperate Russia is when they're getting drones from Iran and missiles from North Korea.

The fact that they've raised the draft age to 65.

The fact that they're taking people off the streets and putting them on the front line without even being trained.

Russia is losing and they know it.

What America needs to do is understand that Biden, if he would have been strong from the beginning,

we would have been much further along than this.

This is not just a war about Ukraine. This is a war about freedom.

And it's one that we have to win.

And so I'm not saying we give cash to Ukraine or blank checks.

I'm not saying we put troops on the ground.

What I am saying is you give them what they need to win.

They need ammunition. They need equipment.

You give them that and you work with the NATO allies and say, what are you giving?

What are you giving? What are you giving?

And we do it collectively.

Because when Ukraine wins, this will send a message to China, to Russia, to Iran, to North Korea,

and to every enemy that wants to mess with us or one of our friends.

If Ukraine loses, Russia has said Poland and the Baltics are next.

And we're looking at a full-on world war.

So it is important that we have the backs of our allies.

And it is important that the rest of the world sees that when we're with you, we're with you completely.

That's what strength is.

And through all of that, it's the reason we need to have a strong military.

A strong military doesn't start wars. A strong military prevents wars.

And a strong focus on the international stage allows for the world to be at peace.

And that's what we should always focus on.

We ran a piece in the Free Press by Selena Zito, a report from East Palestine, Ohio.

And one comment after another, after another, after another from the readers of ours

that identify, I would say, as conservatives or Republicans are,

why the hell was Biden visiting Zelensky?

Why the hell are we supporting the war in Ukraine?

I mean, it is overwhelming that sentiment, I would say, among many, many conservatives

who don't buy the line that supporting Ukraine is a way of fighting for American freedom.

That is an abstraction to people.

I think it's two things, right?

I do remember that when you were a leader, when you see your people hurting,

when you see your people suffering, you have to be there.

I am all for Biden going and being there with Zelensky,

but he should have been with the people of East Palestine first.

I mean, you look at the fact that these are people that don't have much to start with,

and you have a train derailment like that.

We had that in South Carolina.

I mean, the air smells bad.

Your kids are breathing it.

They're drinking it.

Families need to know somebody's got their back.

So I think it's two separate things, right?

I think that if Biden had gone to East Palestine,

you wouldn't hear so much criticism about him being in Ukraine.

It's the fact that he hasn't been, his cabinet members haven't been, he hasn't done anything.

But when it comes to Ukraine, that's our job to let people know why they should care about this.

And I don't think Biden's done a good job communicating that,

but I'm going to continue to remind people that this is a national security issue for America.

Because if you let Russia get away with this, guess what, Taiwan's next.

And China is watching everything.

China is watching sanctions.

China is watching what we're doing militarily.

China is watching how the rest of the world is responding to the US.

So everything we do matters.

And I think it's up to us to continue to tell people standing with Ukraine is standing for America

and standing for every freedom-loving country in this world.

Let's talk a little bit about the culture wars and the way that they're playing inside the Republican Party,

but especially among people who might be considering running for president.

When I look at the Republican Party, I see that anti-woke messaging and campaigning

has sort of dominated the GOP over the last few years.

And while some people interpreted the results of the midterms as a lesson to kind of cool it,

return to issues that matter most to people like education, like crime, like the economy,

it's not clear whether the party is headed that way or not.

We reject woke ideology.

We fight the woke in the legislature.

We fight the woke in the schools.

We fight the woke in the corporations.

We will never, ever surrender to the woke mob.

Florida is where woke goes to die.

We've accomplished more than anybody thought possible.

Just for example, Ron DeSantis has claimed that Florida is where woke goes to die,

and I saw it down a bunch of t-shirts.

Vivek Ramaswani, who entered the race in the past few days, is a major anti-woke crusader.

He wrote a book called Woke Inc.

And I'm curious where you fall and whether or not you think the culture warrior agenda

is a winning issue for voters in 2024 or if it's sort of a tertiary issue?

I don't look at it as what's winning for voters or not winning for voters.

I think what's important is you have to call out hypocrisy whenever you see it.

You mentioned the Don Lemon thing before, and it's the same thing,

that if it had been a Democrat female, people would have lost their minds.

But I also think it goes back to what families are feeling.

I mean, you do look at schools and you see that, look,

when they're trying to push the critical race theory, what are you really doing?

As a mom, how does this affect me?

You've got a five-year-old girl going into kindergarten.

If she's white, you're telling her she's bad.

And if she's brown or black, you're telling her she's never going to be good enough

and she's always going to be a victim.

That's abusive.

When you go and you have the idea that, and I say this all the time,

Florida passed this don't say gay bill.

But basically, it said you don't talk about gender before the age of third grade.

I just don't think that went far enough.

You know, when I was in school, you didn't have sex ed until seventh grade.

And even then, your parents had to sign a permission slip and my dad wouldn't sign it.

So I was the uncool kid in the classroom next door.

That's the job of parents.

That's where the woke situation is upsetting families.

Parenting is meant to happen in the home.

Education is meant to happen in the schools.

Hypocrisy, it shouldn't happen anywhere.

You should treat everybody the same.

That's why these woke issues are stepping up.

Now, where do we put it in the perspective of things?

We need to stay very focused and disciplined on the policies that affect our country

and where we're going to go.

Those issues that I talked to you about debt and education and security and foreign policy,

those things need to happen.

But when we see hypocrisy, we need to call it out and then we move on, right?

