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Hi, I'm Tara Palmieri. I'm Puck's senior political correspondent, and this is Somebody's Gotta Win. Well, I gotta give it to Nikki Haley. She was able to squeeze out a few more minutes of airtime from the networks with her brilliant fakeout.
That's right. On Monday afternoon, her team sent out a memo saying that she had an announcement about the state of the race on Tuesday. And that sort of email indicates to us journalists and the networks that the candidate is probably going to drop out of the race and
The cameras need to be there and they need to be rolling to pick up the final words, because for the most part, the most coverage a candidate gets is when they announce they're running for president and when they drop out of the campaign. And so Nikki Haley got Fox News and CNN to train their cameras on her so she could announce that she's going to keep going.
She does not care that she is likely to lose in South Carolina, her home state, and that she'll keep going after the primary on Saturday. The recent polling shows Nikki Haley at 35 points to Trump at 65 points. It's not surprising that the media would think that that was the announcement she would make. I mean, a lot of politicians don't want to lose in their home state.
It can be a career ruiner. Just ask Marco Rubio. He dropped out of the race in 2016 after he lost in his home state of Florida, and it's been difficult for him to recover since.
But nope, Nikki Haley said she's going to keep going. And she threw in a few more jabs at Trump, calling him more unstable and more unhinged. And she said she's not afraid of him and the Republican machinery, which he's actually swallowing up right now. She sounds like a woman who wants to keep fighting. She's not going to drop out. And I hear this a lot from people. They are despondent about the fact that Donald Trump looks like he will be the Republican nominee. I hear this from friends, my mother asking, but what about Nikki Haley?
Nikki Haley. And I have to say to her, mom, Nikki Haley, it's not happening for her. The numbers are just not there. And yet she's still being covered, right? By the mainstream media. So you think to yourself,
Okay, Nikki Haley, maybe she is still a viable choice. For a long time, I have been hearing from people, smart people, that think that if Donald Trump drops out of the race, which I don't think he will because of his legal problems, there's Nikki Haley with the second most delegates if she just stays in the race and keeps collecting them.
At a certain point, a lot of the states are winner takes all. But still, they think, well, if you go into the Republican National Convention and you can argue that you're the second most delegates, that maybe the nomination could be handed to Nikki Haley, right? She certainly can't get the nomination on her own with...
Donald Trump in the race. So I think to myself, how do we get here? Nikki Haley all along and all the other candidates, they wanted this David and Goliath moment. They wanted the one-on-one with Trump. She got it in New Hampshire. She lost. And that was one of the only states she was poised to
possibly win because of the independent voters, a lot of Democrats that can register to vote in the Republican primaries, and she couldn't pull it off then. So what exactly is the long play if it doesn't look like you're going to win the nomination? When I talk to party leaders, they all say it doesn't even look like she has a future in the Republican Party because of how much she's attacked Trump in the past few weeks.
Now, some would argue she should have been attacking Trump from the beginning, right? To really stand out from the crowded field. So the question is, what is Nikki Haley doing? Is she trying to become rich and famous through this? Does she want to sell books? I don't know, join the board of some defense contractors. She's done that in the past, and it's quite a lucrative move. Is this about bloodying Trump and perhaps changing the Republican Party or just being a voice out there? Although she doesn't really have a ton of ideas.
But she is a counter narrative to Trump and one that the Biden campaign has been highlighting. Or is Nikki Haley just staying in the race to frustrate Trump as he tries to take over the RNC and install his own daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, at the top?
of the organization and take out the current chairwoman, Ronna Romney McDaniel. He can't actually do that until he becomes the party's nominee. And he can't officially be the party's nominee while Nikki Haley is still in the race. He's just the presumptive nominee right now. So she could be stalling him for weeks, just making him grow angrier and angrier as he plans to usurp the Republican National Committee.
After all, without being the official nominee, he can't have a joint fundraising committee with the RNC, which limits his ability to raise cash. It limits his ability to raise checks as high as $880,000 per donor. So yeah, she could be stalling Trump's grand designs on the Republican Party.
