Politics

CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) — Republican Nikki Haley plans to formally announce her 2024 presidential campaign on Wednesday, betting that her boundary-breaking career as a woman and person of color who governed in the heart of the South before representing the U.S. on the world stage can overcome entrenched support for her onetime boss, former President Donald Trump.

Haley, a former South Carolina governor and U.N. ambassador, released a video on Tuesday declaring her candidacy. The Wednesday event in the historic coastal city of Charleston marks the first time she’ll appear in public as a declared White House hopeful. It could also amount to a show of strength in her home state, which holds a critical early primary that influences the fate of the GOP nomination.

The announcement makes Haley the first major Republican to officially challenge Trump, but she will hardly be the last. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former Vice President Mike Pence and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo are among those expected to launch campaigns in the coming months. Haley’s fellow South Carolinian Sen. Tim Scott is also weighing a White House bid.

As the presidential primary season comes into focus, the biggest question is whether anyone in the field will be able to replace Trump at the top of a party that he transformed with his first campaign in 2016. He remains popular with a wide swath of voters who will have significant sway in the primary, though some party officials have blamed him for the GOP’s lackluster performance in last year’s midterms. As it did in 2016, a crowded field could work to Trump’s advantage, allowing him to march to the nomination while his opponents divide support among themselves.

In her announcement video, the 51-year-old Haley made no direct reference to the 76-year-old former president, instead saying it’s “time for a new generation of leadership.”

There appears to be openness among Republicans for fresh faces, according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. In an open-ended question asking Republicans to choose who they want to lead their party, a majority of Republicans didn’t choose either Trump or DeSantis, considered the former president’s top rival. But they also didn’t have a clear alternative in mind.

Eleven other politicians, including Haley, were named by just 1% of Republicans as their preferred leader.

Haley is likely to distinguish herself in the GOP field in part by emphasizing her biography. In the video released on Tuesday, she spoke of growing up in a small South Carolina town as the daughter of Indian immigrants who experienced racist taunts. Despite growing up feeling “different,” Haley insisted that America is not a racist country.

That argument could resonate among Republican voters as many in the party push efforts to block or change the way the subject of systemic racism is taught in schools and universities.

Haley also addressed Republicans with some tough talk, saying in the video that the party has lost the popular vote in seven of the last eight presidential elections and that should prompt a new approach. She highlighted her two successful elections as South Carolina governor, starting with the 2010 victory that made her the state’s first female and minority governor — along with the nation’s youngest, at 38.

She noted — at least in part — the defining moment of her governorship: the 2015 murders of nine Black parishioners in a Charleston church by a self-avowed white supremacist who had been pictured holding Confederate flags.

For years, Haley had resisted calls to remove the Confederate flag from the Statehouse grounds, even casting a rival’s push for its removal as a desperate stunt. But after the massacre and with the support of other leading Republicans, Haley advocated for legislation to remove the flag. It came down less than a month after the murders.

The video showed Haley appearing at the church but made no reference to her work to remove the flag.

And in the aftermath of the U.S. shooting down multiple aerial objects in recent weeks, including a suspected Chinese spy balloon off the South Carolina coast, Haley is likely to position herself as well versed in foreign policy. Her video included imagery of her serving as Trump’s ambassador to the U.N. with the warning that “China and Russia are on the march” and that they think America can be “bullied” and “kicked around.”

“You should know this about me,” Haley said. “I don’t put up with bullies. And when you kick back, it hurts them more if you’re wearing heels.”

Haley’s campaign is a reversal from two years ago, when she said she wouldn’t challenge Trump for president in 2024. But she changed her mind in recent months, citing the country’s economic troubles, among other things.

In a statement, Trump said he wished her “luck.”

“Even though Nikki Haley said, ‘I would never run against my President, he was a great President, the best President in my lifetime,’ I told her she should follow her heart and do what she wants to do,” Trump said. “I wish her luck!”

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Price reported from New York.

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LOS ANGELES (AP) — Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein, whose groundbreaking political career shattered gender barriers from San Francisco’s City Hall to the corridors of Capitol Hill, said Tuesday she won’t seek reelection in 2024.

The senator, who turns 90 in June, is the oldest member of Congress and has faced questions in recent years about her cognitive health and memory, though she has defended her effectiveness representing a state that is home to nearly 40 million people.

