Former President Trump said the only reason he chose Nikki Haley to be the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations was so Henry McMaster, her lieutenant governor at the time, could become governor of South Carolina.
“Nikki Haley is a disaster,” he told supporters at a campaign rally in Atkinson, New Hampshire. “She worked for me for a long time. I know her very well. I actually put her there for a different reason.
“I shouldn't say this, but she had a lieutenant governor named Henry McMaster, who is fantastic,” the 45th president continued. “I figured if I took her out of the South Carolina governorship, put her someplace, any place, I put her someplace, then Henry McMaster, who is my friend and has turned out to be a great governor in South Carolina, Henry McMaster will become the governor. So, I moved her to the United Nations. And, honestly, she was not a good negotiator. She was not a good negotiator.”
This is not the first time Trump has explained his motives in nominating Haley.
“I gave [Haley] the position, but I gave it to her much more so because I wanted Henry McMaster to be the governor of South Carolina," Trump said during a rally in Iowa on Sunday. "And he's been a great help."
He argued Haley doesn’t have what it takes to be president.
"Honestly, she's not tough enough," he added. "She's not tough enough. We're dealing with the toughest people in the world, dealing with people that are on a level that you've never seen."
Haley disagreed.
"Everybody's that's ever worked for me or worked with me, no one ever questions my toughness,” she told CNN’s Dana Bash on Sunday. “He's saying this because now he knows he's in trouble, now he knows this is becoming a two-person race.”
Trump is ahead of Haley in New Hampshire by 13.3 percentage points, according to RealClearPolitics’ average of surveys in the state.