Nikki Haley speaks to the crowd at a caucus night party in West Des Moines, Iowa. (Jeenah Moon/Reuters)
Eko Hot Blog reports that United States (US) Republican presidential candidate, Nikki Haley, effectively leaving former President Donald Trump as the presumptive nominee of the Republican Party.
Haley, who won only one out of 15 states in the Super Tuesday 15-state primaries, announced the suspension of her campaign at press conference Wednesday afternoon around 4pm.
The move came as Trump neared the 1215 delegates he needs to become the Republican nominee for president. After Tuesday’s primaries, the former president had won, 995 to Haley’s 89, putting her far behind her former boss.
Announcing the end of her campaign for president, Haley failed to endorse her Republican rival, saying he will have to earn the votes of those who supported her.
“I said I wanted Americans to have their voices heard. I have done that. I have no regrets,” she said. “And although I will no longer be a candidate, I will not stop using my voice for the things I believe in.”
Haley also congratulated Trump on likely becoming the Republican nominee and said she wished him well.
“I have always been a conservative Republican and always supported the Republican nominee,” the former UN ambassador said. “But on this question, as she did on so many others, Margaret Thatcher provided some good advice when she said, quote, ‘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, and I hope he does that.”
The only woman in the Republican race and Trump’s final remaining major GOP rival, Haley campaigned on her foreign policy experience and general-election appeal, casting her candidacy as a generational change that could bring more voters into the Republican fold.
She was the first candidate to announce a challenge to Trump and outlasted a large field of rivals who were viewed as more viable opponents to become the final candidate standing between him and the nomination, but her message struggled to appeal to a base that overwhelmingly supports the former president.
Haley’s departure officially clears the path for Trump, who many in the party had already seen as the presumptive nominee after dominating the first few nominating contests.
He will face President Joe Biden who defeated him in the 2020 presidential election.
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