Nikki Haley has a fighting chance against Donald Trump,
and I'm going to tell you why.
I'm Walt Hickey. I cover politics at Business Insider.
Let's get going. Do you want to know what I
didn't do today?
I did not do Jenga practice.
What qualities does she have that might attract voters?
The biggest thing that she is going for her is
that her pitch to the GOP,
she and only she is capable of winning back a
number of constituencies that have defected from the Republican Party.
I'm talking specifically about suburban women.
I'm talking specifically about college educated Republicans.
These demographics in particular have begun to defect over the
course of the Trump administration.
Republicans have lost the last seven out of eight popular
votes for president.
She acknowledges that the Republican presidential ticket has not won
a majority of the votes in quite some time.
And so she is very big on on getting that
tent big again and actually winning majorities in elections.
Again, I promise you for her
best days are to come.
No, no. Hey, we're cool.
It's rules. I love this.
Does Haley have a chance at the GOP ticket?
Yeah, she does. Is it the biggest chance?
No. There's there's a guy who has a bigger chance
of being the GOP ticket at this point.
But but yeah, no, she's got a chance.
The thing that we don't expect to see from Haley,
potentially is that it would be difficult at this phase
in the race to think that she is potential vice
presidential material to Donald Trump.
Donald Trump went on a temper tantrum about me last
night.
She's easy to beat.
I think that that relationship is kind of severed at
this point,
and I would be very surprised if the end of
this process was her joining him on the ticket.
Not a lot of good options here.
That was easy. Can Haley win because people don't like
Biden and Trump?
Yeah, I mean, that's, you know,
kind of our argument. Haley is essentially arguing that
Donald Trump's unlikeability is not feasible for him to win
the presidency.
Another go round that over
70% of Americans don't want a Trump Biden rematch.
She is running against both Biden and Trump on the
idea that the country needs a younger,
more vibrant, more capable individual in the White House.
Don't you think we need to have mental competency tests
for anyone over the age of 75?
It's getting harder
this Yeah. Oh boy, oh oh God.
Can Haley win if Trump is taken off primary ballots?
That would potentially be a good thing for her.
Potentially, it would remove the main impediment and and remove
the opposition.
However, you got to play this one out.
If Trump is removed from a primary ballot in a
state,
his reporters are going to be ticked.
Supreme Court is taking the case from Colorado and ticked
people vote more often than people who aren't ticked.
And so there's a very reasonable line of thought that
goes if Trump is removed from the ballot in any
number of different states.
That is a motivating factor to get him written in.
And you do not have to go far back in
American presidential politics to find a presidential contender who was
not listed on the ballot,
who nevertheless won on a write in.
Because Joe Biden just did that.
He did that in New Hampshire,
and I I would not be very surprised if Trump
pulls that off in one of the places that he
is potentially eliminated from a ballot on.
I hate this a lot.
Nope. Nope.
How does Trump's win in New Hampshire affect Haley's chip
Chip.
He took a little bit of a tumble,
but don't count him out quite yet.
Losing the state of New Hampshire
isn't really what you want to do in a primary,
or particularly someone who spends as much time in New
Hampshire as Nikki Haley did.
Eagle eyed viewers may have noticed that this is not,
in fact a Nikki Haley bobblehead.
This is a an improvised Nikki Haley bobblehead.
Because hey, listen, second place in New Hampshire,
right? That's that doesn't get you bobble heads.
You got to start winning stuff.
You get you got to win a state or two
and then the bobblehead machines,
they just let it rip and we'll have lots of
Nikki Haley bobbleheads.
But for the time being,
we get to improvise.
So we're just going to take Trump Tower?
Nope. We're good. We got it.
Nope.
I don't give up.
We're just going to play Trump Tower as it stands
and and take it from here.
Can Haley win if Trump ends up in jail?
I think that might be her strategy at this point.
All that time that he's spending in a courtroom defending
himself,
he's not fighting for the American people.
Her campaign is kind of wagering that for whatever reason,
Trump will not be seen as a viable nominee at
the time of the convention.
I think that this is going to be kind of
an element of her end game and potentially if she's
unable to build a coalition that can actually deliver the
1215 delegates. There is only one solution to this
and that is you have
to elect a badass Republican.
Can Haley win if she secures South Carolina?
Yeah, yeah, she can win if she secures South Carolina.
Thank you for the love New Hampshire.
We're going home to South Carolina.
South Carolina is an interesting state when it comes to
the delegates.
It is winner take all at the statewide level.
And So what that means is that whoever wins the
entire state gets a bunch of delegates.
So straight up, like if she does not secure a
majority of the vote within the state of South Carolina,
she stands potentially the risk of getting wiped out,
even if she does secure some like
49% of the vote. Every time I've run for office
in South Carolina,
I've beaten the political establishment.
If she does manage to pull it out,
and she does manage to get above 50%,
that's a very big victory.
She would be beating Trump in the delegates at that
point.
Almost certainly. It's going to be pretty critical for her
to have a good performance.
Well, I'm a fighter, and now we're the last one
standing next to Donald Trump.
Is there any hope to avoid a Trump Biden
2020 rematch? Why are you not?
Are you not having fun?
Is this not fun for you?
Trump's not concerned about your future.
I promise you Joe Biden is truly a threat
to democracy. It does seem like we are skating towards
a
Trump Biden rematch. It would take some serious politics from
Nikki Haley and some over performance and essentially betting that
her theory of the case for the United States is
correct over Donald Trump's theory of the case that the
GOP can win by bringing back moderates from the suburbs
and basically break the hold that the Democratic Party has
maintained across a number of demographics and and income levels.
If you will commit to go out and vote on
Tuesday,
if you will take friends with you.
So can it happen? Yep.
Will it it we're getting kind of like
just be honest. We're kind of coming up on that.