The announcement came after several prominent California Democrats, including U.S. Reps. Katie Porter and Adam Schiff, already had declared Senate campaigns. With Feinstein a now 30-year veteran of the Senate, there hasn’t been a wide open competition for her seat in decades.

Feinstein plans to remain in Congress through the end of her current term. Speaking to reporters in Washington on Tuesday, she said “there’s times for all things under the sun.”

“I think that will be the right time, towards the end of next year,” she said.

Feinstein is one of the Senate’s few remaining veterans of the so-called Year of the Woman, referring to several women who were elected to the male-dominated chamber during the 1992 election. But even before she moved to Washington, Feinstein was one of the most prominent women in American politics.

She was the first woman to serve as president of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in the 1970s and the first female mayor of San Francisco. She ascended to that post after the November 1978 assassinations of then-Mayor George Moscone and City Supervisor Harvey Milk by a former supervisor, Dan White. Feinstein found Milk’s body.

In the Senate, she was the first woman to head the Senate Intelligence Committee and the first woman to serve as the Judiciary Committee’s top Democrat. She gained a reputation as a pragmatic centrist who left a mark on political battles over issues ranging from reproductive rights to environmental protection.

Feinstein is particularly closely associated with efforts to broaden gun restrictions. Early in her career, the Senate approved her amendment to ban manufacturing and sales of certain types of assault weapons as part of a crime bill that President Bill Clinton signed into law in 1994. The ban expired 10 years later and was never replaced, but it remained a trademark issue in a career that was molded by gun violence.

“Through force of will, she led the fight to get the assault weapons ban passed. Like so many who have been touched by gun violence, that victory was personal for her,” President Joe Biden said in a statement. “I’ve served with more U.S. senators than just about anyone. I can honestly say that Dianne Feinstein is one of the very best.”

She was also known for reaching out to Republicans to find middle ground. While that may have helped her notch legislative accomplishments in Washington, it chafed some in a Democratic Party that has moved increasingly to the left in recent years.

That frustration was on display during her last reelection campaign in 2018. The California Democratic Party endorsed a liberal rival for the seat over her, with some delegates complaining Feinstein had been in Washington too long and hadn’t stood strong enough for immigrants.

She infuriated liberals in 2020 when she closed out confirmation hearings for Justice Amy Coney Barrett with an embrace of Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Lindsey Graham, a Republican, and a public thanks to him for a job well done.

Liberal advocacy groups that had fiercely opposed Barrett’s nomination to replace the late liberal icon Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg were furious and called for her to step down from the committee leadership. A month later, she announced she would remain on the Judiciary Committee but step down as the top Democrat.

But such tension was forgotten on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, where Democrats praised Feinstein’s career. At a closed door lunch of Democratic senators, the lawmakers broke into rounds of applause for Feinstein after Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer announced her decision.

“She’s a legend,” Schumer later told reporters. “A legend in California as the first woman senator; a legend in this Senate. She was the leader on so many different issues, assault weapons, environment, women’s rights, and so much else. She approached everything studiously and carefully.”

At the lunch, Feinstein told her colleagues how hard her husband’s death was and that she would be ready to step away from public life after finishing this term, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., said afterward. Feinstein’s husband, Richard Blum, died last year.

“Senator Feinstein made history,” said Warren. “She changed this country and she was a woman on the front lines in fights, like access to assault weapons, and national security and intelligence.”

Warren added: “Every other woman in public office owes a special debt to Dianne Feinstein.”

In her home state, where Feinstein is the longest serving U.S. senator, she was lionized for her historic tenure in public service.

Democratic U.S. Rep. Nancy Pelosi, the former House speaker, called her San Francisco neighbor “a titan” of the Senate who, among her accomplishments, steered billions of federal dollars to California for environmental protection. Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom called Feinstein a mentor and credited her with “blazing a trail for a new generation of female lawmakers.”

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Associated Press writers Lisa Mascaro and Stephen Groves in Washington contributed.

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COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — A battle for political control of the Ohio House has laid bare the risks the Republican Party faces as factions of its legislative supermajority square off more over tactics and the willingness to thwart long held institutional norms than policy.

