Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley took aim at former President Donald Trump during a rally in Colorado on Tuesday, one week before the state’s presidential primary election.
“No Republican statewide has gotten more than 45% statewide since Donald Trump became president,” Haley said of Colorado’s elections. “Everywhere he goes, chaos follows him.”
The former U.N. ambassador criticized Trump, her former boss, over big spending and higher national debt during his administration, as well as his recent opposition to a congressional bill that would have spent billions to strengthen border security. She blended in criticism of President Joe Biden along the way, saying she has a better chance of beating the Democrat than Trump does.
Here are the big takeaways from the event:
Haley, a former accountant, started out the rally talking about reining in the national debt and reducing the size of the federal government. She criticized COVID aid passed by Congress while Trump was president, alleging high levels of fraud and promising to investigate it. And she said she’d cut taxes for the middle class and simplify tax brackets, though she didn’t provide specifics on her plans.
“Don’t you think it’s finally time we had an accountant in the White House?” she said to cheers at Wings Over the Rockies in Arapahoe County. “We’ll stop the spending, we’ll stop the borrowing.”
She also vowed to crack down on people crossing the southern border illegally and institute a national program requiring businesses to verify that their employees are authorized to work, similar to the one she created in South Carolina.
“Let’s defund sanctuary cities once and for all,” she said to more cheers. “Instead of catch and release, we’re going to go to catch and deport.”
While she said she disagreed with some aspects of the recent immigration compromise that Senate Republicans rejected at Trump’s behest, she said those in Congress should have kept working to improve the proposal.
“Donald Trump comes in, says, ‘Don’t pass anything until after the general election’ and Congress went home on vacation for two weeks,” she said. “Congress needs to do their job and Trump needs to stay out of it. Period.”
She vowed to take better care of veterans who sometimes end up homeless and struggle with access to health care. And she attacked Trump on his resistance to providing more financial aid to Ukraine in its war against Russia.
“He emboldened (Russian President Vladimir) Putin and he put every one of our men and women serving there in danger,” Haley said. “We need a president who understands the No. 1 job is to prevent war, period. Believe Putin when he says once he takes Ukraine, Poland and the Baltics are next.”
Holly Riecks, a 52-year-old teacher and Republican from Highlands Ranch, wore a pro-Haley T-shirt with the slogan “Barred Permanently,” a reference to Trump’s opposition to Haley remaining in the race. Riecks moved through the crowd with a clipboard seeking volunteers to join her in working for the campaign.
“She is the best-qualified candidate,” Riecks said. “I just don’t feel like we have the relationships with people abroad that we used to, and that we have really come apart at the seams as a country. We’re very divided. And she’s a unifier.”
Riecks said she voted for Trump in 2016 and 2020. That won’t happen again, she said, even if he’s the nominee.
Karthik Krishna, a Golden entrepreneur originally from India, said he voted for Trump in 2020 but came to the rally to hear what Haley had to say.
“It’s not just like I want to blindly support somebody,” he said. “I want to talk to her about U.S. policy toward Ukraine, because it feels like we are more for war with a theme, that war is good for business, rather than saying, ‘We want lasting peace.’”
He hasn’t voted in the primary yet, and likes Trump because he “understands how the U.S. has been exploited on the global stage.” But, Krishna said, “It’s too early. I don’t want to lock myself in.”
Meanwhile, outside the venue, 75-year-old Boulder Democrat Julia McKay was handing out flyers encouraging people to sign a petition demanding that the 81-year-old Biden abandon his bid for a second term. She said she’d already cast a vote for “noncommitted delegate” on the Democratic presidential primary ballot. But she came to the rally to hear what Haley had to say.
“I’m interested in her as a candidate. I like her personally,” McKay said. “I think she’s pretty centrist.”
Haley is betting big on Super Tuesday — March 5 — when Colorado is among 15 states holding presidential primaries. But there’s not much evidence to indicate it will turn her struggling campaign around.
The former South Carolina governor lost to Trump by 20 percentage points in her home state Saturday.
A recent poll conducted by Global Strategies Group, a Democratic firm, showed that 76% of registered Republican voters in Colorado viewed former President Donald Trump favorably, while 23% viewed him unfavorably. The margin of error for registered Republicans in that poll was plus or minus 7.1%, and they made up 23% of the 800 respondents. That’s slightly less than the 24% of registered voters who are Republican.
Two-thirds of unaffiliated voters surveyed, who are eligible to vote in the Republican primary, have an unfavorable view of the former president. Unaffiliated voters make up 48% of Colorado’s registered voters.
Haley noted that she’s the last candidate standing between Trump and the nomination. She cited a recent poll that shows her defeating Biden by a significant margin, unlike Trump.
“If you want to start winning again, you have to have someone on the ticket who can win,” she said.
She concluded by asking attendees for their vote.
“Tuesday is election day, so this is what I need you to do: Vote. Vote,” Haley said. “I need you to make sure that 10 other people vote along with you. In a general election you’re given a choice. In a primary election you make your choice.”
While a few hundred people attended Haley’s rally, that doesn’t mean she’s got the support of the state’s GOP.
The Colorado Republican Party, which has endorsed Trump, sent an email to supporters Monday bashing the national conservative nonprofit Americans for Prosperity for supporting Haley.
AFP announced this week that it would stop spending to support Haley’s presidential campaign to focus on congressional contests.
About 50 people attended a fundraising luncheon before Haley’s public talk.
Haley and Trump have each raised just over $1 million from Coloradans through the end of January, while President Joe Biden raised $1.3 million.
It’s too late to mail in ballots for the presidential primary Tuesday. They must instead be delivered to a ballot drop box in your county. Through Tuesday, 300,092 Republican ballots and 221,250 Democratic ballots had been returned, with another 126,941 being processed.
Results of the primaries will be used by Democratic and Republican parties to apportion delegates to national nominating conventions later this summer.
The Colorado GOP will send 37 delegates to the national convention, with three from each of the state’s eight congressional districts and 10 selected at the state assembly, along with the party chair and two national committee members.
The Republican bylaws say delegates will be allocated proportionately to candidates who receive 20% of the vote or more.
There are seven GOP candidates listed on the Colorado ballot, although five have dropped out. Those four haven’t asked to be dropped in Colorado, so their votes will be counted by the Secretary of State’s Office. It’s unclear what will happen regarding Republican delegates if any of those candidates receive 20% or more of the vote.
Those seven candidates paid $20,000 or $40,000 to get Colorado GOP approval to make the ballot, with Haley paying the larger amount. Those paying the lesser amount were supposed to make a campaign stop in the state or hold a fundraiser for the state Republican Party.