And I think that's the case is we have to know how to balance multiple balls at the same time

and not skew one way or the other.

The biggest concern I have is right now, America looks so distracted.

So distracted.

And when we look distracted, the world is less safe.

If China and Russia see us fighting over what gender is what gender

and what we're teaching and all these things, they love that.

They love that.

So let's not take our eye off the ball.

Call out hypocrisy when we need to.

But don't stop working on the issues that are going to make America strong.

Nikki, one of the things that brought you to national prominence,

one of the first times I remember hearing your name was in 2015

around the church shooting in Charleston.

To remind people that's when Dylan Roof walked into the Emmanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church

and murdered nine black parishioners there.

And his aim, as he said, was to start a race war.

Now, you were governor of South Carolina at the time.

And in response to Roof, you called for the removal of the Confederate flag

from the South Carolina Capitol.

Today, we are here in a moment of unity in our state without ill will

to say it's time to move the flag from the Capitol grounds.

Take me back to that decision.

It was such a painful time.

I mean, a painful time for South Carolinians, a painful time for the country,

a painful time for me.

You had what so many South Carolinians do on a Wednesday night.

I mean, you had these 12 people that went to Bible study.

The only difference was on this night someone else showed up.

He didn't look like them.

He didn't sound like them.

He didn't act like them.

And they didn't call the cops.

Instead, they pulled up a chair and they prayed with him for an hour.

And when they bowed their heads in that last prayer, he began to shoot.

These were people like Ethel Lance.

She had lost her daughter to breast cancer and had a broken heart.

But she would go around Mother Emanuel Church, cleaning the church,

singing one day at a time, sweet Jesus, that's all I ask of you.

Give me the strength every day to do what I have to do.

Our youngest victim, Tywanza Sanders, he had just graduated college.

He had the world in front of him.

And on that night, he stood in front of his 87-year-old great Aunt Susie and said,

to the killer, we mean no harm to you.

You don't have to do this.

Or it was people like Cynthia Hurd, whose life motto was simply to be kinder than necessary.

That's who these people were.

They weren't famous.

People didn't know them, but they loved their family.

They loved their community and they loved their church.

And when he did this, it defied anything people could imagine.

And it was the first time we had had a shooting and a place of worship.

And it was on the heels of Ferguson.

And all I knew was I had to put my arms around our state and protect her.

And I had to first make sure those families were taken care of and I had to make sure

the rest of South Carolinians were taken care of.

Because I didn't want children afraid to go to church.

And so I immediately told my office, I said, I want you to call in four groups.

I said, I want you to call in the Republican leadership.

I want you to call in the Democrat leadership.

All in separate meetings, I want you to call in the congressional leadership.

And I want you to call in our community leaders.

And I said, and don't tell them why I'm asking them to come.

Because I knew if I had told them, they would not show up.

When they came in, I said, look, at three o'clock today, I'm going to call for,

and let me go back.

I mean, when this happened, two days later, you had the killer.

His manifesto came out and there he is holding the Confederate flag,

spewing every amount of hate.

What you have to know about the Confederate flag in South Carolina

is that half of South Carolinians saw it as service and heritage.

The other half of South Carolinians saw it as slavery and hate.

My job as their governor was not to judge either side.

My job was to show them there was a better place forward.

My job was to take South Carolina to a better place than she had been.

If I had judged either side, we wouldn't have gotten anything done.

So I called those four groups in and I said, look, at three o'clock today,

I'm going to have a press conference and I'm going to ask for the Confederate flag to come down.

And if you will stand with me, I will forever be grateful.

And if you won't stand with me, I won't tell anyone you were ever in this room.

And at three o'clock, I stood there and we had Republicans, Democrats,

we had whites, blacks, everybody was there.

But the real work had to begin because the only way to pull down the Confederate flag,

you needed two-thirds vote of the House and the Senate.

This had been debated decades before.

The Confederate flag had been put on top of the state house by a Democrat governor in the 60s.

They tried to bring it down in 2000.

Governor David Beasley was defeated over it.

They ended up taking it off the top of the state house dome

and putting it right in front of the state house.

So I had to get to work.

The Senate was very quick to pass it because one of the people killed at Mother Emanuel was the pastor,

Pastor Pinckney, but he was also a senator.

And their brother had died and they very much were feeling the pain of that.

The House was a very different story.

And I remember the Speaker of the House coming to me saying,

they're not going to do it. They're not going to take this flag down.

And I said, they have to take this flag down.

I can't have a child driving by the state house and seeing that.

It is time for us to move on.

It needs to be in a museum where it can be respected by those who wish.

So he comes back to me and he goes, okay, I got it.

But the House, and this is mainly the Republican caucus,

the House said they'll do it, but they want to replace it with a different flag.

I said, no flag.

Flag is coming down. We're not doing this.

He said, okay, I'll go back.

He went back and he said, we've got this flag is coming down.

No replacement flag, but they do want to leave the poll up.

And I had been in the legislature prior six years.

I knew how they think I knew what they did.

And I knew that if we left that poll up when all of the press went away,

another flag was going to go up there.

And I said, no, the poll has to come down.

He said, governor, it's a win for you.

He said, it's a win.

You'll get a win.

I said, no, I don't want any other governor to ever have to go through this again.

And I don't want the people of our state to ever have to go through this again.

I said, the flag comes down.

The poll comes down.

He goes, I can't get that for you.

And I said, then let me talk to them.

