CONWAY, S.C. — With two weeks to go before the South Carolina Republican primary, Nikki Haley is challenging Donald Trump on her home turf while the former president tries to quash his last major rival's narrow path to the nomination.
Trump, turning his campaign's focus to the southern state days after an easy victory in Nevada, revved up a huge crowd of supporters at a Saturday afternoon rally in Conway, near Myrtle Beach, by touting his time in office, repeating his false claims that the 2020 election he lost was rigged, maligning a news media he sees as biased against him and lobbing attacks on Haley and President Joe Biden.
In his rally speech, Trump insulted Haley by using his derisive nickname for her, "Birdbrain," and lavished praise on South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster, who endorsed him early. Trump claimed that selected Haley to serve as his ambassador to the United Nations in 2017 and represent America on the world stage only because he was motivated to make McMaster — her second-in-command — the governor of South Carolina.
"She did a job. She was fine. She was OK. But I didn't put here there because I wanted her there at the United Nations," he said. "I wanted to take your lieutenant governor, who is right here, and make him governor."
"I wanted him because I felt he deserved it," Trump added
Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump interacts with supporters Saturday after speaking during a rally in Conway, S.C.
Trump, long the front-runner in the GOP presidential race, won three states in a row and is looking to use South Carolina's Feb. 24 primary to close out Haley's chances and turn his focus fully on an expected rematch with Biden in the general election.
Haley skipped the Nevada caucuses, condemning the contest as rigged for Trump, and instead focused on South Carolina, kicking off a two-week bus tour across the state where she served as governor from 2011 to 2017.
Speaking to about a couple hundred people gathered outside a historic opera house in Newberry, Haley on Saturday portrayed Trump as an erratic and self-absorbed figure not focused on the American people.
She pointed to the way he flexed his influence over the Republican Party this past week, successfully pressuring GOP lawmakers in Washington to reject a bipartisan border security deal and publicly pressed Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel to consider leaving her job.
"What is happening?" Haley said. "On that day of all those losses, he had his fingerprints all over it," she added.
Republican presidential candidate former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley speaks Saturday at a campaign event in Newberry, S.C.
Haley reprised her questions of Trump's mental fitness, an attack she sharpened since a Jan. 19 speech in which he repeatedly confused her with former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif. Haley, 52, has called for mental competency tests for politicians, a way to contrast with 77-year-old Trump and 81-year-old Biden.
"Why do we have to have someone in their 80s run for office?" she asked. "Why can't they let go of their power?"
Haley continued the argument when speaking to reporters afterward, citing a report released Thursday by the special counsel investigating Biden's possession of classified documents. The report described Biden's memory as "poor."
"American can do better than two 80-year-olds for president," Haley said.
Republican presidential candidate former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, center, poses for a photo Saturday with law enforcement officials after a campaign event in Newberry, S.C.
Bob Pollard, a retired firefighter, said he cannot support Trump because "he's a maniac," adding that Trump's campaign, in which he speaks frequently of "retribution" and his personal grievances, has "turned into a personal vendetta."
Harlie O'Connell, a longtime South Carolina resident who backs Haley, said she plans to support the eventual GOP nominee but prefers it is someone younger. "It's just time for some fresh blood," she said.
Her husband, Mike O'Connell, drew a contrast between the candidates' approach to foreign policy and said he wants the U.S. to continue assisting Ukraine in its war with Russia, as Haley pledged.
"We need to encourage friendships and not discourage them," he said of international relations.
Attendees arrive Saturday for a rally with Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump in Conway, S.C.
Trump, in his remarks and a social media post on Saturday, criticized foreign aid generally and a plan in Congress to provide nearly $100 billion in aid for Ukraine and Israel. He also repeated his praise for foreign strongmen, calling Russian President Vladimir Putin "very smart, very sharp," describing Hungary's nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orbán as "one of the toughest guys" and saying Chinese President Xi Jinping is smart because he "controls 1.4 billion people with an iron fist."
In one very personal attack, Trump questioned why Haley’s husband, Michael Haley, who is deployed on a yearlong stint in Africa with the South Carolina Army National Guard, hasn’t been on the campaign trail. Trump, whose own wife, Melania Trump, has not joined him as he campaigns, asked: “What happened to her husband? Where is he? He’s gone. He knew. He knew.”
Haley responded sharply in a social media post: “Michael is deployed serving our country, something you know nothing about. Someone who continually disrespects the sacrifices of military families has no business being commander in chief.”
Trump wrapped up with an at times apocalyptic vision of the country, listing ills from dirty, crowded airports to looming nuclear war and, if he loses the election, predicting the stock market would crash like it did in 1929, touching off the Great Depression. He referred to his supporters who were prosecuted for their roles in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol as "hostages" who have been "unfairly imprisoned for long periods of time."
He made his extended lament while speaking over an instrumental song that QAnon adherents claimed as their anthem.
Tim Carter, from Murrells Inlet, said he backed Trump since 2016 and would do so again this year.
"We're here to stand for Trump, get our economy better, shut our border down, more jobs for our people," said Carter, a pastor and military veteran who runs an addiction recovery ministry.
Cheryl Savage from Conway said the former president is "here to help us." She said she backed Haley during her first run for governor in 2010 but now feels Haley is hurting herself by staying in the race.
"He deserves a second term," Savage said of Trump. "He did a fantastic job for four years."
