Nikki Haley, an Indian-American politician, has announced her candidacy for president of the United States. She is the first Republican to challenge former U.S. President Donald Trump in his 2024 bid for the White House.
She is also the third Indian-American to have launched a presidential bid, after Bobby Jindal in 2016 and Kamala Harris in 2020. Haley is the second woman of colour to ever seek the Republican Party’s nomination for the White House. She is the two-term Governor of South Carolina and the former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations.
Haley was born Nimrata Nikki Randhawa in Bamberg, South Carolina in 1972. Her Sikh parents Ajit Singh Randhawa and Raj Kaur Randhawa had emigrated from Punjab to Canada and then to the U.S. in the 1960s. She was raised as a Sikh but converted to Christianity after her marriage to Michael Haley in 1996.
At 39, she was the youngest governor in the U.S. when she took office in January 2011. Haley made history as South Carolina’s first female governor. She was also the state’s first Indian-American governor and would go on to serve for two terms.
The next U.S. presidential election is scheduled to be held on November 5, 2024. But before entering the presidential ballot, Haley has to win the Republican Party’s presidential primary which will start in January next year.
Voiceover and Production: Abhinaya Sriram