Six weeks ago, Republican Jason Stephens, a second-term representative from rural southern Ohio, scored a surprise bipartisan win for speaker over Rep. Derek Merrin. Since then, Stephens’ detractors have grabbed headline after headline for their maneuvers — even as a single piece of legislation is yet to be introduced. That includes the crucial and time-sensitive state budget.

And the clashes appear far from over. With Stephens preparing finally to unveil Republicans’ session priorities Wednesday, a group of GOP lawmakers lined up against him — calling themselves “the Republican Majority Caucus” — have not ruled out suing him for control of the caucus campaign fund.

The faction wants a judge to clarify whether the House speaker and the head of the caucus need necessarily be the same person. While Ohio law does not seem to require it, Stephens has asserted he is both.

“I’m the speaker of the House, the head of the Republican caucus, and I’m excited for us to get ready and move forward,” Stephens told reporters after successfully passing House rules Jan. 24 during a typically boring procedural session-turned-raucous.

“We now have our House in order,” he declared, even as Merrin backers stood nearby alleging constitutional and rules violations. Those included that Stephens had failed to let them speak on the floor — a time-honored tool of speakers everywhere — and begun the session at 2:05 p.m. rather than 2 p.m.

It’s all part of a growing line of attacks against Stephens and the Republican representatives who supported him that is roiling lawmaking in a state where the GOP rules every branch of state government and twice chose Republican Donald Trump for president by wide margins.

The fight has included a declared takeover of the GOP caucus by Merrin’s camp, a call for Stephens’ resignation, censure of Stephens and his GOP supporters by the Ohio Republican Party’s central committee and attack ads by one of several same-party PACs that are starting now to fight their reelections.

“There’s a lot of people right now who don’t feel like they have a voice, because the Democrats elected the speaker of the House,” Merrin told reporters the day he declared himself in charge of the caucus and its fundraising operation, despite Stephens’ election. The Associated Press has not yet received records on that closed-door vote in response to its requests.

Fracturing is a known risk of supermajority rule.

Aristotle Hutras, who served as executive secretary to the late Democratic Ohio House Speaker Vernal Riffe, who led the chamber from 1975 to 1995, recalled the legendary Ohio politician worrying aloud after his party won 62 of 99 seats in 1982: “It might be too many, boys.” Republicans this year have 67.

“Even Vern Riffe, historically the longest serving speaker in Ohio history, knew it could be difficult governing with too much of a majority,” said Hutras, who was a young caucus staffer in 1982. “When there are too many in a caucus, every man is a king.”

Hutras said Riffe resolved conflict quickly by getting straight to work.

Merrin’s group believes math is on their side. Forty-three of 67 House Republicans supported him for speaker, a clear majority of the caucus. But 22 broke off and supported Stephens, defying results of an informal speaker vote in November and teaming with all 32 House Democrats.

Clearly perplexed, angry and stung, the Merrin camp went on the attack. Though Merrin is term-limited in two years, many of his allies are new lawmakers whose ability to make their marks could depend on caucus financial support.

They asked the state party’s central committee to condemn Stephens and those who voted for him, including withholding future party endorsements and campaign cash. The panel didn’t go quite that far, but they did vote to censure the 22 lawmakers — as they had after then-U.S. Rep. Anthony Gonzalez voted in favor of Trump’s impeachment.

Their resolution cast Democrats as the enemy, with a “dangerous and perverse” agenda that Stephens and the others had now prevented Republicans from blocking.

Targeted lawmakers pushed back. State Rep. Bill Seitz, a long-serving Cincinnati Republican, said his record as a conservative was clear. State Rep. Sara Carruthers chided Merrin in a Dayton Daily News interview, calling him a crybaby who couldn’t stand being outmaneuvered.

State Rep. Jon Cross quipped to the USA Today Network’s Ohio bureau, “What you’re telling me is I’m a Republican that voted for a Republican speaker and the state Republican party is censuring me? Sounds like the dipsh–s are running the insane asylum.”

The Ironton Tribune, located in the seat of the county where Stephens is a former commissioner and auditor, called the censure “juvenile” and “politics at its worst.”

“(T)here seems to be no interest in turning down the outlandish rhetoric and acting like the adults in the room,” they wrote.

The paper called on Republican Gov. Mike DeWine to speak out and urge the party to “move toward actually getting things done in Columbus.”

