Former GOP presidential candidate Nikki Haley on Monday took issue with former Rep. Criticism from Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) over her bid to campaign with former President Donald Trump to help him secure a victory in November.
Cheney, who endorsed Kamala Harris last week and has repeatedly warned that Trump is a threat to American democracy, told ABC’s This Week on Sunday that he could not judge Haley’s decision to embrace Trump “in any kind of principled way” given the former president’s past criticism during the Republican primaries.
In an interview with Fox & Friends magazine, Haley said she disagreed with Cheney’s assessment.
“I respect his decision, but he can’t say my decision isn’t principled,” Haley said. “Actually it is. We can vote for either style or substance. I vote for substance.”
Haley also argued that Trump’s policies on several issues, including the economy, immigration and foreign policy, are better for the country compared to the current administration’s record, which she pinned solely on Harris.
“We should be very clear. If you don’t like him, say you don’t like him,” Haley said of Trump. “But you can’t say his policies are worse than Kamala Harris. It’s just not a fact.”
Haley acknowledged that the upcoming election will be a tight fight, and again said she would be willing to appear on the campaign trail with Trump if he wanted to.
“I’m on standby,” he said. “I’m happy to be of help. I don’t want to see Kamala Harris win. He is a candidate. He can decide if he needs my support or not.”
Haley, who withdrew from the Republican presidential primary in March, had repeatedly described him as unfit for another term in the White House, calling him “volatile and unstable.”
Although she did not immediately endorse Trump after dropping out of the race, she eventually said in May that she would vote for Trump and spoke in support of his bid for the White House at the Republican National Convention in July.
Haley also previously served as UN ambassador in the Trump administration.
Cheney and his father, former Vice President Dick Cheney, publicly announced their support for Harris last week.
“As citizens, we each have a duty to put country before partisanship to defend our Constitution,” Dick Cheney wrote in a statement.
Still, many Republicans on Capitol Hill dismissed the elder Cheney’s unprecedented move as insignificant.
“I think he’s out of touch,” Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.) said.
