Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis blasted former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley for her refusal to endorse former President Donald Trump for president after she dropped her bid.
DeSantis criticizes Haley for not endorsing Trump: 'You signed the pledge' https://t.co/2MdS41QqHO
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During an appearance on Newsmax’s “The Balance,” the former GOP presidential candidate brought up the pledge Republican primary candidates signed, in which they promised to endorse the party’s eventual nominee.
With Trump declared as the party’s presumptive nominee following his win on Super Tuesday which left him with 1,031 out of the 1,215 delegates required for nomination, DeSantis does not see any valid reason for Haley to still not back his bid.
“I signed the pledge, and you signed the pledge saying that you’re gonna not take your ball and go home. And so I honored the pledge, and she’s gonna have to make a decision about whether she wants to or not,” he stated.
But the idea that somehow circumstances have changed… I think we all knew what we were doing when we did that, and you’ve got to make a judgment about whether that’s meaningful to you. And so for me, I tell people, you know, if I say I’m going to do something, I’m going to do it,” he added.
DeSantis himself endorsed Trump when he quit the presidential race after the New Hampshire primary in January, saying, “It’s clear to me that a majority of Republican primary voters want to give Donald Trump another chance…I signed a pledge to support the Republican nominee and I will honor that pledge. He has my endorsement because we can’t go back to the old Republican guard of yesteryear, a repackaged form of warmed-over corporatism that Nikki Haley represents.”
However, when Haley ended her bid on Wednesday, she fell short of an endorsement of Trump even though she congratulated him for his victory the previous night.
“It is now up to Donald Trump to earn the votes of those in our party and beyond it who did not support him. And I hope he does that. This is now his time for choosing,” she said after saying, “I said I wanted Americans to have their voices heard. I have done it. I have no regrets. And although I will no longer be a candidate, I will not stop using my voice for the things I believe in.”
Top Haley surrogate Rep. Ralph Norman (R-SC), who endorsed the former U.N. ambassador a year ago, told Fox News that she will come around and support the former president eventually.