So I went into the house caucus where I had been blackballed earlier,

which is another story why I ran for governor.

And I said to them, I said, you know what?

I want to tell you a story.

I said, when I was growing up, I used to love to go to Columbia with my dad whenever

I could because I was from a small rural town.

And he would always stop by these produce stands because he liked buying produce

directly from the farmers.

And one day we stopped at a stand.

And my father wears a turban.

Still does to this day.

He stopped by this produce stand and he started getting the produce.

And I saw the husband and wife owners at the cash register.

I was little, but I saw them and they looked concerned.

And then I saw them pick up the phone.

And the next thing I knew two police cars drove up.

My dad continued to get his produce.

And he went to the register and he thanked them and he paid.

He got in the car and he didn't speak to me the entire way home.

He hoped I didn't notice what just happened.

I knew exactly what had happened.

And I told that caucus.

I said, every day when I have to drive to the airport to get on the state plane,

I pass that produce stand and I feel pain.

I said, I don't want a single child to ever drive by the state house and see that flag

and feel pain.

Bring this flag and this pole down.

And that night they voted.

We got the flag down.

We got the pole down.

And I will tell you it was South Carolinians finest hour because we didn't have protests.

We didn't have riots.

We had vigils and we had hugs.

And South Carolina showed the world what true strength and grace look like.

Nikki, you started off that powerful answer by saying you couldn't judge.

You didn't have judgment for either side, but you made a judgment.

And I think a very clear moral judgment.

I didn't make a judgment.

What I did was what's in the best interest of all South Carolinians.

And what was in the best interest of all South Carolinians was to move forward.

Was to move forward in a way that made us better.

That's what I did.

I think too many elected officials judge their own constituencies.

That's not, that's elitist.

That's not for us to do.

Understand why your people feel what they feel.

Understand what their worries and their fears and their concerns are.

And then it's harder, but communicate to them where you think we need to go.

That's what we need to have more of.

Not talking down to people or telling them what is morally right.

It's telling them what will be in the best interest of all of us.

A few years after the flag came down,

you wrote an op-ed saying,

in today's political climate, we would not have been able to remove the flag.

And you blamed, quote, the media hysteria and outrage culture,

which you said makes it difficult to have thoughtful dialogue.

What changed between 2015 when that flag came down and your op-ed a few years later?

I think it's just, we have fallen into, and it goes back to that national self-loathing I'm talking about.

We have fallen into this idea that our country is flawed and bad and racist.

And instead of leaders really talking about ways to move forward, that our country gets better,

you're seeing them talk about ways to divide.

That's not getting us anywhere.

We have to start realizing for the good of our kids, for the good of the next generation,

we don't need to talk about what makes us different.

I always say that when I was growing up, we were the only Indian family in a very small rural Southern town.

And I told you, my father were Turban, my mother were, sorry,

they didn't know who we were, what we were or why we were there.

And I remember when I would get teased on the playground and I would come home.

My mom would say, your job is not to show them how you're different.

Your job is to show them how you're similar.

And it's amazing how that lesson on the playground has played out throughout my life,

whether it was in the corporate world, whether it was as governor, whether it was as ambassador.

If you first take the time to talk to people about what you agree on, people let their guard down,

then you can go and take on the struggle or the challenge that you're trying to deal with.

That's where we have to get back to as Americans, is understand there are things that we all share.

And when we have differences, let's be able to talk about those differences.

That doesn't mean we go into watered down compromises.

It doesn't mean that we go and we cave on things.

It means that you go and you communicate with people with the intent of bringing them to your side,

not with the intent of further pushing them away.

And that has happened.

Now people just don't want to listen to anyone that doesn't think like them.

That's a terrible mistake.

If I had done that at the UN, how would I have gotten all of those sanctions against North Korea

without talking to China, without talking to Russia?

You have to talk with those that think differently in order to get things done.

It takes more work, but it's worth the effort.

After the break, Nikki Haley responds to those who criticize her for having it both ways with Trump.

Stay with us.

Let's talk a little bit about the race as it stands today.

I want to talk a little bit about your primary competition, and I'm not talking about Vivek.

In April 2021, you said you would not run if President Trump ran.

Well, he's running and you are running. What changed?

Everything changed. I mean, when I said that, Biden had just been elected.

Afghanistan had not fallen.

We weren't in this ridiculous amount of stimulus payments and COVID debt.

We didn't have these open borders like never before, and we had not lost the midterms.

And so everything changed.

And it was another thing where I was like, I don't want to wait for somebody else to fix this.

I'm going to go in there and I'm going to get it done because I'm not going to complain about it.

I'm going to do something about it.

A lot of people have pointed out that the only reason that Trump has given you his blessing so to speak to run

is that it's better for him to have as many establishment candidates in the race as possible

in order to take away from the DeSantis vote, who is largely viewed, at least today,

as the main contender for Trump.

Are you worried about splitting the anti-Trump vote and seeing a repeat of 2016 play out?

I don't worry about those things.

I think that's a lot of pundits trying to talk about a lot of things and analyze what they think is going to happen.

What I do focus on is talking to every single person I can and letting them know that we deserve better.

Every American deserves better than what they're getting today.

And I'm going to make sure they do that.

You know, you've got all these pundits that love to sit there and talk about, oh, he's not doing this because of this.

He's not doing this because of that.

That's just wasted energy.

I don't even focus on that.

Look, Trump is a friend.

He knows me.