To get into all of that, I've brought in Terry Sullivan. He is a political strategist with ties to South Carolina. He knows the state very well. In fact, he ran a campaign that went up against Nikki Haley in the early stages of her career. We talk about what exactly is Nikki Haley up to? Is she being brave? Is she being strategic? And does it make sense? The longer she stays in, is it good for her career or bad for her career?
We get into the pros and cons. Or maybe she just doesn't care at all. And she's just throwing caution to the wind. Terry, thanks so much for coming on the show. Tuesday, 12 o'clock. We're all watching cable. Nikki Haley has an update on the state of the race that she had previewed the day before her team sent out a press release. And, you know, Fox, CNN, everyone's thinking, is she dropping out? I mean, I thought the same thing too, because she's set to be...
crushed in her home state of South Carolina at the primary on Saturday. And so I'm just wondering, the polling I've seen is like 65 Trump, 34 Nikki. And that seems generous.
Yeah. What's she doing? Is she in or is she out? I mean, in this, in her speech, she was defiant. I'm still in it. I'm up against the party machinery. That's all for Trump because Trump is now going to install his entire family in the party. And he knocked out the head of the RNC, Ronna McDaniel. But like,
What's Nikki doing? Does she have any chance? Yeah. Like this is, I think what you officially call a death rattle. Like the last that, uh, that someone makes before they pass on it's it's, um, I don't get it. I don't like, look, but there is only one reason why someone stops running for president. Like they don't wake up one morning and say, Hey, Nikki,
I don't think I'm smart enough or likable enough. They stop running because they run out of money. She has unlimited money because Wall Street is just like, I don't think so. Like, first of all, if that is like those donors, frankly, I know those donors. Those are the most, uh,
demanding donors on the planet earth. And so it's like, they're not going to throw good money after bad, you know, they're not here to waste money on this thing. And so, um, Jack Oliver used to be the big fundraiser for George W. Bush back in the day used to have this saying, he said, figure out what's going to happen and be for it.
And that's what a lot of these donors will do. Like they're going to end up supporting Trump. But they're still giving to her. They have been giving after New Hampshire. That's what has been shocking to me. Mind-boggling. But at some point in time, though, I do wonder how much of it's kind of like these folks who give to the Lincoln Project or give to something else. How much of them are like, I just want to get my pound of flesh versus supporting someone to win.
But I don't think that she is giving them the pound of flesh that they want. Oh, definitely not. Definitely not. But no one will. Like, right. Donald Trump is stronger than he's ever been.
He's frankly a better candidate than he's ever been. And he's running a better campaign than he ever has. Are you a Trump supporter, by the way? I'm not. Look, I don't I don't believe in voting. I think it's OK. I've never heard that before. Can you please explain? I don't know. I kind of gave up on it. The you know, I kid a little bit. But like, look, at the end of the day, we don't have an America problem with any politician.
we have a voter problem and we're going to keep, you know, garbage in, garbage out. We're going to keep getting crappy candidates if with, because we've got voters who are making crappy decisions. Do you think they're uninformed? Is that the problem? Are they're being misled by bad information or they don't want, they're tuned out? I think there's a lot of things at play, but I do think that there is way too much anger. Now there's always been anger in politics, but in modern politics,
There hasn't been this much. It's not so much like it's no longer an ideological fight. It used to be, you know, look, my first campaign was Jesse Helms, 1996. I was his youth coordinator and his reelect. And I'm like, people got angry with each other because of,
policy ideas. Now it's all personality driven. Everything about campaigns is about personality. It's no longer about issues. A lot of them talk about far right or far left. It's not really. Donald Trump's not a far right candidate. If anything, he's a populist. But the far right loves him. But so do the moderates. So do blue collar Democrats. I mean, there are a lot...
But that's my point, is that it has nothing to do with ideology. I mean, he is for Medicare and he's not for entitlement reforms or lowering the national debt. Right. I mean, like there's a like he is not a fiscal conservative. No. You know, he's not a social conservative. He wrapped up the national debt. Definitely. He doesn't fit into a box, but every Republican before him did. But every Democrat did.
