Mike Pompeo accuses Nikki Haley of trying to snatch vice president role, book claims

Ex-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is taking swings at numerous former Trump administration officials as the 2024 GOP primary nears and the Republican Party prepares for an all-out battle over who will have the honour of running against Joe Biden.

His new book, Never Give an Inch: Fighting for the America I Love, contains several passages in which Mr Pompeo disparages his former colleagues including Nikki Haley, Donald Trump’s former ambassador to the United Nations. Excerpts of the book were obtained by The Guardian ahead of its publication next week.

The former secretary of state accuses his onetime coworker at the State Department of trying to supplant Vice President Mike Pence on the 2020 reelection ticket, with the supposed backing of White House advisers Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump. He further goes on to say that she “abandoned” Donald Trump when she resigned in 2018, and likened it to her resignation as governor of South Carolina in 2017 – or, as Mr Pompeo refers to it, what she did to “the great people of South Carolina”.

“She has described her role as going toe-to-toe with tyrants,” he wrote, according to The Guardian. “If so, then why would she quit such an important job at such an important time?”

It’s a stunning series of accusations against someone with whom Mr Pompeo could very well be sharing a debate stage in 2024, especially if Mr Trump is forced to back out of the contest thanks to a slew of criminal and civil investigations that now surround him and his closest allies.

The Independent has reached out to Ms Haley for comment on her former colleague’s denunciations.

The ex-ambassador was hardly the only former Trump official to receive a verbal lashing from Mike Pompeo in the book. John Bolton, Mr Trump’s ex-national security adviser who would later go one to become a vocal critic of the president, was also a target of Mr Pompeo’s fury. Similar to Ms Haley, Mr Bolton has floated the possibility of seeking the GOP nomination in 2024.

Mr Pompeo rips Mr Bolton as a “scumbag loser” in his writings about the former White House adviser, and even claims that Mr Bolton’s own memoir contained information that was classified upon its publication. The Justice Department did indeed investigate Mr Bolton to determine if his book had contained such information, but that inquiry was closed in 2021.

Nevertheless, Mr Pompeo asserts that the former national security adviser should “be in jail, for spilling classified information”, and adds that he hopes to testify at the latter’s trial.

The Independent has reached out to Mr Bolton for comment.

He is known to be strongly considering a 2024 run, including to the point of running digital ads to reach potential supporters in key early primary states. He has also said in an interview that Donald Trump’s decision to run (which was announced late last year) would not affect his own decision, though it would be hard to see what lane Mr Pompeo could find in a hypothetical matchup between himself and Donald Trump as well as other high-profile GOP leaders known to be considering bids, like Florida’s Ron DeSantis.