Haley is far from the first to question Trump’s mental fitness, but at a rally in Keene, New Hampshire on Saturday she brought up the bizarre incident to voters, saying: “I’m not saying anything derogatory, but when you’re dealing with the pressures of a presidency, we can’t have someone else that we question whether they’re mentally fit to do this.”

The day before, at Trump’s rally, the former president seemed to repeatedly and incorrectly say that Haley was in charge of Capital security on Jan. 6, 2021, the day when a mob of Trump supporters stormed the building in an effort to stop the presidential certification of Democrat Joe Biden following Trump’s 2020 election loss. 

It was actually Pelosi who was in charge of security at the time, with Haley not even being in office. 

Trump’s claim that Pelosi turned down security that his administration offered her has also been debunked. A special House committee empaneled to probe the attack found no evidence to support his claim.

“Nikki Haley, you know they, do you know they destroyed all of the information, all of the evidence, everything, deleted and destroyed all of it. All of it because of lots of things like Nikki Haley is in charge of security,” Trump told supporters at the Concord rally. “We offered her 10,000 people, soldiers, National Guard, whatever they want. They turned it down. They don’t want to talk about that. These are very dishonest people.”

Responding to Trump’s public gaffe on X (formerly Twitter), his senior campaign advisor Chris LaCivita tried to play it off writing, “Nancy ….Nikki ….its a distinction without a difference.”

How old is too old?

Since launching her campaign 11 months ago, Haley, 52, has called for mental competency tests for politicians over 75, and has suggested it’s time for a “new generational leader”. 

Trump, who is 77 himself, is known for frequently throwing digs at the age of Democratic President Joe Biden, 81, saying he’s mentally unfit for office.

In September, however, Trump also mixed up Biden with former President Barack Obama, saying “with Obama, we won an election that everyone said couldn’t be won.”

At his rally on Saturday night in Manchester, Trump said that he took a cognitive test and “aced it.”

“I’ll let you know when I go bad. I really think I’ll be able to tell you,” he added. “I feel my mind is stronger now than it was 25 years ago. Is that possible?”

Ahead of the 2024 US election, age is shaping up to be an important factor as two white men over 75-years-old look to be front-runners for both major parties. 

An August poll from The Associated Press– NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that 77 per cent of US adults, including 69 per cent of Democrats view Biden as too old for presidential office. The Same poll that over half (51 per cent) of adults, including 28 per cent of Republicans view Trump as too old.

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While Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley has said that she is “very pro-life,” she has also said that abortion is a “personal choice.” Her wording on different thorny political issues such as abortion has left some voters confused about where she actually stands.

This has led some political observers, such as Politico journalist Michael Kruse, to say that Haley has “made a career of taking both sides,” citing her positions on issues such as identity politics, Donald Trump and abortion.

In the weeks leading up to the Iowa caucuses, an Iowa voter praised Haley for pursing a “political middle,” noting this allowed the former South Carolina governor to “compromise” and work “both sides.” Conversely, some conservative commentators have also suggested that Haley’s approach is “inauthentic.”

Haley placed third in the Iowa caucuses on Jan. 15, 2024, drawing support from 19% of voters there.

Polls on Jan. 16, 2024, showed Trump’s lead over Haley in the New Hampshire primary, set for Jan. 23, narrowing.

We are communication and English scholars who study the role of language and persuasion in politics. We are particularly interested in the ways that speakers and writers adapt their messages and language in different situations and among various voters. We call this concept rhetorical adaptivity.

Our research shows that women presidential candidates, more than the men they run against, often speak differently to different audiences in pursuit of moderation and common ground. They also tend to shift their strategies and messages in response to criticism. And they often pay a price for it.

Rhetoric and presidential campaigns

Politicians changing their words and messages to appeal to different audiences is the subject of a book we co-authored in 2023, “Hillary Clinton’s Career in Speeches: The Promises and Perils of Women’s Rhetorical Adaptivity.”

This project examined how Clinton, her presidential opponents in 2008 and 2016, and the Democratic women who ran for president in 2020 campaigned differently. We found that women more commonly adjusted their language and reshaped their positions to appeal to more voters and to manage the controversies they faced.

In 2016, for example, Hillary Clinton tried to find more of a middle ground on abortion by referring to the “fetus” as an “unborn person” and talking about restrictions on “late-term abortions” – even as she defended a “pro-choice” position.