Free Obama. Obama was when it really became much more about a cult of personality than it did for better or worse on both sides. It was Obama that really changed the modern makeup of it has less to do with policies and more to do about voting for someone you like and how you feel. Maybe because it was all just like white dudes voting.
And then after Obama, it changed. It's like, ooh, we've got a woman running Hillary Clinton. We've got an orange real estate titan. I mean, it changed. The demographics changed. So Kamala Harris, she's a South Asian African woman. I think they became celebrities is the point. Like politicians transcend, like Ronald Reagan, sure, because he was an actual celebrity before a politician. But after that, it was the first time that Obama was...
politicians became celebrities more so than just politicians.
policymakers. I guess so. I feel like there could be a rebuttal to this. I just have to think back. I mean, the years of George W. Bush did not exactly inspire a feeling of celebrity. Right. That's my point. And Obama was a very inspiring candidate. But let's go back to Nikki, okay? Who? Nikki Haley. Oh, that's right. You've heard of her before? You've heard of her, right? Yeah. Actually, how exactly do you know Nikki Haley? Let's go back to that. I know I introduced you earlier. You were Marco Rubio's campaign...
his campaign manager. But how exactly do you know Nikki Haley? Because there's a little bit of a beef there just for... I don't know about that. She's got a little bit of beef. I don't have a beef with anybody. Okay. The... She... He's got a fish behind him, by the way, if you can't see him. He's standing in front of a mounted... What kind of fish is that?
It's a sailfish. Sailfish. Okay, yeah. This guy has no beef with anyone. He's got a big beard, bald head, happy. That's it. It's not, I'm out of politics, so I'm working for candidates. So, you know, I'm just happy now. Look, no, look, I actually did work for her back in, when she first ran, she was in the state house in South Carolina. What year is that? This would have been the,
What do we call it? I guess the early 2000s. So probably like, but not too early, I guess, maybe not like 2000 and 80s.
I guess, 2006. The rise of Obama around that period of time. But also the rise of the Tea Party movement. Right. And it was the, and I managed Jim DeMint's first Senate race and always did all his work. So there was a lot of that in South Carolina. And it was the rise and fall of Mark Sanford. Oh, yeah. Remember when he was hiking in the Appalachian with his lover? Right, the Appalachian Trail. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Quite the outdoorsman he is. He was the governor of South Carolina. He cried and resigned. No, he refused to like, so he was like, Nope, Nope. He, um, he did not, uh, he had a South American lover. Right. And his poor wife, Jenny Sanders. Yeah. She was, she's a, yeah, I know. Like,
Like, where to stick that knife in and like, yeah, she was, but she was always a ball buster. She, she was his chief of staff in the governor's office. I had a lot of respect for her. Actually, let me interview her after that. I remember I was 22 years old. Everyone interview her after that. Okay, don't take it away from me, Terry. Any which way she could to like, look, I get it. She wanted, she wanted like to enact her vengeance. She wanted to smear that guy. Justified.
But yeah, when she did, what was it? She went on like Oprah and was so sad and just kept talking about how awful it was for her boys. And I'm thinking to myself, they probably don't like seeing mom on Oprah either. Slash and burn. And then he came back as a Congressman, but then he was primaried out, right? He was, um,
I don't remember how it like, yes, is the short answer. It's okay. We don't have to worry about governor Sanders because we need to talk about Nikki Haley. Nikki Haley. Yes. But, but we, the beginning of Nikki Haley is a, is kind of a figure was through Mark Sanford and he, and he actually spent his campaigns money and,
to help get her elected in that first governor's race. And so I actually worked for a different candidate in that race. So I think that's where she holds the grudge. Which candidate was it? I worked for Gresham Barrett at the time. Oh, okay. I don't know who that is, but I guess you'd have to know South Carolina. He was the congressman from the upstate. He was, yeah. Oh, this was one of the good old boys she was up against and apparently eviscerated in the debates? Right.
