Nikki Haley is raising money for her Republican presidential candidacy off some threats that her rival in the race, former President Donald Trump, recently made to potential donors of hers.
Haley has used one of Trump’s oldest tricks to do this — selling merchandise to raise money.
On Wednesday night, Trump posted to his social media platform, Truth Social, that people who decide to contribute to Haley’s campaign would be “permanently barred from the MAGA camp,” a reference to his campaign slogan from 2016 of Make America Great Again.
Haley’s campaign responded to that post in a unique way — by raising money using the words that her former boss wrote. Haley, who is the former governor of South Carolina, served as the ambassador to the United Nations during the Trump administration.
On Thursday, Haley posted to her page on the social media site X:
“Enough said … Grab your shirt here!”
She then dropped a link that took people to a site where they could donate $5 to her campaign and get a T-shirt in return that reads: “Barred. Permanently.”
One of the former staffers for Trump’s campaign participated quickly. Sarah Matthews, who departed the Trump White House after the Capitol riot in January 2021 posted on X in response to Haley’s T-shirt post:
“Done. Join me in donating to @NikkiHaley here.”
Matthews was among the many former officials in the Trump administration who testified to the House’s special panel that investigated the January 6 attacks.
Despite having high hopes for her performance in the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary, Haley has lagged significantly behind Trump in the primary season thus far. She finished in third place in Iowa, and lost by 11 points to Trump in New Hampshire, Decision Desk HQ reported.
She is now the only competitor to Trump in the GOP primary, since Florida Governor Ron DeSantis decided to halt his campaign following his own disappointing performance in the Iowa caucuses.
Even though Trump is way ahead of Haley, that hasn’t stopped him from attacking her. In his victory speech in New Hampshire, Trump went hard after Haley, saying:
“I have to tell you — it was very interesting, because I said, ‘Wow what a great victory,’ but then somebody ran up to the stage all dressed up nicely when it was at 7, but now I just walked up, and it was at 14.
“Let’s not have somebody take a victory when she had a very bad night. She had a very bad night.”
With Haley still in the race, Trump doesn’t seem to care much about whether he attracts her supporters. In his Truth Social post, he said that when he won the election in 2016, he noticed:
“The losing Candidate’s ‘Donors’ would immediately come to me, and want to ‘help out’ … This is standard in Politics, but no longer with me.
“Anybody that makes a ‘Contribution’ to Birdbrain, from this moment forth, will be permanently barred from the MAGA camp. We don’t want them, and will not accept them, because we Put America First, and ALWAYS WILL!”
