Nikki Haley said Monday that former President Donald Trump and running mate Sen. JD Vance should change the way they speak about women and focus instead on policy positions.
In an interview on Fox News’ “Fox & Friends,” Haley, the former governor of South Carolina, was asked why she thinks Harris has a 14-point lead in the gender gap among women.
“I think it’s because Donald Trump and JD Vance need to change the way they speak about women. You don’t need to call Kamala dumb. She didn’t get this far, you know, just by accident. … She’s a prosecutor. You don’t need to go and talk about intelligence or looks or anything else. Just focus on the policies,” she said.
Haley said that when Republicans call Democratic women “dumb,” “Republican women get their backs up, too.”
“The bottom line is, we win on policies,” she added. “Stick to the policies, leave all the other stuff. That’s how he can win.”
The Trump campaign did not immediately respond to NBC News’ request for comment about Haley’s remarks.
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Trump has been targeting Harris with ad hominem attacks since she entered the race after President Joe Biden dropped out. Speaking to a New Hampshire-focused podcast last week, Trump said that Harris is “not smart enough.”
“Something’s wrong,” Trump said. “There’s something wrong, but we can’t go another four years with a dumb president. We can’t do it. We had four years with a president that should never have been there, and we can’t have it.”
Despite saying earlier this year when she exited the GOP presidential primary race that she wouldn’t endorse Trump, Haley expressed strong support for him in remarks at the Republican National Convention in July.
Since backing him, however, Haley hasn’t shied away from criticizing the former president, for whom she resigned as governor to serve as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.
Haley said in an interview on CBS News’ “Face the Nation” that aired Sunday that she doesn’t agree with Trump’s style or communications strategy, but that “it’s not a question” of whether she would support him over Harris because of his policies.
“Now, do I agree with his style? Do I agree with his approach? Do I agree with his communications? No,” Haley said. “When I look at the policies and how they affect my family, and how I think they’re going to affect the country, that’s where I go back and I look at the differences. I mean this is — these are the candidates we have been given.”
She added later, referring to comments made by Vance, “No, it is not helpful to talk about whether women have children or whether they don’t.”
Haley also said in describing both nominees: “Neither are perfect. Neither are ideal.”
Earlier this year, when she was still running in the Republican presidential primary, Haley commented on the court cases Trump faced during the campaign cycle and said the public sees him go “on these rants about how he’s the victim.”
“I think that’s exactly what we don’t need a strong leader to be,” she said in January o NBC News’ Meet the Press.” “These court cases are going to keep happening one by one. We’re going to keep seeing him in a courtroom, and we’re going to see him come out and do a press conference. That’s not what you want a president to be. But more than that, that’s not what we want Russia to see. That’s not what we want China to see. And that’s not what we want Iran to see.”
Haley also said that Trump isn’t someone who can get the country back on track.
“You can’t do that with him, and I think it’s not being disrespectful, it’s the fact that when you’re 80, you are declining,” she said. “There are multiple things that I think are the reason he should not be president. That’s the whole reason I’m running. I do think that he is in decline, and I think that he needs to know to step away.”
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
