According to a new report from POLITICO, ex-President Donald Trump refused a request from former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley for a meeting this week after the ex-Trump official criticized him — sort of — over his promotion of the lie that the 2020 election was rigged for Joe Biden. Haley “reached out to former President Donald Trump on Wednesday to request a sit-down at Mar-a-Lago, but a source familiar tells Playbook that he turned her down,” POLITICO reported. At Mar-a-Lago, Trump recently met with House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), who criticized him after last month’s Capitol rioting, but nevertheless, he refused Haley.
Scoop: Nikki Haley tried to get a meeting with Trump yesterday but he turned her down, even despite her apparent attempt to patch things up through a @WSJ op-ed yesterday https://t.co/NpL9Duhunl
— Tara Palmeri (@tarapalmeri) February 18, 2021
While previously discussing Trump, Haley said as follows:
‘I think he’s going to find himself further and further isolated. I think his business is suffering at this point. I think he’s lost any sort of political viability he was going to have. I think he’s lost his social media, which meant the world to him. I mean, I think he’s lost the things that really could have kept him moving… I don’t think he’s going to be in the picture. I don’t think he can. He’s fallen so far.’
Politico Playbook: Nikki Haley reached out to Trump on Wednesday to request a sit-down at Mar-a-Lago, but a source familiar tells Playbook that he turned her down. The two haven’t spoken since the insurrection.
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) February 18, 2021
Haley has been floated as a potential candidate in the 2024 Republican presidential primary, but the actual shape that race will take isn’t yet clear. Theoretically, Trump himself could run again, but it’s unclear if he’s interested in doing so. This week, Fox News broadcast an interview with Trump in which he reiterated that he believed that he was the rightful winner of the 2020 presidential election, which is an unhinged lie. At this point, for this claim to be true, Trump would likely have to believe that the federal government is essentially full of untold numbers of secret fraudsters, because the entire presidential transition process has long since played out. No court anywhere in the country ever even partially accepted the idea that systematic fraud was responsible for Biden’s win.
Nikki Haley claims the media is “responsible for the Grand Canyon-sized divide bisecting the GOP,” @brikeilarCNN says.
“The GOP is eating its own, casting out good people as it kowtows to conspiracy theorists … Haley is trying to have it both ways,” Keilar says. #RollTheTape pic.twitter.com/WNxXcaymfF
— CNN Newsroom (@CNNnewsroom) February 18, 2021
Trump was largely quiet for awhile, but his public rhetoric has slowly re-emerged in recent days. Among other examples, he shared a belligerent and angry message targeting Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) after the top Republican said that Trump was responsible for the Capitol rioting. Trump described McConnell as a “dour, sullen, and unsmiling political hack,” among his other pejorative remarks.
Nikki Haley complains the media is stoking a GOP civil war as she tells people to accept the good and the bad with Trump. Who, oh by the way, happens to be stoking a GOP civil war. https://t.co/rv5HwGxs1k
— Amanda Carpenter (@amandacarpenter) February 18, 2021
