March 06, 2024 10:00 AM UTC

Nikki Haley Out, Donald Trump's 2024 Retribution Tour In

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• by: Colorado Pols

NBC News reports, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley’s vow to stay in the 2024 presidential race indefinitely expired about twelve hours after the last polls closed on Super Tuesday:

Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley dropped out of the 2024 presidential race Wednesday after losing every state but Vermont in Super Tuesday’s primary contests, ceding the Republican nomination to former President Donald Trump.

Haley’s decision to end her campaign effectively kicks off the general election, with Trump and President Joe Biden taking unofficial command of their parties early in primary season after a string of victories.

After running a fiesty campaign relentlessly attacking the now-presumed GOP nominee Donald Trump in terms that ensured Haley will not be in the running to be Trump’s vice presidential pick, today Haley is sounding a conciliatory note, though not (yet) executing the full humiliating turnabout and formally endorsing Trump for re-election:

“It is now up to Donald Trump to earn the votes of those in our party and beyond it who did not support him, and I hope he does that,” she said. “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.”

We’re not sure who Haley is describing as a candidate who can ‘bring people into your cause’ and not ‘turn them away,’ but as Haley herself has spent the last year warning the American people, it’s not Donald Trump. And Haley’s not the only Republican who should know better than making peace with Trump’s political inevitability over their better judgment, AP reports:

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell endorsed Donald Trump for president on Wednesday, a remarkable turnaround from the onetime critic who blamed the then-president for “disgraceful” acts in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack but now supports his bid to return to the White House.

The acquiescence of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell after McConnell forcefully condemned Trump’s actions leading up to the January 6th, 2021 assault on the U.S. Capitol to obstruct the certification of Joe Biden’s victory would seem to seal the deal for Trump’s reconquest of the Republican Party. Republican Party chair Ronna McDaniel, who tried so hard to prove herself to Trump that she dropped “Romney” from her name, is about to be replaced with an even more loyal Trump crony, perhaps even Trump’s daughter-in-law Lara Trump.

With Trump now unchallenged for the Republican nomination, what has been a hypothetical scenario for the past three years that many Republicans quietly hoped would be self-remedied by the aggregate weight of Trump’s many unfolding scandals is now upon us. The former President who Colorado courts ruled participated in a violent insurrection to remain in power after losing the 2020 elections is trying again, and that creates, as Nikki Haley said, “a time for choosing” for Republicans with any remaining conscience. Jason Salzman at the Colorado Times Recorder spoke with former Colorado GOP chairman Dick Wadhams, who says he won’t vote for Trump in November:

Asked by KHOW radio host Dan Caplis Feb. 28 if he will “vote for Donald Trump on Election Day, if he’s the nominee,” former Colorado Republican Party Chair Dick Wadhams replied, “No, I’m not going to, Dan. I’m just going to tell ya, I’m not. I cannot stand this stolen election conspiracy crap. I cannot stand how he behaved on January 6th. He drives me nuts when he attacks Nikki Haley’s husband for not being with her on the campaign trail because he’s being deployed in Africa as part of the American military. No, I’m just with it. I hate this choice.”

“Trump and his supporters, including the people who run the party in Colorado, have made it very clear,” continued Wadhams, who last year thought Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis could win Colorado. “They don’t want conservatives like me involved in the Republican Party. They don’t even consider us Republicans. They consider us RINOs and the dreaded establishment.”

“And not one of them has ever won a real election for anything in this state.”

However grim the situation may become nationally, we do expect that Trump atop the general election ballot in Colorado will once again hurt Republicans down the ballot as it has in previous elections. Although Democrats have enjoyed controlling majorities in the Colorado legislature for most of the last two decades, the trend accelerated after Trump’s election in 2016 as Colorado voters firmly rejected the MAGA-fied Republican brand. Not only will Trump never carry the state in a general election, Trump’s presence on the ballot is a major asset for Colorado Democrats.

As for the rest of America? Or whether Trump will accept any outcome other than victory in November? We don’t know what’s going to happen, folks. Some of the outcomes possible are, to put it mildly, very concerning for the future of the country. The only certainty we can offer today is that this improbable, portentous rematch is on. And the stakes are not just high–they’re everything.