Nikki Haley walks fine line on gender in 2024 GOP primary

The former South Carolina governor, like other high-profile female politicians, has long had to weigh how much to talk about being a woman. It is an especially challenging task in the GOP, where voters are sometimes less interested in hearing about topics related to race and gender.

At an event here Wednesday evening billed as a “Women for Nikki" town hall in the state that starts the GOP nomination balloting on Jan. 15, it was mostly those introducing Haley, instead of the candidate herself, who highlighted her gender.

“Maybe it’s time we send a woman to the White House," said Jim von Maur, chief executive of a department store chain based here that provided warehouse space for the event.

“Ladies, we are the most important voting bloc," said Rachel Geilenfeld, the co-chair of Women for Nikki in Iowa, as she urged women to back her candidate.

Haley referenced the gender split in the GOP field only obliquely, saying she planned to talk more about “the fellas" because they have been lying about her in campaign ads. As she undertakes her long-shot primary challenge to former President Donald Trump, whom she served as United Nations ambassador, Haley picks her moments for when to mention her gender.

During her first rally as a candidate in February, Haley drew applause for saying: “May the best woman win." And in a video announcing her campaign, Haley said: “You should know this about me—I don’t put up with bullies. And when you kick back, it hurts them more if you are wearing heels."

Part of her quest is to try to win back suburban women, a general election demographic that has moved away from the GOP during Trump’s tenure as the party’s dominant figure. Her strength among suburban and independent voters is one reason she leads other Republican presidential candidates in hypothetical matchups against President Biden. The latest Wall Street Journal poll had her beating him by 17 percentage points.

Linnea Stockwell, a financial-services industry manager who attended a recent Haley event in a Des Moines suburb, said the candidate’s hawkish foreign-policy views are a top reason she is considering supporting her. But Stockwell said she also thinks a woman and mother would bring unique strengths to the Oval Office.

“It’s important to see women step up," she said. “Being a woman comes with a lot of different roles and titles and she’s doing all of them well, while also being real."

Kevin Laraia, a salesman for a business consulting firm who attended the same event in suburban Des Moines, said Haley’s gender is a plus.

“Her political experience is great and I think she’s a common-sense person," he said. “I also think it’s about time for a woman."

The Journal’s poll showed Trump leading Haley 61% to 14% among Republican women. That is virtually identical to the advantage he has over her with Republican men.

“It seems to me that among the Democrats, in general, they are more interested in talking about how we are different and I think Republicans are more interested in talking about how we are the same," said Barbara Hames-Bryant, president of the Iowa Federation of Republican Women. “She has not made a big deal out of her gender, but her competitors sure have."

Haley’s high heels didn’t come up in this month’s primary debate in Alabama—as they have in past candidate face-offs this fall—but her gender was noted by others.

“Having two X chromosomes does not immunize you from criticism," entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy said as part of an attack against Haley. Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, came to her defense and told Ramaswamy to knock it off before calling Haley a “smart, accomplished woman."

Her approach is a contrast with that of Democrat Hillary Clinton, who spoke explicitly of the importance of shattering the political glass ceiling for women in both her 2008 and 2016 presidential bids. Clinton’s invocation of gender might have helped her win the 2016 Democratic nomination, but it isn’t clear whether it helped her in a failed general election bid against Trump.

Haley is the fifth major female candidate to run for the White House as a Republican, according to the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University. Carly Fiorina, a former Hewlett Packard chief executive, was the most recent before Haley, in 2016.

Just days after Haley entered the race in February, her gender was highlighted when CNN anchor Don Lemon called her, at age 51, “past her prime." Haley used the put-down as a fundraising tool and Lemon later lost his job.

At a recent event in Iowa, Haley repeated the familiar political refrain, “We have to raise strong girls," adding a criticism of some transgender policies.

“Strong girls become strong women," she said. “Strong women become strong leaders. And none of that happens if you have biological boys playing in girls’ sports. We’ve got to put an end to that."

Haley is part of a generation that has seen women increasingly elected as governors, giving them the executive office experience often considered important for a White House bid. A record number—12—were elected as governors in 2022, eight Democrats and four Republicans.

In a recent interview, Haley spoke of an incident shortly after she graduated from college when she was working as an accounting supervisor. About a month into the job, she said, she was attending a meeting of executives where she was the only woman and the chief financial officer asked her to fetch a cup of coffee for the chief executive officer.

“However I handled it was going to reflect how they treated me going forward," she said. “I said, ‘Absolutely.’ And I leaned to the phone in the middle of the desk and called my assistant, and I said, ‘Emily, could you please get Paul a cup of coffee?’ They never asked me to do that again."

Allies of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is competing with Haley to be the sole alternative to Trump in the primary, have tried to tie Haley to Clinton, a deeply unpopular figure within the Republican base.

In a recent television ad that has been heavily criticized by fact-checkers, the Fight Right super PAC uses an out-of-context quote from Haley where she says Clinton was the reason she first ran for office. In more recent history, Haley often lists Margaret Thatcher, the deceased former British prime minister known as the “Iron Lady," as a role model.

As Haley travels the country, her campaign bubble includes a large number of women. Her campaign manager, Betsy Ankeny, and many of her senior aides are women.

Ankeny dismissed the notion that women aren’t rallying to her candidate. “I absolutely think that there is enthusiasm from women across the country for Nikki’s candidacy, and I think you see that in the momentum she has," she said.

In the interview, Haley said she only talks about her heels because others do, pointing to the third primary debate, when Ramaswamy brought them up. But that isn’t always the case.

She mentioned them in her campaign announcement speech and has joked about them as a potential weapon in speeches for more than a decade. At the debate in Miami, Haley corrected Ramaswamy for underestimating the height of her heels.

“I was being serious," she said in the interview. “It was offensive. He was calling them 3-inch heels. I mean, the bigger the threat, the higher the heels, always."

Write to John McCormick at mccormick.john@wsj.com