Both Clinton and Haley opponents have questioned their authenticity, citing the politicians’ shifting language and positions. Such challenges aimed to undermine their candidacies by suggesting they lacked the character to be president.

Haley’s rhetorical maneuvers

Haley’s critics also cite her shifting positions, including on issues such as abortion, Palestinians in Gaza and Donald Trump to argue she lacks a political core.

Former Vice President Mike Pence, for example, was quick to condemn Haley’s “compromising stance” on abortion during the August 2023 Republican debate.

Haley’s opponents have also challenged her changing positions on the Israel-Hamas war. As the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Haley supported Israel and disparaged the U.N.’s Palestinian refugee agency for “using American money to feed Palestinian hatred of the Jewish state.”

Yet, in the early days of the Israel-Hamas war in October 2023, Haley showed more sympathy for the Palestinians.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis ridiculed Haley’s compassion as being “politically correct.” Haley reaffirmed her pro-Israel priorities in response during a speech in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, in mid-October 2023. Haley said she supported Israel and called for the elimination of Hamas. Concern for the Palestinians slipped down the ladder of her priorities.

As a U.N. ambassador, meanwhile, Haley was unwavering in her support for Trump. In her 2019 book, “With All Due Respect,” Haley concluded: “In every instance I dealt with Trump, he was truthful, he listened and he was great to work with.”

Since then, Haley has carved a middle ground approach to Trump. She has argued, “We need him in the Republican Party. I don’t want us to go back to the days before Trump.”

Yet, in other contexts, she disparages Trump for sowing “chaos, vendettas and drama.”

Trump called her out on this discrepancy in the fall of 2023. “She criticizes me one minute, and 15 minutes later, she un-criticizes me.”

Haley’s character woes

Other critics frame Haley’s positions as “flip-flopping.” They don’t interpret what she is doing as moderating her positions or using the language of compromise to build consensus.

Time magazine ran a headline in February 2023 that read: “A Brief History of Nikki Haley’s Biggest Flip Flops on Trump.” In March 2023, The New York Times featured an opinion piece titled, “The Serene Hypocrisy of Nikki Haley.”

Challenging the authenticity of presidential candidates is commonplace, but it is especially piercing when the challenge is directed against women candidates. In presidential politics, research shows that women are conditioned to be uniters, consensus-builders and mitigators of any negativity they face.

Yet, efforts to do this and still “be all things to all people” often result in women candidates falling into gaffe traps.

Haley’s initial refusal to associate “slavery” with the Civil War in December 2023 reinforced a southern trope that some Republicans of color called a “tactical blunder.”

Women’s election challenges

More leadership experts are recognizing the benefits of political candidates integrating multiple perspectives into their thinking and speech. The Pew Research Center found in 2018 that in politics as well as business, women are perceived to be more “compassionate” and “empathic” and are more likely to work out “compromises” than men.

Yet, in presidential campaigns, and especially primaries, compromise, adaptivity and problem-solving are exchanged for hubris, rigidity and ideological purity. Playing to the political middle is treated as politically evasive and opportunistic.

Eventually, women playing to the middle become more gaffe-prone as the campaign unfolds. Women, more than the men they run against, are granted minimal room by opponents and pundits for unforced errors before they are quickly dismissed as “unelectable.”

Shawn J. Parry-Giles, Professor of Communication, University of Maryland and David Kaufer, Professor Emeritus of English, Carnegie Mellon University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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In the lead up to the first caucuses and primaries that will determine the Republican presidential candidate, the 51-year-old former UN Ambassador and South Carolina governor is grabbing voters’ attention as she makes a strong bid against Donald Trump, the current Republican frontrunner. 

While she’s still trailing the former president in the polls by 50 points, according to the Financial Review, recent polling data from RealClearPolitics show Haley as a stronger general-election candidate than Trump if she were to go up against current president Joe Biden in the 2024 election. 

She is rapidly gaining in the polls and drawing large campaign donations from billionaires, ahead of the Republican primary, which will occur in Iowa on January 15.

Other than Trump, Haley’s nearest rivals include Florida governor Ron DeSantis, businessman Vivek Ramaswamy and former New Jersey governor Chris Christie. 