It wasn't that she was visceral. It kind of came out of nowhere. She was in single digits until the final few weeks. Sarah Palin came in for her out of nowhere. Yeah. And that was when Palin was at the height of all of it and held a state house rally that had literally tens of thousands of people. It was insane. Right. Right? Remember the good old days? Where did Sarah Palin go? Not far enough.
Um, you know, have you seen her around? I haven't. She's probably gonna be a CPAC. I think she does that stuff. I, she's kind of really falling off. I know she was part of some of the Trump stuff for a while. Hmm. Um,
I don't know. She's, yeah. Okay. So Nikki didn't love that you worked for another candidate, but then you went on to work for Marco Rubio when she was in the governor's office and Marco needed her endorsement, right? I wouldn't say needed. It was certainly a welcome, a welcome anyone's endorsement, but we already had Trey Gowdy and Tim Scott's endorsement. Trey Gowdy is a congressman from down there. Very popular. Yeah.
Right. Trey was kind of a rock star in the, and you know, amongst conservatives at that point in time. Gray hair. He looks like that character from Harry Potter. Oh,
Oh, yeah. Malvoy with the gray hair. Yeah. I can't remember. I've only seen Harry Potter. Yeah. His hair is awful. It's horrendous, but still a great guy. But no. And so she reached out to our campaign after New Hampshire and invited Marco to the governor's mansion to have dinner. Apparently, the story from what I've told from the Jeb people and from the Cruz people is she'd already committed to both of them for endorsement. Nice.
But then reached out to us and we didn't think we'd get it. We just didn't, you know, it wasn't, and because there hadn't been any interaction between the two and she decided she wanted to endorse Marco. And she was a popular governor at the time. So this was a valuable endorsement. Right. Yeah. So that's where it kind of leads to where we are right now. She's about to get like,
basically in her home state where she was a very popular governor, high approval ratings to term. Um, what has changed in South Carolina? Maybe she could do well if she ran for governor again, but there's a big difference between, uh, governor and president. I think first of all, second of all, who you're running against, you know, I mean, Trump is a strong candidate right now, especially when a place like South Carolina, um,
And it's probably the worst state for her to go up against him, even though that she's so well known. But I also think she's never faced a truly tough primary or election at all. She literally when she when she won the first time for governor, she was went from single digits where no one, you know, no one was covering stories on her just because, well, why would you to winning in less than a month?
Um, she'd never really been through a trying kind of campaign. And even on the early stages of this campaign, you didn't see that where she was really tested because she was likable. She's telegenic. She, you know, uh, smart. She didn't, you know, so no one really, but she wasn't threatening anyone.
And so I do think, you know, she hasn't worn well as a candidate. Why do you think that is? You know, it's tough to run for president coming from being governor. Oddly enough, I think in some ways it's easier. Well, wanting to be a reality TV star is a great way to do it. But also being a senator. A lot of these governors, though, they win the presidency. It's been a traditional thing. But not in a long while. I guess so. Last Republican before Trump. Yeah, it's like Clinton, right? Yeah.
I guess you're right. I mean, Democrats elect senators. I feel like Republicans elect governors. Yeah, but I guess Bush. Bush, never mind. That's stupid. But Bush was different because Bush knew what it was like to be on the national political stage because of his dad. I mean, literally, George W. was literally the campaign manager for his dad.
Um, most people don't remember that, but, but the reality is these governors are pretty isolated and protected from the press corps. Like Ron DeSantis, who couldn't handle a real national press corps. She's always been so protective, uh, protected, like as ambassador to, it's kind of annoying. I always felt like she was too protected in the same way that like Kamala Harris is too protected. A hundred percent. But, but, but, but I think both of them do it to themselves. Yeah.
you know they're afraid and the press can smell fear right yes and they don't like that what are you trying to hide right and the flip-flop on trump it's not great right well but the thing is is is trump like as much as you know he battles with the press he's extremely accessible or at least has been oh yeah totally less so this time but like look he'll you know two
Two hour long press conferences. Great. It's not like, you know, it's not like he's hiding from the press. There was no press conference when I was White House correspondent. He just went out there and spoke. I mean, after Spicer. Yeah. Right. No, I'm with you. It was really that's not true. It was really Jim Acosta's press conference that Donald Trump was invited. Totally. And everyone else is crashing. So listen, now, now it wasn't only Jim. I think that sort of that passed. There was a moment and then everybody was up. So.
