Nikki Haley and America’s Demographic Crisis
Al Arabiya, Saudi Arabia, February 18
Preparations for the 2024 US presidential election campaign are in full swing, showing that it will be a fierce fight between the two major parties – the Republicans and the Democrats – as well as within each party. This has become particularly evident in the last two weeks, with former President Donald Trump rushing to return to the battlefield. He is hopeful that he will be granted the Republicans’ nomination, possibly out of a desire for revenge for what happened in the 2020 elections. This has left many Americans, regardless of their political affiliation, wondering if the Republican Party will accept Trump again. Going back to 2016, it is evident that Donald Trump was a new face to American politics, as he had never been involved in either local or national politics before. Americans knew him as a dealmaker and real estate mogul and accepted him, much to the chagrin of many traditional Republican leaders. Trump found favor with millions of Americans who viewed him as a way out of their current situation, believing he was the one to save the “WASP” – White, Protestant Anglo-Saxons. It is no surprise that there is strong opposition among the Republican base to Trump’s candidacy; however, what is striking and potentially dangerous is that Trump is still the front-runner among Republican candidates, as shown in recent opinion polls. Millions of Republicans still see him as the only one capable of making America strong and protecting it from the impending demographic change. Therefore, the question remains: Are there any Republicans who pose a threat to Trump’s chances of reelection to the White House? The first candidate to threaten President Trump in his upcoming battle is the young, bright-faced Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who has the greatest chance of winning if he decides to run for the presidency. However, the Republican scene has and will continue to shift significantly after Nikki Haley, the ambassador chosen by Trump to serve the United States at the United Nations, announced her intent to run in the upcoming presidential elections for the Republican Party. It may be a fateful coincidence, rather than an objective one, that her birthdate is January 20th – the day the elected US president enters the White House, which many may consider a good omen. Something is shifting in the Republican Party. Can Haley, an American of Asian descent born to immigrant parents from the Indian Sikh community, be the first Asian president of the United States and the first woman ever to occupy this position? It is certain that Nikki Haley’s candidacy may directly benefit Trump, a fact many political analysts overlook. The concept of the “melting pot” is slowly declining, and WASPs today have an underlying fear that they will soon be sacrificed, particularly within the next two decades, to immigrants from diverse backgrounds who have nothing to do with the first generations of European Puritans that sought to find a new Promised Land in the United States. Many statistics suggest that WASPs soon will make up 40% or less of the American population, increasing fears of electing a president of Asian descent, despite Haley’s clear stance against China. In his book on identity and human dignity, Francis Fukayama pauses to consider the growing rejection of “the other” as one of the most serious obstacles facing America’s future. He warns that if this rejection remains quiet and ideological, it could turn into violent chaos. In most recent polls, Haley received only 1% of the GOP voters’ support, and it is unclear how Trump and the other WASP choir members will respond. The only clear beneficiary of Haley’s candidacy is Trump, although DeSantis remains a potential threat as well. –Emil Amin (translated by Asaf Zilberfarb)
