Defying Trump, Nikki Haley seeks border deal “fix now”

Joining issue with Donald Trump, rival Indian American Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley urged Congress to amend a bipartisan border deal unveiled by Senate negotiators Sunday, urging lawmakers that “we need this fix now.”

“They need to stay there. They need to figure this out. They need to adjust it, amend it in any way that they can, and they should not leave DC until they get us a border bill,” Haley told Fox News on Monday. “And no, we are not waiting until the general election to do this.”

A bipartisan group of senators released their deal to tackle immigration at the US southern border Sunday evening, immediately receiving blowback from top House Republicans and allies of the former President.

READ: Nikki Haley mocks Trump on “Saturday Night Live” (February 5, 2024)

Republican presidential front runner Trump railed against the bill on Monday, calling it “a great gift to the Democrats, and a Death Wish for The Republican Party.”

Haley told Fox News one of the aspects she liked about the bill was the changes it would make to the asylum claim process, which would increase the standard for such claims by requiring that asylum-seekers have a “reasonable possibility” of being persecuted or tortured in their country.

READ: Nikki Haley blasts Trump for questioning her eligibility (January 29, 2024)

But Haley explained she did not like some aspects of the bill, including that the legislation would not require asylum-seekers to be in Mexico while their claims were being processed and that it would set a threshold of 5,000 daily crossings that would have to be reached before migrants without appointments could be turned away at the border.

“We have a completely open border. America’s acting like it’s Sep 10, and we better remember what Sep 12 felt like, ’cause it only takes one person to cross that border to create a 9/11 moment,” Haley said, claiming Trump wanted to wait until after the general election to address the border.

READ: Nikki Haley takes Halloween-themed swipe at Donald Trump (February 2, 2024)

Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has vowed to hold a procedural vote to advance the package Wednesday, though it’s unclear if the legislation has the necessary 60 votes to clear the chamber.

President Joe Biden praised the agreement in a Sunday night statement that called on Congress to send it to his desk: “If you believe, as I do, that we must secure the border now, doing nothing is not an option,” Biden said.

Meanwhile, Haley has requested Secret Service protection following an increase in threats, according to a campaign spokeswoman.

The request also comes after so-called “swatting” attacks – when people make false reports to law enforcement with the intent of provoking an emergency police response – targeting her South Carolina home.

The former South Carolina governor recently told NBC’s “Meet the Press” that one of those incidents took place while she was away but her elderly parents were at home.

“The last thing you want is to see multiple law enforcement officials with guns drawn pointing at my parents…it is an awful situation,” she said at the time.

Haley also told NBC that she’d “had threats made.”

While campaigning in South Carolina on Monday, Haley told the Wall Street Journal that the campaign has had “multiple issues” that led to the request for Secret Service protection.

Haley has been campaigning heavily in her home state ahead of its Republican primary on Feb 24.