As the window closes on her presidential campaign, Nikki Haley is changing her tune.
She’s no longer just attacking Donald Trump, she’s also attacking Republicans who support him.
All of them.
Losing is a kind of death that concentrates the mind, and with Super Tuesday likely to be her last stand, Haley is unleashing on the people whose votes she courted for more than a year.
She didn’t persuade enough of them, so now she’s blaming them for not being the right kind of Republicans.
“I get why Republicans are leaving the Republican Party, because we were just always about small government and freedom: economic freedom, personal freedom,” Haley told a gaggle of reporters Friday.
“You don’t see economic freedom coming from Republicans now.”
In the next breath, she threw the media under the bus, saying, “All of you have made this race about Trump. You haven’t made it about a primary, you haven’t made it about the direction of the country. You’ve just made it about Trump.”
If that wasn’t confusing enough, she insisted she’s not against him.
“I’m not anti-Trump,” she claimed.
“This is about the fact that I think America is better than this. And I think that the Republican Party is better than this, and I think we can do more than this.”
Minutes later, she took a rally stage and eviscerated Trump over the national debt, tariffs, threatening to leave NATO and pretty much everything else she could think of.
Out of step
Even allowing that Haley has little to lose at this point, her burn-it-down day was extraordinary.
It also illustrated why she has seen her GOP support actually decline during the primaries and why she gets much of her backing from Democrats, some of whom want to boost her because they believe she would be easier to beat in November.
For all of Haley’s energy and commendable record of public service, she’s out of step with the party she wants to lead.
She doesn’t seem to like it very much and its voters have returned the favor.
After her chat with Washington reporters, some described her as appealing to a party that no longer exists.
As Bloomberg news put it, she “lamented the direction of the Republican Party — claiming it has abandoned its core principles of small government and free markets.”
Naturally, this angle was framed as an American tragedy, as if those reporters had great affection for the GOP until Trump ruined everything.
If you believe that. . .
In truth, Haley’s not wrong that the party has changed.
But she doesn’t seem to understand why it had to change.
It would help if she at least recognized that radical leftists now control the Dems’ agenda and that a collegial GOP approach is doomed to fail.
Like the media, Haley yearns for the days when the GOP was genteel, united — and comfortable with losing.
Enter Trump, and whatever anyone wants to say of him, most of which is true, his GOP is no longer comfortable with losing.
He survived the spying of the FBI and CIA, defeated Hillary Clinton and is again under relentless attack from Dem media and prosecutors.
He has somehow survived it all and that is why he’s going to be the party’s presidential nominee for the third consecutive time.
And don’t forget that his policy record is far superior to President Biden’s, especially on the border and economy.
Trump’s ace, of course, is that his supporters see in him a defender and street fighter they never had in Mitt Romney, John McCain or either of the Bushes.
And Haley, despite her racial background and pioneering efforts to break the party’s glass ceiling, more resembles the GOP nominees of yesteryear than Trump.
Her temperament and policies are why many Trump supporters call her a RINO — a Republican in name only.
That’s the ultimate insult, reserved for those who are willing to compromise with Democrats on the assumption the favor will be returned.
Anyone who believes such give-and-take Dems still exist isn’t paying attention.
Dems stick together
Three examples of how today’s Dems play by the cutthroat rules formerly ascribed to leaders of the Soviet Union: What’s mine is mine, what’s yours is negotiable.
First, despite a historically-narrow House margin and internal splits, Republicans took the rare step of expelling one of their own, George Santos, after he was indicted on federal charges.
A Democrat, Tom Suozzi, recently won the special election for the New York seat.
By comparison, Dems control the razor-tight Senate, but there was no push to expel one of their own, New Jersey Sen. Robert Menendez, who was indicted on more serious charges, which included being a foreign agent.
Second, consider how each side views impeachment.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s Dem-controlled House ginned-up charges against Trump over Ukraine during his presidency, and produced two articles of impeachment.
Both were approved, with only two Dems voting no on the first and only three voting no on the second.
On the second Trump impeachment, after Jan. 6, 10 Republicans joined all Dems in voting yes and GOP Rep. Liz Cheney was a chief architect of the House hearings that followed.
Now Republicans have the House, but struggled even to impeach Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas for his refusal to secure the border.
The first vote failed in a tie, a second vote succeeded by one vote as three Republicans joined all Dems voting no.
Notice how Dems, whatever their differences, stick together for the big votes?
As for impeaching Joe Biden over his corrupt family schemes, the GOP had trouble getting a majority of its members just to support a formal impeachment inquiry.
All Dems voted no.
During hearings, Dems try to derail witnesses and downplay testimony, and unite in defending the president despite evidence Biden participated in the schemes.
No matter that testimony and bank records show he got money from his brother Jim Biden, who got it from foreign clients.
There is no Dem version of Liz Cheney willing to break ranks, nor is there enough GOP support to even consider an impeachment vote.
Ruthless politics
Third, there’s the unprecedented move to prosecute and bankrupt Trump, with indictments and civil cases coming from New York, Georgia and federal authorities — all led by Democrats.
In addition, numerous blue states outrageously considered or tried to ban Trump from appearing on ballots.
The Supreme Court is expected to rule soon on the matter.
Lest anyone think the legal assault is organic, The New York Times reported two years ago that Biden was unhappy that Attorney General Merrick Garland had not prosecuted Trump.
Soon, Garland saluted and obeyed.
On the Georgia case, chief prosecutor Fani Willis hired her lover and appears to have lied about it under oath.
Records show Willis & Co. spent days in the White House, suggesting Biden aides helped direct prosecution of his Republican opponent.
That’s the united, ruthless front Republicans are up against, and it’s why Trump, and only Trump, is the last candidate standing.
