The Untold Truth Of Nikki Haley

It's no secret Nikki Haley has a reputation for breaking down political barriers. She made history in 2010 when she was elected as the first female governor of South Carolina, and in 2017, she drew national attention again when President Donald Trump gave her the job of U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, making her the administration's first female appointment. 

Needless to say, Haley's knack for firsts (and controversy) has many people asking questions about her personal life and background. So, what's the story behind this outspoken Republican? Let's find out.

At a time when immigration reform is front and center in the Trump administration, Haley's background is particularly compelling. Her parents, Ajit Singh and Raj Kaur Randhawa, are immigrants who built a multi-million dollar empire in America. Of course, they didn't just stumble into their success. Before settling in the United States, the couple emigrated from India to Canada so Singh could pursue his Ph.D. Upon completing the program in 1969, Singh was offered the opportunity to teach biology at a college in South Carolina. Although he was excited about the gig, money was tight. Haley's sister, Simran Singh, claimed in a blog post that her parents moved to South Carolina with a meager "eight dollars in their pocket." 

Singh and Randhawa transformed their meager funds into a booming clothing company called Exotica International. After Haley graduated from Clemson University with a degree in accounting, she became the chief financial officer of her family's business. Although some might be blown away by her parents' triumphs, Haley isn't surprised one bit. "They loved the fact that only in America, we could be as successful as we wanted to be and nothing would stand in our way," she said (via Politico). "My parents started a business out of the living room of our home and, 30-plus years later, it was a multimillion dollar company."

Although Nikki Haley puts on a strong front, she has experienced plenty of hardships in her life. She opened up about some of these vulnerable and painful moments in a 2013 speech about reducing child abuse in South Carolina. Haley told the audience that she was physically abused as a child. The alleged abuse began after Haley's mother asked two neighbors to babysit her during work hours. "I never wanted to go," Haley recalled (via The State). "But she didn't know quite what it was and didn't think anything of it."

The warning signs became clear when Haley returned home one day with "a lot of bruises and a lot of issues," she recalled. Those neighbors "packed up and left" before they could be brought to justice, Haley wrote in her 2012 book, Can't Is Not an Option: My American Story. To this day, she said she can't walk by the couple's home without feeling ill. "Years later, when I walked by the trailer, I would still get a sick feeling in my stomach," she wrote. 

As an Indian American, Haley has experienced racism throughout her life, even as a child. According to a 2011 interview in The Atlantic, a 4-year-old Haley and her 8-year-old sister were kicked out of a beauty pageant in their hometown because the judges "were baffled over what to do with the two Indian American girls." The pageant typically crowned one white and one African American winner, the magazine reported. "At intermission, they called all the contestants on the stage: white girls on one side, black girls on the other, with the Haley sisters standing alone in the middle. The judges then announced that they had to disqualify the sisters, and handed each of them crayons and a coloring book. Before ushering them off the stage, they let Nikki sing the song she had prepared, 'This Land Is Your Land.'"

Haley confronted bigotry again in 2004 when she ran for a seat in the South Carolina House of Representatives against Republican incumbent Larry Koon. During the bitter campaign, fliers were distributed that allegedly referred to Haley as an "Indian female/Buddhist/housekeeper," reported Vogue.

When you're in the public eye, it's a given there will be things you don't like written or said about you. Of course, some people deal with notoriety better than others. In Nikki Haley's case, her ability to rise above the fray was tested in September 2011, following the publication of an article questioning her July 2011 trip to Europe. The article's author, a then 25-year-old reporter named Renee Dudley, accused Haley of misusing "more than $127,000" of taxpayer money to enjoy "five-star hotels and sip cocktails at the Paris Ritz," according to The Post and Courier. Essentially, Dudley insinuated that Haley misled South Carolinians about the intended purpose of the trip, which was supposedly to bring jobs to the state. 

Haley wasn't thrilled with Dudley's work. "All I will tell you is, God bless that little girl at The Post and Courier," she said during an appearance on Laura Ingraham's radio show (via HuffPost). "Her job is to create conflict, my job is to create jobs." Haley later apologized, sort of. "The story painted a grossly inaccurate picture and was unprofessionally done, but my 'little girl' comment was inappropriate and I regret that," she said in a statement (via The Post and Courier). "Everyone can have a bad day. I'll forgive her bad story, if she'll forgive my poor choice of words."

Nikki Haley has suffered through numerous attacks on her personal life over the years, but in January 2018, she faced one of the most difficult rumors of her political career following the publication of Michael Wolff's Fire and Fury. 

In interviews to promote the book, Wolff repeatedly drew attention to a particular passage about Haley allegedly spending lots of "private time" with Trump on Air Force One. "She had become a particular focus of Trump's attention, and he of hers," he wrote in the book. Although Wolff never claimed Haley and Trump were having an affair, people strongly suspect that the author insinuated it during an appearance on HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher. When Maher asked Wolff who Trump is allegedly cheating with, Wolff responded: "You just have to read between the lines ... You'll know it. Now that I've told you, when you hit that paragraph, you're gonna say, 'Bingo.'"

Haley shot down that gossip during an appearance on Politico's podcast, "Women Rule." "It is absolutely not true," she said. "...I've noticed that if you speak your mind and you're strong about it and you say what you believe, there is a small percentage of people that resent that. And the way they deal with it is to try and throw arrows — lies or not — to diminish you."