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Opinion: Why doesn’t South Carolina love Nikki Haley?

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Opinion: Why doesn’t South Carolina love Nikki Haley?

Nikki Haley titled her 2022 book after the late British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s assertion that “If you want something said, ask a man. If you want something done, ask a woman.” She’s made a point of projecting that Iron Lady toughness in the 2024 race, from her Reaganesque foreign policy views and 5-inch heels she calls ammunition, to her response when Donald Trump said anyone supporting Haley after New Hampshire would be “permanently barred from the MAGA camp.”

“Well in that case…donate here. Let’s Go!” the former South Carolina governor said on X, and linked to a contribution page. Within less than 24 hours, $1 million had poured in.

Sometimes Haley has struck me as too tough, too harsh. Still, I felt for her when the top politicians from her state — the governor, the lieutenant governor, the attorney general, the treasurer, two congressmen, the speaker of the state House and even the senator she appointed — traipsed to New Hampshire last month to endorse and celebrate Trump. He carried the state easily and is on track to win even bigger in her home state primary on Feb. 24.

Why doesn’t South Carolina love Nikki Haley? Or maybe it does, just not enough?

A humiliating home-state loss is sometimes the final straw in a nomination race (see: Marco Rubio, Florida, 2016). It can also make the difference between winning or losing the presidency itself (see: Al Gore, Tennessee, 2000).

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Gore and his state had grown apart politically, on guns and many other issues, over his decades in Congress and as vice president. Haley is facing more of a Rubio-style Rubicon moment. In South Carolina, she has trailed Trump by crushing margins in every poll.

At the same time, like Rubio, who easily won a third Senate term in 2022, Haley has not been unpopular in her state. In a Winthrop University poll in November, 59% of registered voters had a very or somewhat favorable view of her, and that rose to 71% for Republicans. And while a new Washington Post-Monmouth University poll of potential South Carolina primary voters shows her approval rating slipping as Trump has attacked her, 54% still say they’d be enthusiastic or satisfied if she became the GOP nominee.

“She is a very conservative Republican and that has made her beloved among South Carolina Republicans,” Scott Huffmon, director of Winthrop University’s Center for Public Opinion & Policy Research, told me. “They just want Donald Trump to be president again.”

That’s one problem. The other is that Haley has endeared herself to South Carolina voters far more than to her colleagues in politics. “She really curried popularity among rank-and-file Republicans, while at the same time cultivating disaffection among the political elite,” Huffmon said.

Haley’s political career took off in 2004 when she defeated a 30-year legislative veteran in a state House primary. Six years later, she became governor after besting a field that included the lieutenant governor, the attorney general and a congressman.

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As governor a dozen years ago, Haley chose one-term House member Tim Scott, a conservative Black Republican, to fill a Senate vacancy. He dropped his own presidential bid in November and is now an enthusiastic Trump backer.

“You must really hate her,” Trump said as Scott smiled behind him on victory night in New Hampshire. “I just love you,” Scott replied. He must be quite madly in love, because just a few days earlier, Scott had asserted that the quadruply indicted Trump would “restore law and order.”

Then there’s Gov. Henry McMaster, another Trump lover and another politician who has a history with Haley. He was the state attorney general she defeated in the 2010 gubernatorial primary. Four years later, he was elected lieutenant governor, and he endorsed Trump early in the 2016 race. By late November that year, President-elect Trump named Haley to be his United Nations ambassador — allowing McMaster to become governor.

Trump is a vengeful cult leader. “I don’t get too angry, I get even,” he said in his “victory” speech after the New Hampshire vote — then threatened that if Haley didn’t drop out, she’d be under investigation in 15 minutes for “a little stuff that she doesn’t want to talk about.” Scott told CBS News the race would solidify for Trump in South Carolina and “I would love for her to join the Trump team and go ahead and endorse now and not wait any time.” But, as Scott also said, “she’s tenacious.”

The most astonishing thing about the Trump-versus-Haley finale is that, while I personally disagree with her on nearly everything outside of supporting Ukraine and removing the Confederate flag from the state Capitol, she is a candidate tailor-made to nudge the Republican Party into the future: the smart, conservative, 50-something daughter of immigrant Indian parents, with a multiracial family and a husband in the National Guard, who sees the world clearly and wouldn’t hand Ukraine to Vladimir Putin.

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Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, ending his campaign a few days before the New Hampshire primary, said he’d endorse Trump “because we can’t go back to the old Republican Guard of yesteryear, a repackaged form of warmed-over corporatism that Nikki Haley represents.” But the DeSantis war on “woke” and corporations such as Disney is no path to the future, nor is the Trump war on truth, justice and the American way.