He knows if you kick me, I kick back.

He knows I talked to him before I decided to run and he knows exactly why I'm doing this.

You know, I'm not going to sit there and analyze where he is.

I'm going to sit there and analyze where Americans are and where they want to go.

The rest is wasted energy.

Okay, a lot of people are sick of Trump, especially after January 6th.

And they look at Ron DeSantis in Florida, who hasn't announced, but he's probably going to get in and say,

he's got the Trump appeal, but without the craziness, right?

He doesn't strike many people as a guy who would lie about winning and spend more time talking about himself than his country.

So maybe he's the guy.

Maybe he's Trump without the bad stuff.

What do you say to that voter?

I don't kick sideways.

I don't pay attention to anybody else.

There's going to be a few people in.

Some are my friends.

That's not my focus.

My focus is on the fact that Joe Biden has done a terrible job, that we are in a terrible situation because of the fact that he's a weak president.

And so when I talk to Americans, they don't want to hear me talk about others in the primary.

They want to hear me talk about what I'm going to do to make their life better.

And so that's what I focus on.

The Trump White House, according to just about everyone, was tumultuous, was an understatement.

So many people quit.

Other people work fired on Twitter.

Most people came out of that experience worse for wear.

You not only lasted nearly two years, which seemed like an eternity to many of us watching on the outside, but you came out pretty much unscathed.

You didn't really allow yourself to be embarrassed.

You didn't really have any scandals.

You weren't really involved, at least from the outside, civilians watching in the backstabbing that seemed to dominate the world of Trump.

How did you do it?

I mean, I always tell everybody the way I got out of there without a tweet was the fact that I told him the truth.

You know, when the president was doing something good, I rallied.

I fought.

I tried to really make sure that we made America look strong and America look proud.

And when I thought he was going in the wrong direction, I met with them, called him and said, you can't do this.

But instead, you could do X, Y, or Z.

So I always gave him options so that he could make the decision he needed.

And he always knew that I didn't just tell him what he wanted to hear.

And he respected that and he appreciated that.

He knew I was tough.

He knew that I would never lie to him and he knew that I wasn't going to embarrass him.

And I really focused on my work.

I stayed out of D.C. as much as possible.

I was there once a week or once every two weeks for meetings with him or the National Security Council.

But the rest of the time I was in New York doing my job.

And I'll tell you, because I haven't ever held a job in D.C.,

I think it's the reason I see things with clarity.

I think D.C. is the problem.

It's that bubble.

It's the way people think.

It's how they do things.

I'm a worker.

At the end of the day, I very much know what I have to get done.

And I did it.

And I think he very much respected that.

And he knew that I was tough.

He knew that I would do things.

And there would be times where I saw in real time I could do a negotiation.

I'd call him.

He always picked up the phone.

And I'd say, look, I see where I can make this move or I can make that move.

Are you good with that?

He's like, run with it.

So there was just trust between us.

Here's how I see what's sort of shaken down among the Republican Party in the past five years, post-Trump.

Some went the way of Liz Cheney.

Others went the way of Trump.

And a very, very, very few tried to sort of stay out of it.

And that's you, right?

And I wonder, A, if you think that strategy has worked.

And B, how long you think you can actually sustain what I view as a kind of avoidance when you're running against the person, right?

It's one thing to do that when you're an ambassador working for the Trump White House.

It's quite another when you're running against him.

And surely we'll face maybe not Carly Fiorina level attacks, but Trump style attacks.

I mean, I know he hasn't branded you as a little Marco or whatever, but surely that day will come.

So how long do you think you can sort of sustain the having your cake and eating it too?

It's so funny that everybody thinks that I'm avoiding anything.

I'm actually being very true to who I am.

So first of all, do I agree with Trump on 100% of things?

No, do I disagree with Trump on 100% of things?

No, I don't agree with my husband 100% of the time.

So when President Trump does something or says something, I think there were a lot of policies that he had in his administration that were great.

I'm always going to praise him for that.

I'm always going to tell him.

I think there are things that he did that were detrimental.

I have always called him out on that.

And so people don't understand how I do both, but isn't that how we deal with everybody?

You don't agree with somebody 100% of the time.

You don't hate somebody 100% of the time.

That's how I see it with him.

So, you know, is there a day he's going to call me a name?

Maybe.

Do I care?

No.

And am I going to continue to say what I think?

Absolutely.

And I'm going to be honest about it.

You gave an interview two years ago with Politico and you said you were really angry with Trump over his treatment of Mike Pence on January 6th.

You said, when I tell you I'm angry, it's an understatement.

You also said, I don't think he's going to be in the picture.

I don't think he can.

He's fallen so far speaking about it.

Do you still agree with those sentiments or at least the first part of it?

Are you still angry with how he treated Mike Pence on that day?

I was so upset and I still think that was a terrible day.

I mean, we can never have that happen again.

And yes, I mean, that was a real emotion and a real feeling because, look, you had a lot of us that really were proud of the legacy.

We were proud of the things we all work together to lift Americans up, to make America strong, all of that.

And to see all of that happen and to see what happened on January 6th, of course we were devastated.

Of course we were mad and of course we were disgusted by what happened.

So, no, I absolutely stand for what I said then.

I said it then, I'm saying it now, but that goes back to that, like, you can sit there and agree with the fact that I think he was the right president at the right time.

And I can also agree with the fact that I think that was a terrible mistake for our country on January 6th and I hope it never happens again.

