Trump insinuates that Haley's husband was deployed to Africa to escape her

Former President Donald J. Trump continued his aggressive attacks on Nikki Haley on Saturday, insinuating at a rally in South Carolina that her husband, a National Guardsman, left for a mission to escape her.

'What happened to her husband? Where is he?” Mr. Trump told a crowd in Conway, S.C., “He's gone.”

He then paused for a moment before adding suggestively, “He knew. He knew it.”

Mr. Trump's comments, made in Ms. Haley's home state two weeks before the Republican primaries, mark a stark turn in an escalating barrage of attacks on her as he aims to knock her out of contention in the Republican primary. primaries. While he has criticized Ms. Haley's political views for weeks and made vague statements claiming she lacks a presidential temperament, he has refrained from making specific personal smears.

Later in his speech in South Carolina, Mr. Trump — who has called Ms. Haley “birdbrain” for months without offering an explanation — called her “brain dead” as he criticized her standing in the national polls.

Ms. Haley's campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but she did posted a response to X that referred to the absence of her husband, Michael, from the campaign trail.

“Michael is being deployed to serve our country, something you know nothing about. Someone who continually disrespects the sacrifices of military families has nothing to do with being commander in chief,” she wrote.

Mrs. Haley's husband is currently serving a voluntary, year-long deployment in Africa, which began last June. He is stationed at Camp Lemonnier, a sprawling military base in Djibouti. Trump's comments followed increased attention to the issue among right-wing media personalities who support the former president.

Although currently abroad, Mr. Haley has been a frequent presence in Ms. Haley's messages in her bid for the nomination. In her stump speech, she describes him as one of her reasons for running, often describing his struggles after returning from a war zone and suggesting that his work has informed her views on foreign policy and immigration.

“The other candidates sit there and say I'm a warmonger,” she said last year at a community center in Treynor, Iowa, where a restored U.S. Army helicopter hangs as a tribute to the 114th Aviation Company in Vinh Long, South Vietnam . “Are you kidding me? My husband is in the military. The last thing I want him to do is go fight. This is about preventing war. We should always strive to prevent war.”

In interviews with voters in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, Mr. Haley has often emerged organically as a reason for their support. Women and mothers with spouses or children in the military tend to connect with the difficult experience of worrying about their loved ones and rarely seeing them. Retired military officers see her as someone who might better understand their plight.

Both Mrs. Haley and Mr. Trump share, to some extent, their spouses' absence from the campaign trail. Melania Trump, the former first lady, has not accompanied Mr. Trump at events nor been at his side during his court appearances.

Mr Trump's attacks on Ms Haley, the former governor of South Carolina, came as his campaign had for weeks pursued a strategy designed to humiliate her in her home state.

On Saturday, Mr. Trump said again that he only appointed her ambassador to the United Nations to pave the way for her successor, Gov. Henry McMaster, who endorsed Mr. Trump shortly after he began his 2024 campaign.

Ms. Haley has also stepped up her criticism of Mr. Trump, especially as her path to the Republican nomination has narrowed and she has become his only major competitor. She recently attacked Mr. Trump in light of the special counsel's report questioning President Biden's mental acuity over his handling of classified documents.

During campaign stops in South Carolina on Saturday, she doubled down on her urgent calls for Republicans not to overlook Trump's own age and mental challenges, warning without evidence that Democrats appeared to be looking to replace Mr. Biden and that Republicans needed to “wake up.” ,” at.

In Newberry, S.C., her campaign staff handed out mock mental competency worksheets with questions the sheets suggested Mr. Trump and Mr. Biden would fail. Ms. Haley told reporters that she had not taken the test but that she would be happy to do so.

The Haley campaign also paid for a mobile billboard to troll the former president around the Myrtle Beach area, including near his event in Conway.

Mr Trump has also called for cognitive tests for presidential candidates as part of his strategy to attack Mr Biden's mental acuity for months.

On Saturday he turned Ms Haley's attack back on her. “I don't think Nikki would pass the test,” he said. “Not really.”

Maggie Haberman contributed reporting from New York.