Why Nikki Haley is already looking beyond the South Carolina primary

In presidential politics, there’s an unwritten rule that losing in your home state should be avoided at all costs. However, as former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley faces off against former President Donald Trump in South Carolina this weekend, polls suggest Haley, the state's former governor, may need to prove herself the exception to that rule if her campaign is to continue. Yahoo News Chief National Correspondent Jon Ward explains why Haley’s announcement that she has no plans to withdraw from the race ahead of her home state’s primary is less surprising than you might think.

Video Transcript

JOHN WARD: The normal logic in politics is that you try to avoid losing in your home state. And based on the polling, South Carolina has always been an uphill battle for Haley. So that's a clear precedent that Haley will be breaking from if she stays in the race after South Carolina, if she does lose it. I think a lot of people are probably surprised that Haley is sticking to her guns in this race, because for a lot of her political career, Nikki Haley's reputation has been that she's an opportunist.

So she's not an ideologue. She's not a Liz Cheney, who's opposing Trump based on concern for the constitution or concern for democracy. And yet, she's saying she's going to fight to the end. She's trying to argue to other Republicans and to voters, look, Trump is a flawed candidate. And if we nominate him, we're risking handing the presidency to the Democrats for another four years. So it is surprising. But the argument that she's making to carry out this strategy is sort of in line with what her reputation has been.

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