Tim Alberta wrote in Politico in 2021 in a profile of you that you, quote, can't decide who you want to be, the leader of a post-Trump GOP or a friend to the president.

How do you answer that criticism?

It was more about he couldn't decide who he wanted me to be.

I know exactly who I am.

I have always said exactly who I am.

If people don't like what I say, I can't help that.

But what I will tell you is I love this country.

I know that my parents came here and I'm determined to prove to them that they made the right decision.

I know my husband deployed in Afghanistan and I saw the sacrifice that I and so many military families go through and I know that freedom and their sacrifice matters.

I am the mom of two children and I see my daughters getting married and I see how hard it is for them to afford a home.

And I have a son in college and I see how he's having to write papers of things he doesn't believe just to get an A.

So what I am saying is I know who I am.

I know why I'm doing this and I know where I'm going to take this country.

I don't really worry about what everybody else tries to analyze me to be.

I care about what the Americans think of me.

Okay, let's talk a little bit about the state of the GOP.

It took Kevin McCarthy 15 rounds of voting and negotiating to get elected as Speaker of the House.

That is the longest speaker vote in over 150 years.

Dan Crenshaw, the Republican congressman from Texas said about it.

McCarthy will get there. He's going to get there.

We will not vote for anyone else but McCarthy.

These people think they're stubborn, we're more stubborn because we're standing for principle.

They're standing for personal notoriety, we are standing for principle.

We will go longer.

And McCarthy will become Speaker.

So the real question is what's the consequences for those no names.

You tell me.

It's devastating.

It's devastating.

They think they're not going to get the committees they want.

Well, obviously they won't.

But it's going to be so much worse than that.

They are enemies now.

It's devastating. They're enemies now.

To me, that whole moment kind of summed up.

It was kind of a microcosm of where the GOP is these days.

Another moment, another flash point was at the State of the Union with Marjorie Taylor Greene

and her white first standing up and screaming,

liar, liar, about Biden.

And the reason I ask this isn't to single out any one of these sort of newcomers to the party.

It's really because I think the Democrats are so weakened, a lot of political independence

and honestly a lot of disillusioned Democrats I know are desperate for an alternative.

But they look at the circus that is the modern day GOP and say,

you know what, I'm going to stick with this party because the other one just seems so crazy.

What do you say to that voter that, you know, there's so many people who are so frustrated,

especially post COVID, especially with school closures,

especially with crime in cities who are ready for an alternative.

What do you say to that person who then looks at, you know,

the antics of a Marjorie Taylor Greene and says,

I just can't bear to pull the lever for that party?

Well, I think if you look at why we lost the midterms,

a lot of it was that, you know, you had the fact,

it's not that they loved Joe Biden or the direction the Democrats were going.

What they saw is Republicans were hating on each other and the Democrats.

And from an independent standpoint, it looked like chaos and they didn't want to be a part of that.

So I think that, you know, Republicans need to understand that when it comes to the speaker's race.

Look, I don't understand why they didn't get in a room and figure that out.

I mean, when I was governor, I would bring people in a room and say, OK,

we're going to work through this and we're not leaving until we fix it.

I wish they would have done that because I don't think the American people needed to see that.

Having said that, I don't disagree with those minority few that didn't want to vote for McCarthy.

Not saying that I think McCarthy is bad or anything else, but what were they saying?

They were basically saying what is going to be different.

Remember under McCarthy's era, they opened back up earmarks.

I mean, the American people paid for $12 million for a baseball stadium in New York,

$15 million for New Jersey to get the World Cup, $6.5 million for golf courses in Colorado.

You got $2 million for a hip hop museum in New York.

That is not the spending that needs to happen and that happened under the Republicans watch, right?

The debt and the spending that has happened to get us $31 trillion, that happened with Republicans.

So these people were going in saying, how are you going to be different?

And what is really important, Barry, is there wasn't one elected official whose constituents were saying,

oh, you got to vote for Kevin McCarthy.

Why aren't you voting for him?

Nobody cares who the speaker is.

They care how you're going to lead.

So if you look at a Ralph Norman who says, that's fine, I'll be with you, Kevin, but I want to vote on term limits.

I completely agree with Kevin.

If you have somebody else that says, I want to be with you, Kevin,

but we need to start having these bills and look at them 72 hours in advance,

not just having to vote on something.

I absolutely agree with that.

So the idea that they could get some good transparent stuff out for the American people, I support it.

I think what they were trying to do was right.

Did you have some peacocks in there?

Yeah, you had some peacocks in there.

But you did have some good elected officials that were saying, look, I got to fight for my people.

And I think they genuinely were trying to do that.

I just wish they would have done it behind closed doors.

We're living through a time of incredible political realignment.

We've mentioned East Palestine a few times, and I look at what's happening there,

and I think, I can't believe Michael Moore is not there with the documentary crew.

That, to me, is such an obvious issue for progressives to care about.

It's about the environment.

It's about the working class.

And yet somehow that's coded as a right-wing issue where you have sort of JD Vance and Donald Trump taking up that emblem.

What does it mean these days, in your view, to be a conservative?

What does it mean in an era in which all of these labels are thrown up in the air?

And I think a lot of people don't really know which apply to them anymore.

How do you define what it is to be a conservative?

I think a conservative understands that government was intended to secure the rights and freedoms of the people,

not intended to be all things to all people.

I think a conservative understands that capitalism and economic freedom

has been the greatest force for good in the history of the world.

