DeSantis shrugs off Haley end-of-year coffers as lined by ‘liberal Wall Street executives’

WAUKEE, Iowa — Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) dismissed former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley raising $24 million in the last three months before the 2024 Republican presidential primary’s Iowa caucuses.

“She has been able to get massive funding from, you know, liberal Democrats, even in places like California,” DeSantis told reporters Wednesday in Waukee, Iowa, after a campaign event. “Liberal Wall Street executives, they’ve been raising huge money for her there.”

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DeSantis, who has not shared his 2023 fourth-quarter fundraising numbers, contended Haley’s financial backers are not supporting her because they believe she would be “a change agent.”

“They’re doing that because they know that she’s somebody that they would be able to control,” DeSantis said. “And so, my view is to do what’s right. Don’t try to chase what donors are wanting to do and that’s what I’ve done my entire time in office.”

Haley raised $11 million during the third quarter, compared to former President Donald Trump‘s $45.5 million and DeSantis’s $15 million. Trump has not released his fourth-quarter data either, but much reportedly has been spent on legal fees.

“The debate will be very clear,” DeSantis said of next week’s final debate before the caucuses between himself and Haley. “There’ll be a very clear contrast between somebody who, by her admission, she was inspired to run for office, not by Ronald Reagan or Margaret Thatcher, but by Hillary Clinton.

“She’s got an agenda that’s really very similar, almost like the Republican version of Hillary,” he added. “They both obviously have given a lot of speeches to Wall Street behind closed doors and made millions of dollars without disclosing the contents of that, and they’ve obviously got a lot of support from those types of folks, but that ultimately is not going to fly in Iowa. That’s not what people want to see. They want to see people that are going to stand and fight.”

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DeSantis is crisscrossing Iowa before the Jan. 15 caucuses, hosting 10 events in the state between Wednesday and Sunday.

While Trump has an average 33-percentage-point lead over DeSantis and Haley, with 51% of the vote in Iowa, DeSantis and Haley are closer with 19% and 16% apiece, respectively, according to RealClearPolitics.