Nikki Haley says she 'didn't judge either side' in South Carolina debate over removing Confederate flag

SUMTER, S.C — Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley said Monday that she “didn’t judge either side” in a 2015 debate over lowering a Confederate flag on the South Carolina Statehouse's grounds following the deadly Mother Emanuel shooting.

“I didn't pick who was right or who was wrong, because that's not what a leader does,” Haley told a crowd gathered at a local American Legion Hall in the central part of the state. “What a leader does is bring out the best in people so that we can make the best decisions together.”

Haley was referring to her actions as then-governor when she called for the Confederate flag to be taken down at the Statehouse following a racially motivated mass shooting that left nine dead at a historically Black church. The horrific attack sparked conversations over whether the flag's presence served to preserve the state’s oppressive past.

At the time, Haley argued that that there was no need to “declare a winner and loser” in arguments over what the flag stood for, whether South Carolinians saw the image as “a symbol of slavery, discrimination and hate" or “traditions of history, of heritage and of ancestry.”

She later argued in a 2019 op-ed that the flag’s meaning was “hijacked” by the shooter in the Charleston church attack and that it previously had represented “service and sacrifice and heritage.”

The Anti-Defamation League classifies the Confederate flag as a hate symbol for its representation of white supremacy and slavery.

Haley’s latest comments about the Confederate flag debate come as she garnered widespread criticism last year for failing to describe slavery as the cause of the Civil War. She also previously claimed that Texas had a right to secede from the United States.

The former governor has sought to highlight her efforts to remove the Confederate flag during presidential campaign stump speeches as evidence of her ability to reach across the aisle and serve as a unifying figure. But she has often tiptoed around discussing her own views of the flag, merely stating that it “was personally very contentious.”

“Half of South Carolina saw the flag as heritage and tradition. The other half saw it as slavery and hate,” she repeated at multiple early primary campaign stops.

Haley has added to her South Carolina pitch in recent days about her work taking down the Confederate flag. She repeated similar remarks at an event later in the day in Camden, reiterating calls for a culture of unity and stating that "the tone at the top matters."

Haley trails former President Donald Trump, who has long defended the Confederate flag, by over 30 points in South Carolina, which is holding its pivotal GOP primary on Saturday.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Nikki Haley refused to 'judge either side' in Confederate flag debate