Top 5 Reasons Haley Should Win 2024 Presidential Election

By Arielle Karni ‘26
With the 2024 presidential election less than a year away and the primary season upon us, tensions are already running high as the question of who is best fit to run our country for the next four years arises in everyone’s mind. Here are the top 5 reasons why I believe that Nikki Haley is the best candidate for the Republican nomination and to win in the general election.

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1. It should be clear to everyone on both sides of the aisle that we need an alternative to both Joe Biden and Donald Trump. One can barely keep his eyes open or climb up or down a flight of stairs or walk across a dais without stumbling, and the other became the first president ever to be indicted and is accumulating indictments and felony charges like it’s his hobby. At ages 80 and 77 respectively, both are beyond whatever prime they may have once had and neither is nearly a strong enough candidate to embody American ideals such that he is worthy of becoming the oldest serving U.S. president. They are from generations too remote from today’s society to run a country in this modern era. “I think the majority of Americans know we need a new generational leader, that we need to leave the negativity of the past behind us,” Haley told CNN. Let’s hope she is right.
   
2. U.S. politics have become extremist, on the far left promising free higher education to all and permitting unbridled illegal immigration, or on the far right steadfastly embracing 2nd Amendment rights while the number of nationwide mass shootings is staggeringly high and supporting 6-week bans on abortion when most women don’t even know they are pregnant at six weeks and opinion polls show that the majority of Americans support the legalization of abortion in most cases. Nikki Haley is the most centrist of the candidates and attractive to independent voters looking for an alternative to Biden and Trump, balancing the scales in a way that suits the country in the best way possible. She urges her fellow Republicans to pursue their conservative agenda in a pragmatic manner and to cease pushing for a national abortion ban. Aren’t we ready for a president who has the ability and desire to unify the country and Congress rather than being further divisive?
   
3. Nikki Haley has served as the governor of South Carolina and U.S. ambassador to the UN, demonstrating her dual ability to lead in both international and national diplomacy. Nikki Haley is also clearly the only sane adult in the running, as evidenced by, among other things, Governor DeSantis’ unwinnable war against Disney, his state’s largest employer, and his defense of slavery, and Vivek Ramaswamy’s detestable goal of taking Trump’s policy agenda “even further." I hope that Chris Christie recognizes his lower standing in polls (at the time of publication) and succumbs to backing Haley, furthering his venerable singular goal of beating Trump. 
   
4. She is a woman, and it is time for the U.S. to elect a female president and crawl out from underneath the established patriarchy. While this fact alone does not qualify her, and I do not endorse supporting any candidate based solely on gender, religion or ethnicity, I believe that Nikki Haley, as the most politically accomplished woman to ever run in a Republican primary, is the right woman for the job. Despite the growing gender gap between the parties, women comprise almost half of the Republican primary electorate and have the power to get her elected as the party’s nominee. During the first GOP debate, Haley aptly quoted Margaret Thatcher, reminding us, “If you want something said, ask a man. If you want something done, ask a woman.” 
   
5. Israel. Period. As governor, Nikki Haley signed the first anti-BDS legislation in the country. During her time at the UN, one of the most notoriously anti-Israel and antisemitic organizations worldwide that has historically inordinately focused on demonizing Israel in comparison to blatant and incessant human rights violations such as China, Iran, Syria, North Korea and Myanmar, Haley ardently supported moving the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, called out the UN Security Council’s opposition to such move as an “embarrassment” and tirelessly worked toward ending the days of Israel bashing at the UN. While members of President Biden’s own Democratic party cannot even bring themselves to call out Hamas’ actions on October 7 as the abhorrent terrorist acts that they were, acknowledge Israel’s right to exist, or condemn antisemitism on American college campuses, I question whether President Biden will be able to stand firmly behind Israel as the friend that Israel deserves, risking votes among his constituency relating to the issue of Israel. Can American Jews vote in good conscience for President Biden in today’s climate of surging antisemitism and existential threat to Israel’s existence?

For these reasons, Nikki Haley is the candidate for me.