Kerr: Haley can help Republicans win back their party

Former Vice President Mike Pence and Sen. Tim Scott have both dropped out of the GOP presidential primary. Former New Jersey governor Chris Christie has been a heroic voice of truth throughout the campaign, but surely realizes deep down he will not be the party’s 2024 nominee.

Vivek Ramaswamy has demonstrated emphatically he’s not a serious candidate for the White House, and Florida governor Ronald DeSantis has somehow proven even more unlikeable than Donald Trump.

Meanwhile, former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley consistently comes across as the most presidential of all the candidates vying for the Republican nomination, including the one who’s actually been president. She’s also emerged as Republicans’ best bet to reclaim a party effectively usurped by a bunch of clowns, sycophants and entitled brats.

A lot of Republicans – meaning real Republicans, not brainwashed cultists – previously seemed resigned to the inevitability of Trump as the GOP nominee again, but that’s because a viable alternative hadn’t yet emerged. Now, in Haley, the party can offer a candidate with experience, intelligence, youthful vitality and a more forward-focused charisma than what was previously on the table. As the state still hosting the nation’s first primary, New Hampshire is in a unique position to slingshot her campaign to the front of the field.

Headlines now claim Haley is battling DeSantis for the second spot among GOP candidates, but this underdog candidate is a bit more ambitious than that. She’s gunning for the top seed, and has a much better shot than folks might have predicted not so long ago.

Just in the past couple of weeks, Haley has picked up the endorsements of the billion-dollar conservative Koch network and New Hampshire political icon Judd Gregg, who recently said Granite State voters have an “obligation to step outside the box of trite political prognostication and give the nation a bit of a jolt.” Hopefully, the state’s savvy Gov. Chris Sununu – not a big Trump fan – will also recognize the benefit of backing Haley.

Some Trump supporters have an amusing practice of labelling everyone who doesn’t embrace their guy as a RINO, to the extent I’m convinced they have no idea what it actually means. The label stands for “Republican In Name Only,” but I would hardly call right-wing firebrand Ann Coulter, former Fox News chairman Rupert Murdoch, former ambassador John Bolton, Trump’s own attorney general William Barr, and of course Liz Cheney champions of liberalism. Coulter, who once wrote a book entitled In Trump We Trust: E Pluribus Awesome!, now acknowledges that while she was “familiar with what a narcissistic, ridiculous, tacky, vulgar, arriviste this guy was,” she did not anticipate how “abjectly stupid the man is.”

These Republican critics are all far more conservative than Trump, who as President had no problem increasing federal spending, running up the national debt, expanding government (Space Force, seriously?), appeasing Russia and putting his own interests above the Constitution.

The ex-game show host generated a platoon of mini-Trump imitators who are likewise pretty good at making headlines, but accomplish little in the way of legislation. You’ve heard all about this lunatic fringe – Santos, Boebert, Greene, Gaetz, Tuberville – who are apparently so obnoxious they can’t even stand each other. If you need a snapshot of what the GOP has devolved into, look no further than the circus which is today’s US House of Representatives.

A record number of voters turned out in 2020 for the express purpose of casting Trump out of office – and that was before the horrorshow of January 6, 2021, and the increasingly unhinged behavior showing him as the deranged gerbil he’s always been.

His followers make a lot of noise when they try to drown out any voice of dissent, which I believe makes them sound larger in number than the reality. But here’s the funny thing – you can scream as loud as you want, but your vote still only counts as one. This is a concept a lot of Trumpettes couldn’t fathom after Joe Biden kicked their guy’s ass in 2020.

I’ve been a longtime Christie fan, even before he took on the thankless but important role of reminding GOP voters of the dangers an emboldened Trump represents in a second term. At this point, however, his continued presence in the race only benefits his former ally, whose 2024 nomination Christie has described as a “death sentence” for the Republican Party.  After seeing Christie bodyslam DeSantis and Ramaswamy during this week’s debate, don’t be surprised if he drops out and endorses Haley sometime soon.

Don’t forget, the New Hampshire primary next month on the 23rd will be followed in February by balloting in South Carolina, where Haley served as governor for six years before accepting Trump’s appointment as ambassador to the United Nations. A strong showing in these two states could convince voters in other primaries they don’t have to be stuck with a guy currently engaged in his fourth campaign for President.

Haley has been the chief executive of a Southern state but also a player on the world stage. She would bring a unique perspective to the Oval Office, having experienced racism as a kid and with a military spouse currently serving overseas. She has the star power to bring new people into the Republican tent, especially younger generations. She embraces the genius of America and genuinely understands what it takes to keep us free.

If you think Democrats aren’t looking forward to whipping Trump again in 2024, you are absolutely nuts. Their worst nightmare is a brown-skinned woman born Nimarata Nikki Randhawa, who literally looks half Biden’s age and will likely debate circles around him on stage if she ever gets the chance.

D. Allan Kerr remembers the days when America was in decent hands with either of the two major party nominees campaigning for President.

This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Kerr: Haley can help Republicans win back their party