Nikki Haley’s candidacy for the Republican nomination was not as simple as is often believed. This involved a number of different and conflicting motivations: portraying Donald Trump as unelectable, inciting Trump supporters to consider his candidacy, and crossing the fine line between challenging Trump and establishing his position as electoral successor. She had to qualify him as a short-term loser without definitively locating herself in the anti-Trump camp, three short years before the serious start of the campaign for the 2028 presidential election.
washingtonpost
