As the Georgia Senate race comes down to the wire, South Carolina governor Nikki Haley had a bizarre choice of words regarding Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA) when she spoke at a Herschel Walker rally on Sunday. As Haley tried to appeal to the Republican mantra of border security, she stated that maybe the person they should deport is Warnock himself.
From The Guardian:
“I am the daughter of Indian immigrants,” Haley said in Hiram, Georgia, on Sunday. “They came here legally; they put in the time, they put in the price, they are offended by what’s happening on [the southern US] border.
“Legal immigrants are more patriotic than the leftists these days. They knew they worked to come into America, and they love America. They want the laws followed in America, so the only person we need to make sure we deport is Warnock.”
Haley may have meant to say that voting Warnock out of his Senate seat during the election was her intention, but that doesn’t make the language any less gross. Sen. Warnock has lived in the United States all his life, and falsely equating him with that specific term is not right. Harvard professor and pastor Cornell William Brooks had something to say about Haley’s own history in a tweet.
“Were it not for civil rights laws Black folks died for, Nikki Haley’s family might not be in America.
“Were it not for a HBCU [historically Black college and university] giving her father his first job in the US, Haley wouldn’t be in a position to insult Georgia’s first Black senator. Warnock’s history makes her story possible.”
Haley also said that Walker was “a good person who has been put through the wringer and has had everything but the kitchen sink thrown at him.” Her statement here ignores that many of Walker’s troubles during his campaign are his fault.