Billionaire backings

In recent weeks, several high-profile donors have indicated they’ll back her over DeSantis, who is polling behind her. Billionaire Charles Koch’s network has raised millions in an effort to support Haley’s campaign– an endorsement that BBC news correspondent Sam Cabral says “has the potential to reshape the race”. 

On Friday, Home Depot co-founder and billionaire Ken Langone put his support behind Haley as well, saying Trump’s time has “come and gone”. 

At the Republican’s final debate last week, Haley’s recent surge in party support made her a prime target from the group, especially as Trump chose not to attend. 

DeSantis lead the attacks, saying “she will cave to the donors” who he claimed are making money in China and “are not going to let her be tough on China”. 

Ramaswamy also took a swing at Haley, accusing her of corruption. 

“Larry Fink, the king of the woke industrial complex, the ESG movement, the CEO of BlackRock, the most powerful company in the world, now supports Nikki Haley,” he said.

Responding to the attacks by laughing them off, Haley said, “I love all the attention fellas”, adding that they were mad because she was taking away their donor support.

“When it comes to these corporate people who want to suddenly support us we’ll take it, but I don’t ask them what their policies are. They asked me what my policies are. We opposed every single corporate bailout we possibly could,” she said. 

So, what is Nikki Haley’s background?

The daughter of Indian immigrants and raised in the Sikh faith, Haley grew up in rural South Carolina where she described enduring racism. In her video announcing her presidential bid, she referenced this past, saying it had an impact on her personal and political life.  

In 2011, Haley became the first woman and first Indian American to be elected governor of South Carolina. She then served as the ambassador to the United Nations from the US under President Trump. 

When she launched her presidential campaign in February 2023, Haley was the first major GOP challenger to Trump and only the fifth Republican woman to run for president this century.

What are her policies?

Haley has said in multiple debates that she is against abortion rights for women. She stands apart from the rest of her GOP competition, however, as she has called for a “national consensus” when it comes to a federal abortion ban. Haley has said she would sign a six-week abortion ban if that was what “the people decide”, with exceptions for rape and incest.

Despite being the daughter of immigrants, Haley’s stance against immigration is tough– although still more lenient than her GOP rivals. She has said she would assign thousands of immigration agents to carry out deportations and has called on the US to “close” the border” and defund “sanctuary cities”. 

When it comes to other issues, her stances are as follows: Haley blames big government spending for inflation, has said China is “the greatest threat to American security and prosperity”, believes helping Ukraine defend itself from Russian aggression is in the US national interest, spoke out against red flag gun laws and has opposed efforts to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. 

Can she beat Trump?

Although she has worked under Trump as UN Ambassador and supported him in the past, Haley is distancing herself from him in her presidential campaign. 

“A president must have moral clarity”, she says in a campaign video, adding that Americans “have to leave behind the chaos and drama of the past”.

Political analysts believe Haley has a chance at the presidency since she can garner support from the independent and moderate voters– those people who don’t support Donal Trump and have mixed views of Joe Biden’s performance as president. 

She also has the potential to close the gender gap and class divide, according to Politico, where Trump has especially struggled to gain the majority votes of women and white voters with university degrees.  

As the runner-up to Trump– who faces 91 criminal charges– Haley would be next in line for the GOP nomination should he end up in jail and the Republican convention decides they don’t want to run someone who’s a convicted felon. 

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However, unlike other recent departures from the Trump administration, she appears to be leaving on good terms, with Trump saying she has done a “fantastic job” and that she leaves the role in a much more “glamorous position”. He added Haley is very “special” to him and is welcome back in the White House anytime.

Haley’s resignation will leave just five women in the Trump administration, with the remaining 17 members all men.

Haley has become known in the position for firmly taking on Syria, Russia, Iran, North Korea and others. She was particularly tough on calling out the use of chemical weapons in Syria. She also defended Trump’s decision to move the American embassy to Jerusalem.

Haley said the role has been the “honour of a lifetime” but that she’s a firm believer in term limits. “You have to be selfless to know when it’s time to step aside and allow someone else to do the job.”

She has ruled out running for President in 2020, but some analysts suggest 2024 could  be an option.

Haley also praised Trump’s family members Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump while speaking to media overnight, saying Kushner is a “hidden genius”.

Haley recently told TIME that as a child she wanted to be mayor of the South Carolina town where she grew up because that “was as far as I can see”. She went on to become South Carolina Governor.

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