DES MOINES, Iowa — Former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley took aim at President Joe Biden on Monday night for “lecturing” her about the cause of the Civil War after he delivered a speech at the South Carolina church where nine black parishioners were killed in a 2015 shooting.
“Let me be clear for those who don’t seem to know: Slavery was the cause of the Civil War,” Biden said, referring to Haley’s recent gaffe that received swift criticism from both sides of the aisle when asked at a town hall in late December about the cause of the Civil War and she didn’t mention slavery. She later walked back the comment, clarifying she thought it was “a given” that everyone associated slavery with the war.
During a Fox News town hall, Haley was asked to respond to Biden’s comments earlier on Monday and argued that “for Biden to show up there and give a political speech is offensive in itself.”
“I don’t need someone who palled around with segregationists in the ’70s and has said racist comments all the way through his career lecturing me or anyone in South Carolina about what it means to have racism, slavery, or anything related to the Civil War,” she said.
Haley, who was the governor of South Carolina at the time of the Charleston church shooting, gained national attention in the aftermath when she signed legislation to remove the Confederate battle flag from the grounds of the Statehouse.
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Immediately following the speech, Haley’s campaign sent reporters a timeline highlighting Biden’s record on race. Biden was criticized during the 2020 presidential cycle for speaking positively about two segregationist senators he had previously worked with in the upper chamber.
The first voters will decide who they want as the GOP nominee during the Jan. 15 Iowa caucuses. Former President Donald Trump consistently leads his rivals in national and early nominating state polling. A RealClearPolitics average shows Trump at 62.7%, Haley at 11%, and Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) at 10.9%.