“On the Holmes Front,” with Frank Holmes
President Donald Trump may have the ultimate political curveball coming just ahead of this year’s presidential election.
According to one political insider in Washington, Trump is planning to replace Vice President Mike Pence on his re-election ticket with former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley.
“This is not a prediction. It’s a certainty,” said Democratic strategist Paul Begala.
Begala, who advised the Clintons, said the ticket switch-up is “guaranteed”—and even predicted the exact date Trump would name his new running mate.
“On Thursday, July 16—that’s the date the Democrat gives his or her acceptance address … Donald Trump will call a press conference at Mar-a-Lago,” where “he’s going to dump Mike Pence and put Nikki Haley on the ticket,” Begala told the pro-Israeli AIPAC conference this week.
His comments got so much traction that Haley had to address them head-on.
Haley denied the rumor, and told Fox News that Pence is “the right partner for the president.”
But rumors have swirled for months that Trump would tap Haley as veep.
The president tried to put that gossip to rest in November 2018, when he asked Pence to be his running mate in front of an entire press conference.
When a reporter asked Trump if Pence would be on the ticket in 2020, Trump asked Pence, who sat in the front row: “Mike, will you be my running mate?”
But Washington won’t let the idea die — it’s especially popular among conservatives’ enemies.
The founder of a group called “Democrats for Trump” wrote a 2019 op-ed in the Wall Street Journal titled, “Trump-Haley 2020.”
New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman claimed it had been personally approved by WSJ owner Rupert Murdoch, who “speaks frequently with [Trump] about the 2020 ticket.”
Murdoch is among those who Trump speaks frequently with who has mulled about the 2020 ticket. It was possible chicken or egg in Trump asking about Pence loyalty months ago. Here’s @Katierogers and me on that topic https://t.co/wXuwZR7vl7
— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) June 24, 2019
A liberal blogger at The Week claimed he’d heard about a full-blown “Draft Haley” movement.
Even Oprah Winfrey’s magazine jumped on the Haley veep bandwagon.
Oprah, an intimate friend of the Obamas, may want Haley on the ticket because she was formerly one of Trump’s critics.
Haley’s first assault came when she gave the GOP response to Barack Obama’s last State of the Union address — but used it to try to stop Trump from becoming president.
“During anxious times, it can be tempting to follow the siren call of the angriest voices,” Haley said, an obvious dig at Trump. “We must resist that temptation.”
At the time, “Beltway Republicans praised her speech … because she was speaking for them,” said Joel B. Pollack of Breitbart.
But grassroots conservatives were outraged Haley chose “to attack Trump on a night when they’re supposed to be attacking Obama,” as Allahpundit blogged at HotAir.com.
Haley ripped Trump again a few weeks later, just before the 2016 South Carolina primary.
Trump is “everything a governor doesn’t want in a president,” Nikki Haley said.
The future president shot back that Haley is “weak on illegal immigration, and she certainly has no trouble asking me for campaign contributions.”
Haley had no trouble accepting a post as President Trump’s ambassador to the United Nations — however, she frequently pushed a more hawkish foreign policy than Trump’s America First plans.
It looked like she announced new sanctions against without even asking President Trump first.
The sanctions never rolled out, and Haley quit, shocking the D.C. establishment.
Bridges weren’t burned inside the White House, however. Trump appeared at her side when she left the White House and graciously called Haley “a friend of mine,” who “did a great job at the UN.”
But insiders say that Haley has her eye on another job: his.
Haley didn’t help squash rumors when she had dinner last February with liberal GOP megadonor Paul Singer. Conservative pundit Bill Kristol let it be known that his fellow Never Trumpers hoped Haley would challenge Trump in the Republican primary this year.
“No, I am not running for 2020,” Haley said. “I can promise you what I’ll be doing is campaigning for” Trump — and Pence.
But she’s staffing up her organization and is considered one of the early favorites to take the party away from the Trump-Pence faction come 2024.
If the Never Trumpers want control of the Republican Party, Trump should let them fight for it in 2024 — not hand it to them this year.
Frank Holmes is a veteran journalist and an outspoken conservative that talks about the news that was in his weekly article, “On The Holmes Front.”