I think conservatism understands that a strong America is a safe America that's strong abroad.

I think that's what a conservatism understands, that family values matter,

and making sure our kids have a better opportunity than what we had is the focus of where we go.

That's what I think conservatism is.

And it's freedom.

Above all things, it's every amount of freedom for parents to decide where their kids go to school,

for people to decide how best to spend their money as opposed to government,

for elected officials to understand if you educate Americans, they can make the decision that's best for them.

That's really what it is, and what a leader does is a leader sets the tone for who they represent.

When I was governor, I set the tone.

I mean, I took a state that was in double-digit unemployment.

We had been the butt of the jokes.

Everybody made fun of South Carolina as uneducated and unworthy.

And, you know, I knew that I had to change.

So I focused on not only changing the culture, the business climate,

making sure our South Carolinians learn new trade so that they could take on these new jobs,

and we became the beast of the Southeast.

It very much is about empowering people to see the best of themselves.

That's what we should want, is how can we show them that we need them,

and how do we get them to step up in a way that really helps us become a better country?

In your campaign kickoff, you said the country is ready to move past, quote, division and distractions.

It's become a cliche at this point to say we're more divided than ever,

but we really feel like we're more divided than ever.

We're fractured on just about everything.

If you're the nominee representing the Republican Party for president,

you'll have to appeal not just to Republicans, not just to the base,

but also to Democratic and independent voters if you want to win the electoral college,

let alone the popular vote.

And yet, as you pointed out in that announcement,

the Republican Party has lost the popular vote in seven out of eight of the last presidential elections.

What's your plan on appealing to a broad swath of voters in our incredibly polarized age?

I will do exactly what I did as governor of South Carolina.

We were able to pull people in because I let them know I was focused on lifting up everybody,

not just to select few.

You talk to people, you know, my parents were Democrats until Reagan,

not because they were really Democrats, but because Republicans didn't talk to them.

And so what Republicans have to understand is we need to speak to everyone

in a way that everyone can see where we want to take them.

And you do that not by going to minorities and suburban women

and different communities and saying you should be with us.

Instead, you go and you ask them, what do you care about?

And guess what?

They all care about their kids' education.

They all want to make sure that their kids have better opportunities than what they had.

They want a safe America that's strong abroad.

It's about talking about your views in a way that you are unwavering,

but in a way that understands what they care about.

That's the focus.

That's where we have to go is to understand this is a story of addition.

This is a story of bringing people in.

Look, there's a reason that I had the least negatives of anybody, you know, in the field.

There's a reason that I'm more likely to win a general than anyone else.

It's because I identify with so many different people.

It's your experiences that bring you the ability to communicate with all people.

And so, you know, whether it's being, you know, a child that grew up

and understands what it means to be bullied or have discrimination,

whether it's, you know, the daughter of immigrant parents who were forced on education

and the importance of that, whether it's a mom who understands family values

and that parents need to be in charge,

whether it's a military spouse that sees the pressures that our military is under,

all of those experiences, that's what I go out and bring.

I talk about what I've lived, not what I think others should know.

It's what I've lived and how I think we can take us forward.

Let's talk a little bit about the response, especially among the press, to your announcement.

We talked a little while ago about Don Lemon and what he said,

but he wasn't the only one who sort of stepped in it.

He Goldberg said something similar on the view.

She said, you're not a new generation, you're 51.

And these sort of comments aren't new, right?

You're someone who's been in the public eye for a while now,

but I think they're particularly stark when they're coming from the left,

which is supposed to be hypersensitive to even the most minor of microaggressions,

and here they are basically saying, you're a hag.

I wrote a column in 2018 when I was at the Times called The Slut Shaming of Nikki Haley,

after Michael Wolfe published his book Fire and Fury.

It was all the rage at the time about the first year of the Trump administration.

And he basically accused you of having an affair with the president based on rumors without a shred of fact.

And I pointed out just very simply that there's something about a Republican woman of color

that makes people's heads spin and makes the left say things that they would never condone

to be said about a woman with progressive politics.

How do you begin to understand this hypocrisy and does it get under your skin at all?

It doesn't get under my skin. It doesn't make it less disgusting.

So it's disgusting, but at the same time, I truly do think it says more about them than me.

It's funny how liberals will go and say, oh, but the Democrats are the party of women,

yet they're the most sexist when it comes to comments about me.

They'll say, oh, the Democrats are the party of minorities,

yet they're the first ones to sit there and hit me on a racist situation.

So no, it's something I've been used to all of my life and especially in my political career.

These aren't the first attacks I'll get. There will be many more.

But all it does is motivate me. It really does.

It's sad that it happens, but they can't stand the fact that a conservative minority female would not be Democrat

and they don't know what to do with it.

And so they say things to me that they would never allow Republicans to say to Democrats.

And I think what we need to look at in America is how are you going to handle that?

If they're doing this to me, I'm going to let it roll off my shoulders,

but how does everybody else want to handle that?

Because I think at some point, accountability falls for everybody, not just Republicans.

Democrats have to be accountable for their actions, too, and their words as well.

But one of the things I think is unique about you is you're kind of betwixt in between.

Like, you're getting it from the Whoopi Goldbergs and the Don Lemons,

but you're also getting it from the right, right?

Megyn Kelly said last week that you have a tiny little mousy voice.

Ann Coulter, and this was the big news last week, said,

She's just a preposterous creature.

