Nikki Haley attacks Trump in campaign memo to donors
Republican presidential candidate and former Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley slammed her former boss — and now opponent — for the Republican nomination, former President Donald Trump, in a campaign memo sent to donors on Monday.
The memo, sent by Haley's campaign manager Betsy Ankney, characterizes Trump as "consumed by the grievances of the past and the promise of more drama in the future, rather than a forward-looking vision for the American people."
It also touts Haley's fundraising performance of $11 million in the first six weeks since she announced her White House bid on Feb. 15.
"That's more than Donald Trump raised in his first quarter in this race, and more than nearly all the Republican presidential candidates in 2016 raised in their first quarter," says Haley's memo, which was first published by Axios.
Trump, who declared he was running for president in mid-November last year, raised about $3.8 million in roughly the same period of time, according to his FEC filing.
The memo joked that Trump had a pretty good first quarter of the year, "if you count being indicted as 'good.'"
Since Trump was indicted by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg last week, his campaign says it has taken in over $13 million in donations.
The former president wasn't the only Republican criticized in the fundraising letter. Possible 2024 GOP contender Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was also singled out for derision for "essentially" launching a presidential campaign with his book tour and making "one misstep after another." The memo slammed DeSantis on foreign policy, pointing out his comment sizing up Russia's invasion of Ukraine as a "territorial dispute," an assessment that opened him up to pushback from his own party.
DeSantis is "not ready for prime time… and then there are the others," the memo reads. "Wait, what others?"
At this point, the Republican field is small — Haley, Trump, biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy and former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson are the four Republicans who have announced they are running for the 2024 GOP nomination.
Editor's note: When Haley's first-quarter fundraising numbers were publicly released on April 15, it was revealed that she had raised $3.3 million in contributions and another $1.8 million was transferred from her joint fundraising committee, for a total of $5.1 million in receipts, not $11 million, as her campaign had earlier claimed. Read the full story here.
