Nikki Haley grins as Vivek Ramaswamy is BOOED by Alabama crowd for holding up a sign calling her ‘corrupt’ – after he compared her campaign launch to a ‘woke Dylan Mulvaney Bud Light ad’
Former UN Ambassador. Nikki Haley broke out into a smile as Vivek Ramaswamy was booed by the crowd at the fourth Republican primary debate for calling her “corrupt” and holding up a notepad to write it down.
Ramaswamy, as in previous debates, took some particularly harsh shots at Haley, including an accusation that she used “identity politics” to highlight the fact that she is a woman during her 2024 re-election campaign. .
The 38-year-old tech entrepreneur said Hailey’s pitch video was “like a Dylan Mulvaney commercial for Bud Light about how she would kick heels.”
“She said at the first debate that only a woman can do this job,” Ramaswamy said. “After the third debate, when I criticized Ronna McDaniel for her five failed years leading this party and criticized Nikki for her corrupt foreign dealings as a military contractor, she said I had a ‘woman problem.’
“Maybe I don’t have a problem with women, you have a problem with corruption,” he said.
Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy was given a notepad at the fourth Republican debate to take notes during the showdown, as were all the competitors on stage. Instead, he brought it up mid-debate, revealing that he had scrawled “Nikki = Corrupt.”
Former UN Ambassador. Nikki Haley reacts to Ramaswamy being booed for holding a clipboard calling her “corrupt” during the fourth GOP primary debate on Wednesday
Ramaswamy scribbled something on his notepad early in the debate.
At that moment he showed it to the public: “Nikki = Corruption.”
“And I think that’s something that people need to know. Nikki is corrupt,” he said, holding up a clipboard.
Ramaswamy was booed and Hayley tried not to smile.
When moderator Eliana Johnson asked Haley if she wanted to respond, she demurred.
“No, it’s not worth my time to answer him,” she said.
Ramaswamy’s senior adviser and communications director Tricia McLaughlin later told DailyMail.com that the plan was to put up a sign that read “Nikki = corrupt.”
“I think we kind of fooled around with it. It’s very meme-able. And in the end he did it. This happened at the last minute.
“He may have made other recordings, but this was the most important recording,” she said.
Throughout much of the debate, Haley had an ally in New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who fiercely defended her against another Ramaswami attack—that she would not be able to pinpoint certain Ukrainian provinces on a map.
Ramaswamy spoke of the need for a “sensible peace deal” in Ukraine’s war with Russia, then turned to Haley, saying she and President Joe Biden were among the few politicians who believed in a “senseless war.”
“One thing that Joe Biden and Nikki Haley have in common is that neither of them can even tell you the three provinces in eastern Ukraine that they want to send our troops to actually fight for,” Ramaswamy said.
“She has no idea what the hell the names of those provinces are that she wants to send our sons and daughters, our troops and our military equipment to fight over,” he continued.
“So put aside this myth that you were sold – that someone had a cup of coffee, worked at the UN and then made $8 million – has real foreign policy experience,” the millionaire author added.
Hayley remained stone-faced throughout the attack.
“Look at the blank expression,” Ramaswamy said. “She doesn’t know the names of the provinces.”
He argued that his status as an “outsider” gave him an elevated perspective.
When Christie’s turn came, the former governor of New Jersey spoke out about the attack.
“This is the fourth debate where in the first 20 minutes you would be voted the worst bully in America,” he told Ramaswamy.
Christy called Haley “a smart, educated woman.”
“I want to say something else: We’ve been in this debate for 25 minutes and he insulted Nikki Haley’s basic intelligence, not her position, her basic intelligence,” he roared.
“She doesn’t know the regions, she won’t be able to find on a map what his three-year-old child could find,” he listed the insults.
“Look, if you want to disagree on some issues, that’s fine, and Nikki and I disagree on some issues. But I’ll tell you this: I’ve known her for 12 years, which is longer than he even started voting in the Republican primaries,” Christie added.