But her candidacy did remind me that I need to immigrate to India

so I can demand they start taking down parts of their history.

Well, you are a good person.

Something they used to say about Barack Obama, why don't you go back to your own country?

Hey, baby, why don't you go back to your own country and reconsider that?

How prevalent do you feel that that sentiment is on the right?

I don't worry about it. You know, those that are going to be haters

are going to hate no matter what I say, what I do, I don't fit their mold.

You've got some media personalities now.

They're never going to like me because they don't like the way I look or sound or anything else.

It's okay. You know, if that's how they feel, I'm never going to win them.

I'm not going to sit there and beg to have that.

I think overall Americans are good people.

I think they make good decisions. I think they are sound and they have good judgment.

And I think that they're quality individuals.

There's always going to be haters that say things that are unfortunate.

But if I lived my life according to haters, I wouldn't be where I am today.

I've lived my life according to good people and it's the good people I gravitate to.

And I've always said, you know, not just to me, but to my team,

that if you give credibility and credence to the haters,

you're disrespecting the people that support you and love you so much.

And so I choose to focus on the people that support and love

and win over the people that we haven't received.

But the haters, I just don't, they don't phase me.

If they knew how little I cared, they wouldn't do it.

So when they go low, you go high?

When they go low, I ignore them. I don't even pay attention.

I usually, I'll come out with a koozie that says, you know,

pass my prime, hold my beer and I'll make $25,000 off a koozie.

So like, you know, if you want to criticize me, bring it.

You're, you know, I'll find a way to make lemonade out of lemons any day of the week, literally.

You've spoken out against identity politics.

And yet in your campaign announcement, you emphasized your identity,

which every politician does as a minority woman, as the daughter of Indian immigrants.

And that same announcement, you were talking about foreign policy.

And you emphasized your femininity.

China and Russia are on the march.

They all think we can be bullied, kicked around.

You should know this about me.

I don't put up with bullies.

And when you kick back, it hurts them more if you're wearing heels.

I'm Nikki Haley and I'm running for president.

And when you kick back, you said it hurts them more when you're wearing heels.

To me, it's a kind of like very leaning, you go girl type of play that you kind of see reserved for democratic politicians.

So I guess I'm left wondering how central is your identity as a woman,

and particularly a woman of South Asian descent to your candidacy.

And do you draw a line between sort of inclusive identity politics or exclusionary identity politics?

In other words, there's a version of identity politics that says,

I'm going to tell you who I am.

I'm going to tell you about that fruit stand so you can understand my story.

But I'm not telling you that story to say to you, you can never understand because you're not me.

So it's a few things.

I think, first of all, the reason I talk about being a brown girl growing up in a black and white world,

I talk about that from the standpoint of when I would come home being bullied,

my mom would say your job is not to show them how you're different, your job is to show them how you're similar.

Because I think that's a lesson for all Americans.

Don't let people divide you based on what you look like.

Let them go and show them how similar you are to them.

So it's a life lesson that I think all Americans can learn from,

but I think it also helps them understand me more.

When I talk about being a woman, when I talk about heels, I'm proud of being a woman.

I'm a feminine girl.

I love that.

And so, look, I don't deny what people can see.

They can see I'm a brown woman.

That's fine.

And so I have fun with it.

If you're going to criticize me for those things anyway, I'm going to lean into it and have fun.

And I have always done that.

It's not identity politics.

It's just loving who you are.

And I love being a woman.

I love my heritage.

I love how I was raised and I love how it has made me who I am today.

And so, you know, identity politics are when you divide people based on what you are.

I'm not dividing people based on what I am.

I'm trying to show people that we are all more similar than we are different.

One of the themes of your presidential bid is, though you're not past your prime,

you have said that many of our politicians very much are.

You actually said it's time for the permanent politicians to retire and a new generation to take the reins.

You suggested mandatory mental competency tests for congressmen of a certain age.

I definitely cannot argue with that.

You've been in politics, though, for nearly two decades.

So what exactly distinguishes you from the old guard?

And do you actually think that there should be a cap on how old you can be to have a job in Washington?

Look, I mean, if you look at the military, people age out.

If you look at different jobs, people age out because you have to be at the top of your prime, right?

So, I mean, I look at, I was elected governor when I was 38.

I was the youngest governor in the country.

And I served all the way through the UN for eight years, I believe, in term limits.

So it was a reason I walked away because after eight years,

you have to know when to walk away and let someone else be able to do that.

It allows you to recharge, it allows you to get back.

But the mental competency test is amazing how much of a nerve that hit.

When you've got elected officials, first of all, look at DC.

It's old.

You know, we need term limits.

We need people to understand that, look, you have to know how to rotate out.

You have to let other people do these jobs.

But the second thing is you need to be at the top of your game.

These are people making decisions on our national security.

These are people making decisions on what's going to happen to our children.

I'm not saying it keeps them from holding a job.

I'm saying do the mental competency test so the people that you serve know that you are up to your prime.

If you fail it, I'm not saying you can't serve.

I'm saying your people need to know you failed it.

So, you know, look, I think that's important.

If they gave everybody mental competency tests, I think it would be warranted

because I think the issues of the day are that important.

And look, I mean, you know, people talk about age, whether it's whoopie saying I'm 51 or Don Lemon saying I'm past my prime.

I'm 30 years younger than Biden.

What I'm saying is when you have someone with this many issues in the country,

we need to make sure somebody's got the physical, mental, emotional stamina to be able to get us through this.