Haley is the best option. But her own state will likely finish her off if she doesn’t cave to MAGA Mania before that happens.

Jill Lawrence is an opinion writer and author of “The Art of the Political Deal: How Congress Beat the Odds and Broke Through Gridlock.” @JillDLawrence

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McCarthy says Trump will use ‘everything he can’ to force Senate action on SAVE America Act

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McCarthy says Trump will use ‘everything he can’ to force Senate action on SAVE America Act

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As infighting over the SAVE America Act throws congressional Republicans into disarray, President Donald Trump’s bid to get the stalled election bill across the finish line gained one notable ally.

Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., told Fox News Digital that he supports the election integrity measure and indicated that Trump should continue to use every available tool to pressure the Senate to pass it.

“He’s going to try everything he can to make sure he passes that through,” McCarthy said in a brief interview outside the U.S. Capitol. 

The ex-speaker’s comments came after Trump abruptly called off a signing ceremony Wednesday for a bipartisan housing bill to pressure the Republican-controlled Senate to act on the SAVE America Act.

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President Donald Trump boards Air Force One as he departs Reading Regional Airport in Reading, Pa., on June 23, 2026. (Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters)

IRATE REPUBLICANS ACCUSE TRUMP OF HANDING DEMOCRATS A WIN AFTER BLOWING UP HOUSING PACKAGE

The move surprised Republican lawmakers, some of whom were praising the bill’s passage at a press conference when Trump’s Truth Social post broke.

But Trump has repeatedly cast the election measure — requiring proof of citizenship to vote in federal elections and voter identification requirements — as his top legislative priority.

The legislation’s momentum, however, has slowed in the upper chamber, where Republican leadership insists the votes aren’t there amid widespread Democratic opposition. Senate Republicans have also been unwilling to eliminate the legislative filibuster, which requires a 60-vote threshold to pass the legislation.

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Former Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy speaks during a ceremony honoring President Ronald Reagan on the 115th anniversary of his birthday at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif., on Feb. 6, 2026. (Hans Gutknecht/MediaNews Group)

TRUMP CALLS MAIL IN VOTING CORRUPT AS SENATE BEGINS DEBATE ON SAVE ACT REQUIRING VOTER ID

Amid the SAVE standoff, a group of conservative lawmakers effectively shut down the House floor in an effort to force Senate action on the election bill. 

But the Senate recessed Wednesday for two weeks over the July 4 holiday, leaving the measure in limbo until lawmakers return.

The conservative-led blockade sparked fierce backlash, with several members inside the GOP conference telling Fox News Digital the move risked torpedoing their own legislative agenda.

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Meanwhile, the House has also yet to pass a version of the legislation incorporating several of the president’s priorities, including a mail-in voting crackdown and provisions banning men from competing in women’s sports and child sex change procedures. 

Trump has not indicated whether he will sign the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, despite the likely existence of a veto-proof majority.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., told reporters Thursday that the housing bill had been transmitted to the White House for Trump’s signature following a meeting with the president.

Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., talks with reporters in the U.S. Capitol on June 10, 2026. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)

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Trump now has 10 days to sign the package or veto it. If he does nothing, the legislation automatically becomes law at the end of the 10-day period.

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Trump budget request omits funds for L.A. fire relief, prompting criticism from senators

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Trump budget request omits funds for L.A. fire relief, prompting criticism from senators

California’s two Democratic senators on Thursday criticized the Trump administration after it requested $87.6 billion from Congress to address some of the nation’s most “urgent needs” but omitted funding for victims of last year’s Los Angeles wildfires.

“Donald Trump’s desire to punish Los Angeles and the state of California for not voting for him, means once again that thousands of Angelinos are left watching this administration fight for anything but them, their businesses, and their communities,” Sens. Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff said in a joint statement.

“These fires did not discriminate based on party or political preference. Neither should this administration,” they added.

The omission is the latest strain in a yearlong standoff between California leaders and the Trump administration over federal disaster aid, and it comes after Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger met with President Trump at the Oval Office in April to request the funding.

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At the meeting, Trump signaled his commitment to working with local officials to help with disaster recovery efforts. The officials asked for $16 billion that would be split between the city and county. The money would consist primarily of disbursements from the Federal Emergency Management Agency flagged for communities hit by the fires, part of a $33.9-billion wildfire relief funding request made by Gov. Gavin Newsom.

Two months later, those talks have yet to yield results sought by local leaders.

