OPINION:
A version of this story appeared in the On Background newsletter from The Washington Times. Click here to receive On Background delivered directly to your inbox each Friday.
DES MOINES, Iowa — Campaigning here in frigid Iowa over the weekend, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley donned a sweater emblazoned across the chest: “She who dares wins.”
It was not subtle. Rather, it was a ham-fisted attempt to inject gender politics into this Republican primary cycle.
Ms. Haley might as well have borrowed the sweater from Hillary Clinton, whose 2016 campaign slogan was “I’m with her.” Unfortunately for Mrs. Clinton, not enough were “with her” to get her elected president. She will have to settle in the history books as America’s 42nd first lady, former senator and former secretary of state.
But this failed gender agenda is a strategy Ms. Haley now wants to try in the Republican Party.
From the beginning, she has built her campaign on this basic platform: “I am woman — hear me roar!” She talks about her high-heeled shoes and how she uses them as weapons. She talks about how only women get things done. She has even resorted to scolding conservative men — “fellas,” she calls them — from talking about abortion in policy debates.
What serious person who actually cares about the issue of abortion — or live children or women’s rights or healthy families or democracy — would publicly seek to exclude men from this important debate? Do men not bear equal responsibility when it comes to getting pregnant, bearing children and raising families?
Not if you are Nikki Haley and you have a primary election to win, apparently.
The Wall Street Journal editorial board recently asked: “Who’s Afraid of Nikki Haley?”
For starters, it is fairly amazing how many Republicans across the political spectrum reject Nikki Haley — even some who remain unsold on another Donald Trump term.
Sen. Rand Paul, the Kentucky Republican with a strong libertarian streak, made a big announcement that while he could not endorse any specific candidate, he was damn certain he opposed Ms. Haley. The hashtag “#NeverNikki” trended on the internet.
Sen. Marco Rubio, the Florida Republican who is a pretty mainstream defense hawk, endorsed Mr. Trump.
Even former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, whose only goal in politics is to block Mr. Trump from the Republican nomination, could not bring himself to endorse Ms. Haley. She’s “gonna get smoked,” he predicted in a hot mic moment.
To answer The Wall Street Journal’s question, a lot of Republicans are afraid of Ms. Haley.
That Ms. Haley’s campaign is relying on Democratic voters to play in the Republican primary cycle should be a glaring warning sign for anyone trying to take her seriously.
But then there is the much larger America First agenda that Donald Trump used to hijack the GOP from the monied Republican establishment, which is Ms. Haley’s base within the party. That agenda includes a secure border, deep skepticism about foreign wars, and policies to protect American workers.
Ms. Haley has been shredded by her Republican adversaries for being weak on the border and for her coziness with the military-industrial complex. Hilariously, she actually served on the board of Boeing after being Mr. Trump’s ambassador to the United Nations.
One of the most vicious hits on Ms. Haley came from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis last week when he observed, “You can take the ambassador out of the U.N., but you can’t take the U.N. out of the ambassador.”
For Ms. Haley, these attacks are just sexist. Which takes us to the biggest reason good Republican voters are “afraid” of Nikki Haley.
Mr. Trump’s meteoric success in politics is mostly thanks to his commonsense America First agenda. But almost equally important is his ferocious and unrelenting attacks on the mainstream media and Democratic politicians for injecting race and gender into every political debate.
His refusal to allow them to put everything in a racial context is why Mr. Trump enjoys historic support (for a Republican candidate) among African American and Hispanic voters.
But Democrats and the media remain so addicted to their race and gender politics that they even have a name for it. They call it “identity politics.” But there is a better name for it. It’s called “racism.”
And the only people who revert to that style of gutter politics are low, self-serving politicians who are unable to win elections based on the issues or their ideas.
• Charles Hurt is the opinion editor of The Washington Times.
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