GOP presidential candidate Nikki Haley slammed the Republican National Committee (RNC) on Sunday for pressuring her to drop out of the race.
Haley told NBC’s Kristen Welker on “Meet the Press” the RNC was “clearly not” acting like an honest broker after the RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel said the GOP should unite behind Trump. Haley’s comments also come after it was reported the RNC was weighing a resolution last week to declare the former president as the “presumptive nominee.”
“If you’re going to go in and basically tell the American people that you’re going to go and decide who the nominee is after only two states have voted. I mean, 48 states out there. This is a democracy. The American people want to have their say in who is going to be their nominee,” Haley said.
The former South Carolina also said it was wrong for Trump to pressure the RNC to back him. When Welker pressed her on what “actual knowledge” she had that Trump pushed the RNC to do that and then pulled back on it, she pointed to Trump asking the RNC to cancel the debates.
“I mean, we know exactly — the people that pushed it are his people. And I know that during the debates I mean, he was pushing Ronna McDaniel to stop the debates. He was calling her every other day,” Haley responded.
“He’s been pushing them to pay for his lawsuits and all of these other things, but at the end of the day, this is not about the RNC. This is about the American people. This is not about a, you know, a political party deciding who they want to be the nominee,” she continued.
Haley has vowed to remain in the GOP primary race despite losing the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary earlier this month. She has moved her campaign stops to her home state of South Carolina, where she said Sunday she needs to do “better” than she did in New Hampshire.