Nikki Haley Voters for Biden group quickly endorse Kamala Harris after Biden drops out

A group of voters who supported former South Carolina governor and Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris after President Joe Biden dropped out of the presidential race Sunday.

Craig Snyder, director of the coalition once known as Haley Voters for Biden but rebranded as Haley Voters for Harris, said the Democratic vice president is “the most likely and the best alternative for the Democratic nomination.”

Snyder, a long-time Republican, said he wants voters who disapprove of former president Donald Trump as the leader of the Republican Party to have a voice.

"We think that quickly rallying around the vice president is the best way to do that," Snyder said Monday.

On Sunday, the presidential race dramatically changed after Biden stepped aside following weeks of calls for him to drop out instigated by a disappointing debate performance last month. Democrats openly fretted about whether the president could secure a win in November against Trump.

Biden immediately endorsed Harris, who shortly after announced her candidacy. Harris, so far, is uncontested before the 2024 Democratic National Convention scheduled for Aug. 19-22 in Chicago.

More: With President Biden out of the race, South Carolina delegates vote to back Kamala Harris

Built from a team with members who worked for Democrats and Republicans, Haley Voters for Harris aims to encourage voters “across the political spectrum and Haley voters in particular to vote for Kamala Harris in November,” according to the coalition’s website.

Snyder, based in Pennsylvania, was once a GOP candidate for the U.S. Senate in 2022. The team includes other longtime Republicans like senior advisors Sarah Lenti, who worked on the 2004 Bush re-election campaign and the 2008 McCain campaign, and Mary Anna Mancuso who worked as a social media consultant for Lindsey Graham's presidential campaign in 2016.

The group is an “outgrowth” of the nonprofit Primary Pivot – organized to motivate Democrats and Independents to vote for Haley. PivotPAC finances the group that raised $396,521 for Biden from July 2023 to June 2024, according to Federal Election Commission filings.

"Trump is an existential threat to our democracy," Tiffany James, a South Carolinian working as a political consultant for the organization, told the Greenville News in February. "He has violated our democracy in so many different ways.”

The group is not affiliated with Haley or Haley’s nonprofit Stand for America.

Haley gives Trump 'strong endorsement'

At the Republican National Convention on July 16, Haley gave former rival Trump her “strong endorsement” despite criticizing him during her run for the GOP nomination.

"You don't have to agree with Trump 100 percent of the time to vote with him. Take it from me, I haven't always agreed with him,” Haley said. “We agree on keeping America strong. We agree on keeping America safe. We agree Democrats have moved so far to the left and that they are putting our freedoms in danger."

When Haley suspended her presidential bid, she did not endorse Trump, and said that he needed to "earn the votes of those in our party and beyond who did not support him." Snyder does not believe Trump has worked to earn Haley voters over, saying his "best opportunity" was when he selected who his vice president would be if elected.

Last week, Trump picked Ohio's U.S. Sen. JD Vance, a Trump critic turned top ally, as his running mate. Snyder said that although Trump could have chosen someone who could reach out to moderate and center-right voters, he chose "maybe the only person in the country who is more devoted to Trumpism than Trump himself."

In Haley’s February stump speech, she warned of a future of President Harris and continued that warning at the RNC. She also has not commented on Biden’s exit or Harris’ candidacy.

“For more than a year I've said a vote for Joe Biden is a vote for President Kamala Harris. After seeing the debate, everyone knows it's true," Haley said in her convention speech. "If we have four more years of Biden or a single day of Harris, our country will be badly worse off," "For the sake of our nation, we have to go with Donald Trump."

Despite the declaration, Snyder said that Haley voters he’s spoken to do not “begrudge” her.

“It’s seen as a personal political decision based on what she thinks is best for herself and her family,” Snyder said. “It’s not a decisive factor in the minds of these voters, there are some voters who voted for Gov. Haley in the primaries who were very much devoted to her as an individual, but there were a lot more who voted for her as the best available vehicle to register a protest against Donald Trump.”

Snyder points out that even after Haley dropped out in early March, she received 16% of the Pennsylvania primary vote held on April 25, a phenomenon known as “zombie voters.”

Snyder says the group wants to ensure Haley voters know Harris as a “tough prosecutor,” referring to Harris’ three decades as a prosecutor before she was elected attorney general of California and later a U.S. Senator.

Snyder also said that while Haley denounced Harris, she also said that “the first party to retire its 80-year-old candidate will be the party that wins the election.”

“Now we know which party that is,” Snyder said.

Savannah Moss covers politics for the Greenville News. Reach her at smoss@gannett.com or follow her on X.

This article originally appeared on Greenville News: Group encouraging Nikki Haley backers to vote for Biden endorses Harris