The budget request, submitted by the Office of Management and Budget on Wednesday, mostly seeks funding for the Pentagon to address costs related to the Iran war. It also includes $11.1 billion in economic assistance for American farmers, $1.4 billion to address the Ebola virus outbreak in Central Africa, $500 million to support “ongoing efforts to complete restorations and construction projects” across the nation’s capital and $1 billion to boost the pensions of workers at General Motors that were cut as a result of the automaker’s bankruptcy.

“I urge the Congress to take action on these important and urgent requests as soon as possible,” White House budget director Russell Vought wrote in a letter addressed to House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.).

Vought said the administration was open to discussing “additional relief for other urgent matters.” The White House did not immediately respond when asked why the budget request did not mention the Eaton and Palisades disaster relief funds.

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State leaders, including Newsom, have repeatedly accused the Trump administration of stonewalling billions in wildfire aid. The governor visited Washington in December to meet with lawmakers, including three who serve on the Senate and House appropriations committees, to push for the funding.

The governor also attempted to meet with FEMA about the matter, but said his request was denied. Newsom, a political foe of Trump’s, would not say whether he had attempted to meet with Trump to talk about the recovery efforts.

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Trump administration pledges $150M in aid, deploys Navy warships after deadly Venezuela earthquakes

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Trump administration pledges 0M in aid, deploys Navy warships after deadly Venezuela earthquakes

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Following a catastrophic set of earthquakes that left at least 235 people dead in Venezuela, the Trump administration has activated a government-wide humanitarian response, pledging $150 million in aid and deploying U.S. Navy warships to assist in life-saving rescue operations.

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The rapid mobilization Thursday comes after back-to-back magnitude 7.2 and 7.5 earthquakes rocked northern Venezuela roughly 120 miles west of Caracas Wednesday night. 

The rare earthquake “doublet” injured more than 940 people and turned the state of La Guaira into a disaster zone, while forcing the closure of the damaged Simón Bolívar International Airport, according to Venezuela’s Health Ministry.

US RESCUE TEAMS TO DESCEND ON HARD-HIT CARIBBEAN AFTER CATASTROPHIC HURRICANE MELISSA’S IMPACT

Rescuers search for victims in a collapsed building following an earthquake in Caracas on June 24, 2026. (Manaure Quintero / AFP via Getty Images)

The U.S. Department of State announced on Thursday it is mobilizing $150 million in aid, which includes $50 million in new bilateral awards for relief partners on the ground — such as Samaritan’s Purse, Catholic Relief Services and World Vision — along with a $100 million contribution to a United Nations humanitarian pooled fund.

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To spearhead efforts on the ground, the State Department has deployed a regional Disaster Assistance Response Team alongside two highly specialized urban search-and-rescue teams from fire departments in Fairfax County, Virginia, and Los Angeles County, California. 

U.S. WARSHIPS TO PATROL INTERNATIONAL WATERS AROUND VENEZUELA AS TRUMP VOWS TO STOP CARTELS

Members of the County of Los Angeles Fire Department’s international urban search and rescue team (USA-2) prepare to leave for Venezuela, in Pacoima, Calif., Thursday. (Blake Fagan/AFP via Getty Images)

U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) said it is surging assigned U.S. military forces to the region, directing the USS Fort Lauderdale and the USS Billings to Venezuela to back the State Department-led operations.

The USS Fort Lauderdale will serve as a “floating command center” with a flight deck to support heavy-lift helicopters and a well deck to launch landing craft, according to SOUTHCOM.

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Meanwhile, the agile USS Billings will provide critical support close to the shorelines to accelerate the disaster response missions.

U.S. SOUTHCOM said it has directed USS Fort Lauderdale (LPD 28) and USS Billings (LCS 15) to Venezuela to support State Department-led U.S. government relief operations in Venezuela. (@Southcom/X)

SOUTHCOM said it is also sending rotary-wing aircraft, which will provide critical life-saving airlift support, transporting U.S. government response personnel, search and rescue teams and partners during relief operations.

Amid the crisis, the State Department emphasized that the safety of U.S. citizens remains the administration’s highest priority.

“The Trump Administration has no higher priority than the safety and security of Americans. The Department of State is working tirelessly to provide consular assistance to U.S. citizens and their families in the affected areas,” officials wrote in a statement. “The United States remains steadfast in its commitment to helping Venezuela recover from this devastating disaster and will continue to explore additional ways to provide meaningful assistance during this critical time.”

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U.S. citizens in Venezuela are urged to enroll in the Smart Traveler Enrollment Program (STEP) and can contact the State Department 24/7 at 202-501-4444 for emergency assistance.

Family members in the U.S. seeking information on loved ones can call toll-free at 888-407-4747.

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