I got to say, I know you're a Marco Rubio alum. There are a lot of Marco Rubio alums on her campaign. It feels very similar. It feels like they're running a very conventional presidential campaign against a very non-conventional candidate. Very similar. And, and, you know, what's the definition of insanity doing the same thing and expecting a different outcome. It's kind of like how Ron DeSantis ran the Ted Cruz campaign with the Ted Cruz people. Yeah. But,
But how did he manage to be the Ted Cruz campaign only less likable? Yeah, I know. He made Ted Cruz look charming. It was really something. But in some ways, I may be, you know...
reaching, but Rubio's campaigns would have died in Florida in his home state. When he couldn't win his home state, he had no argument to keep going forward. Is that what we're going to see on Saturday? Yeah. I mean, look, it should be. But keep in mind, this is what's interesting. The national polling right now, the Real Clear Politics average has Nicky at like 17%. When Marco dropped out, he was in the low 20s
And he dropped out. But it was still a four-person race. And Donald Trump was in the high 30s.
So that's like the level of delusion. Like, like her campaign is like, what the hell are you guys thinking? Like there was no clear path when we were in the twenties and, and you know, now there's just, it's not even mathematically possible. Yeah. Is she just running to be rich and famous? Is that what you think? I think she's running for a board seat. I don't know. I like it. Didn't she, isn't she already on a board or maybe.
or made like $8 million on one of those boards? A couple of them. But I mean, what else is the reasoning behind it? She's already become a millionaire thanks to her public service. Yeah, she is... Maybe she's going to be on The View. I don't know. But does this kill her future chances at...
in politics, like does she have to wait two cycles? Does the Republican Party even want her anymore? Look, Trump mangles candidates so badly. I mean, that's what's so interesting about this time. First of all, all the candidates were kind of B-teamers.
um the crop of candidates that that um you had running because traditionally especially in the republican party there's only been it's only been donald trump and george hw were the only two republicans to get the nomination in modern uh primaries that hadn't run and lost before every single other one of them george h had run before bob dole had run like you just look mit romney and
And so, so it's, the Republican party is traditionally like to have someone who's been vetted this time. Nobody would, except for Chris Christie. And he really wasn't running for president. See what show he lands on. I don't even, yeah, it's nobody like there's lots of substance, like Ted Cruz, you know,
ran a great campaign last time. Marco ran a good campaign last time. Like, there are good, qualified candidates. And you just watch that debate stage every time this past time, and you think, what the hell? And so, but it's because Trump just chewed them all up. Well, they were afraid of Trump.
And they couldn't attack the real bear in the room. And that was a problem. Especially when they attacked him, then they hugged him and they couldn't come back. And that's where, look, that's where Nikki's at. Like Nikki's now like somehow Donald Trump, according to Nikki, is the antichrist and everyone knows it. You're like, well, why did you stand behind him for all this time then? And I believe I saw in a recent report that she said she would pardon him. Yeah, I think so. I think so.
Some could argue that all of these candidates, they just want, they had to get through the debate stage. They had to fight each other off. They couldn't fight Trump off yet. They didn't want to alienate his base.
And so it was better just to ignore him. This is their argument. They're probably wrong. But we'd like get through the masses, be the last man standing. David against Goliath. You have your chance one on one. You get all the not never Trumpers. Genius strategy. Genius strategy. It's clearly working very well for them. It hasn't worked. Why not? Like, I don't know. Look, it didn't work when we tried it in twenty sixteen. But no one consolidated in twenty sixteen.
There was never this moment.
That's the point. And I guess that's the thing is at least it was mathematically possible in 2016. This time, I have no idea what the hell they're thinking. Since the first time there was a debate, Trump has never been below 50%. And yet they got on those debate stages and instead of using the opportunity to beat up on the guy who wasn't there, they just fought amongst each other. It was insane. So you think if they had just kept like beating up Trump, he would have been below 50 and then they'd have a better shot when one of them got down to one-on-one? Yeah.
