Nikki Haley claps back at Trump after he mocks her husband's absence from campaign trail

It is getting personal between Donald Trump and Nikki Haley two weeks before South Carolina's Republican primary The former president is taking personal shots at Haley rather than focusing on policy differences He mocked her husband for not being with her out on the campaign trail. He is currently deployed overseas With the South Carolina National Guard, but here's what he said Where's her husband? Oh, he's away. He's away. What happened to her husband? What happened to her husband? Where is he he's gone He knew he knew Again, he is deployed overseas right now and moments ago The former South Carolina governor hit back at Donald Trump demanding that the former president confront her directly Donald Trump had a rally today and in that rally He mocked my husband's military service and I'll say this Donald if you have something to say Don't say it behind my back get on a debate stage and say it to my face If you mock the service of a combat veteran You don't deserve a driver's license. Let alone being president of the United States Ron Nikki Haley slammed Trump for his remarks earlier today saying in a post on X quote Michael is deployed serving our country something, you know nothing about Someone who continually disrespects the sacrifices of military families has no business being commander-in-chief You know Ron Trump has repeatedly mocked people serving their country in uniform. What do you make of this? Yeah, I mean and this is part of the strangeness. I think of the entire Republican Primary, I mean that language from Nikki Haley is in line with much tougher criticism that she's offering of him on a variety of fronts That simply was not there in all of 2023 when she had the forum of Republican Debates in Iowa and New Hampshire in the early stages of race when the media attention was most intense And the concrete had not hardened in this race She was not criticizing Trump in anywhere near the terms that she is across the board and it's really not just her You know We know from General John Kelly who served as Trump's own White House chief of staff and instead of Department of Homeland Security That Trump he is confirmed in statements the reporting originally in the Atlantic the Trump referred to military service members as losers and Suckers. Well, right is John Kelly gonna go on camera somewhere and discuss that rather than just issue a statement I mean Trump has had this kind of you know Ronson's and it's described as a Praetorian Guard of defenders in conservative media But certainly the Republicans inside the GOP coalition who have reservations about his conduct and behavior and inclinations Haven't exactly been telling their voters Sharing those concerns with their voters in an unvarnished way And Ron is Trump gonna pay a price for this I think it depends. I mean a lot of it is baked in Jim Obviously, you know you I think he already is paying a price you have a president in in Joe Biden Approval rating is stuck at 40% But the two of them are essentially in a dead heat that's what I call the Trump tax that Biden runs further ahead of his approval rating than Presidents typically are able to do and we saw that in 2022. There already is a price But the real question is whether those Senior officials in a Trump administration like General Kelly like Mark Esper I think you'll be talking to you shortly Bill Barr James Mattis John Bolton Are they going to go out in a more visible way and share their concerns with the public that you know? They believe Trump is unfit to be president And you know the question of whether they are going to be willing to say that in a highly public way I think will answer your question of how much cost there ultimately is for him and Ron Yeah, and Ron earlier today Trump was taking credit bragging once again for tanking the bipartisan border deal. Let's listen to that Yeah This week we also had another massive victory that every conservative should celebrate We crushed crooked Joe Biden's disastrous open borders bill Mike Johnson did a very good job and the whole group did a great job in Congress. We crushed it We saved America from yet another horrific Biden betrayal Ron in the previous hour, I tried to press congressman Tim Burchett on this he would not accept What I was saying that essentially Trump pressured the Republicans into into killing this he didn't want to go there But isn't that the case? Sure, I mean it was a clear indication that this is a Trump Party and you know, I think it is important to look not only at Trump's actions here But what the alternative is that he is putting forward, you know Because of the way the Republican primary is played out and the manner I was just talking about there really has been extraordinarily little debate about Trump's Agenda for a second term, but but he has put forward a much more militant and very specific agenda compared to what he ran on In 16 or 20 and one of the areas that is the most militant and specific are his plans on immigration I mean he has talked that he you know He said on Friday night Jim Friday afternoon at the NRA that within moments quote unquote within moments of taking office He would begin a mass deportation program Stephen Miller has put out Extraordinary detail about how they intend to do this with large-scale raids in major cities Moving people to internment camp in Texas and then removing them from the country in constant place I talked to a former ICE chief of staff this week who said that would take a hundred to a hundred and fifty thousand Law enforcement personnel plus another fifty thousand people to run these camps and one of the ways they are talking about doing this openly and explicitly is requisitioning National Guard troops from red states and Sending them into blue states whose governors won't cooperate So you're talking about the National Guard from Texas or Arkansas going into the west side of Chicago? Potentially to deport people and think about what that might how that might play out in practice and I think this is you know, could you imagine scenes of Federal law enforcement and national guards from out-of-state in Conflict with local police that are defending a church where migrants have kind of, you know rushed for for safety The question of what a second Trump term would mean across the board really has not been engaged by anyone Including Biden, but certainly not by the other Republicans and it you know It is an open question how much a part of the debate that's going to be between now and November well and Ron the Senate also had an unusual weekend session this weekend to try to pass a to Ukraine Israel and Taiwan and You know, one of the issues is is Trump going to take that deal as well and earlier this afternoon at this rally in South Carolina he was essentially saying to Russia Go ahead and invade NATO countries if that's what you want to do if these NATO countries aren't putting enough money into NATO Right, this is the way he describes it then he's not going to defend them He says as president if they are attacked by Russia, I mean you you juxtapose that with I mean I was speaking with Patti Davis the daughter of former president Ronald Reagan the late president I that in the previous hour that is not Ronald Reagan's Republican Party No, yeah and I don't think Trump has to tank this deal in the same way of direct intervention because so many of the Republican senators have moved in that direction now They may be 10 willing to move this forward it kind of the the remnants of the Reagan Party that saw the u.s Standing up against aggression Russian aggression as you know, a central part of the GOP identity, but you know this again is Part of what I was just saying we are we are not really at a point where there has been much discussion or debate About what a Trump second term would mean and one of the reason, you know He says he would settle the Ukraine war within 24 hours. And I think most people Understand that to mean that he would force Zelensky and Ukraine to accept Russian control over a significant part of the country by threatening to cut off Their aid and I think that's what many of the critics ultimately in the Republican Party Envisioned it's just one of many we could you know, we could talk about tariffs. We could talk about Using the insurrection act to send federal forces into blue cities to fight crime or round up the homeless I mean, there's a broad array of issues on which he has laid out a very specific agenda That simply hasn't been addressed much yet in the context of the presidential race Right. Well, there have been other things that have been talked about in the news over the last several days and I'm glad that Ron you're You're highlighting the issues because that's where voters are going to be looking to try to parse out where they're gonna stand When it comes down to these two choices coming up in November Ron Brownstein as always. Thank you very much. Really appreciate it