'Globalist ... Grumpy old men:' Donald Trump, Nikki Haley trade insults in S.C. campaign
Two weeks before the pivotal South Carolina Republican primary, former president Donald Trump and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley spent Saturday trading insults at Palmetto State campaign events.
While Trump denounced Haley as a "globalist" who is seeking votes from non-Republicans, Haley said Trump is too old and too chaotic to win a general election against Democrats.
"Nikki (Haley) may have started her career in South Carolina ... but she is now 100 percent the candidate of Wall Street and the war machine," Trump said during a rally at Coastal Carolina University in Conway, near Myrtle Beach.
Haley, a former United Nations ambassador for Trump as well as governor of South Carolina, conducted a bus tour of the state and had her staff hand out a prototype of a mental competency test that should be applied to Trump.
As her bus rolled into Newberry, S.C., Haley posted on the social media site X, formerly Twitter: "The Beast of the Southeast is here and ready to roll! Join us…let’s see if Donald Trump can keep up!"
The South Carolina primary is Feb. 24
The candidates are expected to keep up the back-and-forth heading into the South Carolina Republican Party primary on Feb. 24.
During his rally at Coastal Carolina, Trump described Haley - his former appointee - as "the candidate of globalists and warmers," a candidate funded by "big donors and special interests" who favor free trade and lax immigration rules.
"There isn't anything nice about her," Trump said of his opponent.
In addition to attacking Haley, Trump again criticized the decision by a special counsel not to charge Biden for taking classified information when he left the vice president's office in 2017.
Trump again called for dismissal of his own prosecution for mishandling classified information, but there are differences in the cases.
Trump is also accused of defying grand jury subpoenas for his documents, while Biden cooperated with the investigation of Robert Hur.
Trump also noted that Special Counsel said Biden should not be tried in part because he is has a faulty memory.
Biden and allies said Hur distorted the president's testimony and smeared him unfairly.
Haley hits Trump (and Biden) over mental competency
During her bus tour, Haley also stressed questions about the mental fitness of Biden - and of Trump.
“Why do we have to have someone in their 80s run for office?” Haley said during her bus stop at Newberry. "Why can’t they let go of their power?”
At the prompting of an audience member, Haley said: "They are grumpy old men."
The two campaigns also jousted on social media.
In another X post, Haley hit Trump for not visiting South Carolina more times. "Donald, if you change your mind about Mar-a-Lago, South Carolina would be a great place to retire in the next few months!"
The proposed mental competency test - a flier that said, "Can you pass a mental competency test? Can Joe Biden? Can Donald Trump?" - irked members of the Trump campaign.
On X, Trump senior campaign adviser Jason Miller said: "This is the kind of thing that gets shoved back in her staff’s faces when they sit down for WH, RNC or Hill job interviews in the future."
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'Globalist; Grumpy:' Donald Trump, Nikki Haley trade insults in S.C.