Here's what I know. I know that if your opponent is above 50%, you have to do something to dislodge them. You have to take votes away from them. And so you have to offer information and an alternative. You can't just be more likable. You've got to give, especially when, when it's, he's basically the incumbent, he's the incumbent nominee and you have to give a fireable offense to voters to say, Hey, this is why you should fire the guy or gal. He's currently got the job.
before you can ever tell them why they should hire you, the juror's not a job opening. And so they never gave a fireable offense. And anytime you take on an incumbent in, you know, be it governor's race, congressional race, whatever, you've got to say, hey, this is why you should get rid of the other guy. It can't be I'm just really likable or I'm really smart. And so it was a real problem for them that they never engaged him.
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The reason that I wanted to get you on the pod ahead of the primary is that I still hear from people all the time. What about Nikki Haley? Like even my mother, but what about Nikki Haley? Come on. What's going on with Nikki Haley? She could be Trump. Right. And obviously a lot of very wealthy people still see her as an insurance policy. That's how they're, that's the way she's described. If,
Trump falls into some sort of legal issues. There's Nikki Haley who can have the second most number of
right? Going into the Republican National Convention. I, for one, just want to disqualify the idea that Trump would ever drop out because of legal issues. I believe he is running because of his legal issues and the ability to pardon himself and who knows what else he can do. Maybe raise money to pay off that $500 million he owns. But for everyone out there, can you explain why Nikki Haley really isn't an insurance policy? And
Let's start with that. And then we can break down the rest. Sure. If you want to get in the really wonky technical side of it, these delegates are not going to be bound after the first ballot. Now, everyone's different. Every state's different, everything. But for the most part, these delegates at the convention... The ones you would pick up at Super Tuesday.
whichever one she picked up and the one that she's already picked up. Sure. If she, yeah. Anything she picks up the, those. So, but Trump's will be as well. So let's say Donald Trump gets hit by a meteor and, and he's no longer the nominee. I think it's either choking on a Big Mac or hit by a meteor. I think a problem. The two, maybe I'm not going to go there. I don't want to talk about death, but keep going. Right. But look, it,
It could be Mike Pence. It could be... But could she make the argument like, hey, I've got the second most delegates. It's mine. It's mine. And everybody else would be like, oh, yeah, that's cool. Sure. No problem. You're right. Go ahead. You think so? They would give it to Nikki. No, these are the same people that are convinced that there's some sort of plot to put Gavin Newsom in to replace Joe Biden. Like...
Is Kamala Harris going to be okay with that? I mean, is Mayor Pete going to be okay? It's just not realistic to say that there's not other folks that would say, hey, no way, I want to run. I'd be better at it. Here's the reason I'd be the better one. So it would become a contested convention, essentially. It would be a contested convention. And I honestly think that there's a better shot that a Ron DeSantis contest
Could get it than a Nikki Haley, because right now she's just hurting herself with the base. So what does he do? He jumps in there and he's like, I want to make the argument to win over the delegates that are not attached to Nikki or Trump. Look, they all liked him. Look, when he got out, like he had higher faves than she did when he dropped out amongst Republican primary voters. Like people saw him as a as a movement conservative who ran against Trump, didn't beat him and then dropped out.
And that's just not what she's viewed. She's positioning herself in different ways. You know, the attacks have become very personal. The the in New Hampshire, she was encouraging Democrats to vote for like it. This is not it's not the behavior that's going to endear her.
to delegates at the convention. Delegates who are attached to Trump. Or any delegates, but yes, the delegates that would be attached to Trump if the argument that some people make is she could pick up these delegates at the convention. And my argument is
Like, these are the last people... Like, she's the last person they'd pick. They'd go pick somebody else. Okay. And then the other thing to point out is after Super Tuesday, it's really winner-takes-all in the rest of the states. So she really wouldn't be able to collect delegates after that. It's quirky and weird and every state's different. But yeah, there's a lot of winner-take-all states. But even, like, it just...