And I think being transparent to the American people is a good thing.

And I think for all those people who were offended by it,

I think that tells the American people all they need to know.

After the break, I asked Nikki Haley what her favorite low country staple is.

That and more questions in the lightning round. Stay with us.

Okay, Nikki Haley, you ready for a lightning round?

Sure.

Who's your hero?

My mom.

What's a greater threat? China or Russia?

China.

Should John Fetterman have dropped out of the race for the Senate?

Yes.

Who is the most interesting Republican in Congress?

Oh, that's hard. We've got good Republicans.

Okay, how about in the Senate?

You know, I love what Joni Ernst has done.

I really love how she's strong militarily, but she's strong conservative.

She's a good communicator. She continues to do great things.

We really have some good Republicans.

I mean, I think it's hard for me to see the most interesting because I tend to look at the most tough

or the ones that are more substantive.

I think Michael Waltz in the House is fantastic.

Like, I think the way he gets the military and strength and the way he does that,

I've really enjoyed him.

I love the fact that, you know, we've got new leaders like Zach Nunn coming in.

I like the toughness of Nancy Mace.

There's a lot of good ones out there.

Who's the Democrat right now that you most admire?

I worked really well with Cardin and Menendez on foreign policy

because I liked how they were able to kind of put partisan stuff aside when it came to foreign policy.

So those are the two that come to mind that I actually worked with.

Best American president ever.

Between Abraham Lincoln and Ronald Reagan.

What's the best thing about South Carolina?

The people. Hands down, the people.

What's your favorite low-country staple?

Mm. Trimping grits.

What's your favorite American singer or band?

Oh, so I am a music buff. I have a lot.

I know you are.

I love anyone from, like, Meat Loaf to Death Leopard to, I think, the song I listened to before I got on stage

to give my speech of running for president was the Ozzy Osbourne Post Malone song.

So, I mean, like, I just love music. I love all music.

What is your biggest concern regarding America right now, number one concern?

That we've lost our purpose. That we've lost our core values of who we are as Americans.

What's the last book that you read?

J.D. Vance's book.

Was January 6th an insurrection, a riot, or a coup?

A sad day in America.

Would you support Trump if you were the candidate?

Yes.

What's happening in America right now that gives you the greatest amount of hope?

The next generation.

They don't care so much about money as making sure they make a difference.

And I think a lot of people don't see that.

Who is the most admirable person that you've worked with in your political life?

HR McMaster.

If you could undo one policy mistake of the last 50 years, what would it be?

You know, I think getting involved in the war would probably be a big one.

The war in Iraq?

Yes.

Not the war in Afghanistan?

Well, I mean, it all kind of blended together, but yes.

Phil in the blank.

The UN is?

A farce.

What's the last thing you changed your mind about?

What song I'd come out to for announcing president?

What was it?

What did you change from?

I love rock and roll too.

I have the tiger.

Was there a moment that you knew that you were going to run for president?

I mean, Bill Clinton knew he wanted to do it from a really young age.

Do you have the same kind of thing?

No, I actually wasn't that kid.

I wasn't that kid that was involved in politics.

I wasn't that kid that was in college Republicans.

I actually never was involved in politics until I came back home to work in the family business.

And I was telling my mom how hard it was to make a dollar and how easy it was for government to take it.

And my mom said, don't complain about it.

Do something about it.

I didn't know you weren't supposed to run against a 30 year income at a primary.

He was the longest serving legislator in South Carolina.

And once I got in, the only option was to win.

Vivek Ramaswani is talking about banning social media for kids under 16.

Do you think that's a good idea?

I think that's a parent's decision.

Do you think TikTok should be legal in America?

No.

Do you think big tech should be broken up?

I think that Section 230 protected them on freedom of speech when they changed the rules.

I think they changed the rules on Section 230 and it needs to be opened back up again.

What should we be doing in this country about the crisis of meaning among young people and the fact that so many of them are anxious and depressed?

Do we need a religious revival?

I always think a religious revival is an amazing thing, but I think more than that we have to look at the harm that was done to them during COVID.

I saw it with my own children.

And the idea that they were isolated, forced isolation, forced maskings, forced closure, and then no one focused on...

We've been a country that has missed the mental health issue before.

Now it's even more prevalent.

And I think the idea that we have to understand one in four people have a mental health issue.

But if treated, they can lead a perfectly normal life.

We need to commit as a country to understand that the mental health issues in this country are a serious problem,

and we need to take the time to really figure out how to make it right.

Okay, last question.

You're a mom of two young adults, as you mentioned before.

After a term of president of the United States, if you win, what would you want to leave your kids with?

What would you want your legacy to be?

I would want them to know that I was a strong leader, but never stopped being a great mom.

Because I've always believed it's family first.

I've always said if I'm a good mom and a good wife, I'll be a good governor.

I'll be a good ambassador.

And so it's still for me as family first.

I never want them to feel I'm not there for them.

And what I hope they take away is no matter what job she held, she was always there for us.

Nikki Haley from a hotel room in Austin on the campaign trail.

Thank you for taking the time.

I really appreciate it.

Thanks. Tell your listeners go to NikkiHaley.com. Let's do this.

Thanks as always for listening.

If you like this conversation, if it provoked you, if it made you angry, if it inspired you,

if it made you ask a bunch of questions, that's all great.

That's the point.

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Thanks so much, and we'll see you next time.

T-K-Max

Machine-generated transcript that may contain inaccuracies.