Washington — Former presidential candidate Nikki Haley said Wednesday she will vote for presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, even though she has previously called him “not qualified” to lead the nation.
Haley, in her first political public appearance since suspending her campaign, announced she will be voting for Trump, despite all of her intense and extensive criticism of the indicted former president’s actions and character. Haley, a former South Carolina governor, served as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations in the Trump administration.
Since the beginning of the year, Haley has called Trump “as unhinged” and “more unhinged than he ever was.” During a February rally, Haley called Trump “not qualified to be the president of the United States,” after he blasted Haley’s deployed husband.
“I will be voting for Trump,” Haley said during Wednesday’s speech at the Hudson Institute in Washington, D.C. “Having said that, I stand by what I said in my suspension speech.”
In her speech suspending her campaign back in March, Haley said she has always supported the GOP nominee, but quoted former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher, who said, “Never just follow the crowd. Always make up your own mind.”
“It is now up to Donald Trump to earn the votes of those in our party and beyond it who did not support him,” Haley said when she dropped out of the race. “And I hope he does that. At its best, politics is about bringing people into your cause, not turning them away. And our conservative cause badly needs more people. This is now his time for choosing.”
— Nidia Cavazos contributed to this report.
Kathryn Watson is a politics reporter for CBS News Digital, based in Washington, D.C.
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