All this is just such a far pipe dream. And how do you compete? Is this as big of a pipe dream as like Biden drops out ahead of the convention pipe dream? And like Michelle Obama is dropped down from a, I think it's less likely than Biden dropping out because I don't think anyone thinks Biden is on his a game right now from a, from a,
health age kind of thing. And so, you know, could he? Yeah, sure. But I think it literally there's no way Trump's going to drop out. I don't see it happening either. It's on his DNA. Let me just ask you a few more questions. If Nikki Haley continues after South Carolina, is that further hurting her political future or does it not make it does not matter at all? I think she's hurt herself so much that
that it's tough to imagine it's getting worse, but it could. She could just stay in there if she had enough money through Super Tuesday after...
Yeah, but like to what end? Like at some point in time, you just start to look pathetic. You think like the press stops covering her. Yeah, in a way. Right. I mean, they already are. She starts to lose any sort of... South Carolina, I just talked to a good buddy who's a reporter. He's down there right now and he's laughing. He's like, I didn't think it'd be possible for a South Carolina primary to ever be boring, but this one is. Well, Trump might not even be there in South Carolina. He's got CPAC that night. So yeah, he might...
I'd even go. I think the Washington Post has one person in the state right now. I'm kind of bummed because I like South Carolina, so I would have been happy to go there. A little Charleston. No one's volunteering to go to Sumter or Florence, but everyone's willing to go to Charleston. Yeah. Yeah, I love a little Charleston. Okay.
Okay. So she may stay in there, but we think the longer she stays on, she becomes a Rick Santorum, right? Which you don't want to be. Right. That means you can't even really be on a political panel, right? Yeah, but at least Rick Santorum was like this ideological crusader. Okay. You don't think she brings any new ideas with her? The thing is, is that like, first of all, she's a little bit all over the map on the issues. And second of all, like she's positioned herself as a moderate and there's not a lot of, like no one's passionately moderate, you know? Yeah.
So she doesn't have a place in the, in the future of the GOP is what you're saying? I don't think so. Yeah, I really don't. Now this isn't to say, this is a no way to dissuade people from voting for her in South Carolina. You can vote. You can prove us both wrong. Okay. I am in no way saying this is not the point of the podcast, but it is to just, you know,
you know, when you're having a cocktail conversation, you live outside of South Carolina. People are asking you, what's going on with Nikki Haley? You can tell them. Here's what a real South Carolina insider and a journalist who's very involved, who's been talking to the insiders. This is what they're saying about what's going on with Nikki Haley. And, I don't know.
I don't know what having known her and her career. Do you think she will just drop out on, on Saturday after the results come in? I'm I didn't look, my money was that she was going to be gone after New Hampshire because first of all, it was a disappointing showing in New Hampshire. But I didn't think she'd want to get humiliated in her home state.
And look, after a while, just get like running for president sucks. It's a really, really tough. You have to stay at residence in. That's what she said. Remember? Oh, my God. The door takes you outside. But the, you know, the twenty ninth night each month that you're in that damn residence in. It's grueling. We've all been there. Oh, I'm sure.
I mean, reporters do the same thing. Totally. And so it's, you know, it's one of those things where why keep doing it? Like, I'm not sure what the end game here is. Is there any reason to stay in the game? I can't imagine one. I mean, like, I really can't.
I've talked to some smart people that are like, you know, I can't imagine it. Terry, thank you. This was really helpful. Thanks for having me. I'd love to have you on again. Maybe, you know, post a biopsy or whatever we want to do later on.
That was another episode of Somebody's Got to Win. I'm Tara Palmieri. I want to thank my producers, Christopher Sutton and Connor Nevins. If you liked this episode, please rate, subscribe, and share it with your friends. If you like my reporting, please go to puck.news slash Tara Palmieri and sign up for my newsletter, The Best and the Brightest. You can use the discount code Tara20. We're off for the rest of the week, but we'll be back next Tuesday.