DeWine, an establishment Republican whose support for Trump has been tepid, has faced his own share of run-ins with the state central committee — where opponents of his aggressive early response to the coronavirus have grown in their numbers. He said he was staying out of it.

His budget bill, a $57.5 billion blueprint for state spending over the two years beginning July 1, is among House bills that are yet to materialize — though some committee activity has begun on the proposal.

Stephens’ and Merrin’s differences appear largely to surround stylistic decisions, including how quickly a measure to the ballot that would make it harder to amend Ohio’s constitution should be pushed and whether to fully eliminate Ohio’s income tax, for example.

A key exception is with regard to unions. Stephens questions a so-called “backpack bill” that would extend Ohio’s vouchers to every schoolchild, including those attending private schools, and appears to have rejected bringing an anti-union “right to work” bill this session, which had been a Merrin priority.

Groups touting parents’ rights, a burgeoning Republican priority nationally, have used union donations to try to link Stephens and his leadership team to former Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder, who’s on trial for corruption in Cincinnati. They cast the group as in the pocket of “Big Labor,” including the same teachers’ unions that supported Householder and have opposed the backpack bill.

“Conservatives in Ohio are aghast at the backroom deal-making that led to the speakership of Jason Stephens,” said former U.S. Senate candidate and Ohio Strong Action PAC Chair Mike Gibbons. “Because we have seen time and again, these deals end up sacrificing principled conservative policy.”

He said he represents a group of conservative leaders, and groups that have a clear agenda. They are pushing to retire Ohio’s income tax and for a suite of bills that died last session, including the backpack bill, a ban on transgender student-athletes in girls sports and one prohibiting gender affirming surgeries to minors.

They also back a ballot proposal that would raise the threshold for changing Ohio’s constitution from 50% to 60%. That idea arose suddenly during last year’s lameduck session, just as issues guaranteeing abortion rights, reforming redistricting and legalizing recreational marijuana were being contemplated. Then-Speaker Bob Cupp, also a Republican, declined to bring the issue to the floor for a lack of votes. Under Stephens, the House missed a Feb. 1 cutoff for getting it on the spring ballot.

Gibbons said his coalition will be bringing its issues “straight to the voters of Ohio, making the case” in the coming weeks.

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Samantha Hendrickson is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

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ATLANTA (AP) — A Georgia judge on Monday ordered the partial release later this week of a report by a special grand jury that investigated efforts by former President Donald Trump and his allies to overturn his 2020 election loss.

The report’s introduction and conclusion, as well as a section in which the grand jurors expressed concerns that some witnesses may have lied under oath, will be released on Thursday, said Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney.

Any recommendations on who should or should not be prosecuted will remain secret for now to protect their due process rights, McBurney wrote.

McBurney’s order came three weeks after hearing arguments from prosecutors, who urged the report be kept secret until they decide on charges, and a coalition of media organizations, which pressed for its release.

The release is a significant development in one of several cases that threaten legal jeopardy for the former president as he ramps up a 2024 White House campaign. The special grand jury spent about seven months hearing testimony from witnesses including high-profile Trump allies, such as attorney Rudy Giuliani and Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, and high-ranking Georgia officials, such as Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and Gov. Brian Kemp.

McBurney wrote that the report includes recommendations for Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, including “a roster of who should (or should not) be indicted, and for what, in relation to the conduct (and aftermath) of the 2020 general election in Georgia.” The special grand jury did not have the power to issue indictments, and it will ultimately be up to Willis to decide whether to seek indictments from a regular grand jury.

The special grand jury’s final report was requested by Willis and is meant to inform her investigative decision-making process, McBurney wrote, adding that the panel’s investigation was largely controlled by the district attorney and her team and was “a one-sided exploration.”

There was “very limited due process” for people for whom the grand jurors recommended charges, McBurney wrote. Some may not have had the opportunity to appear before the panel, and those who did appear did not have the right to have their lawyers present or to offer any rebuttal.

For that reason, the judge concluded, it is not appropriate to release the full report at this time.

It is not clear if or when Willis will present the case to a regular grand jury with the purpose of getting one or more indictments. At a Jan. 24 hearing, she said decisions are “imminent” but did not elaborate.

Trump told The Associated Press last month that he did “absolutely nothing wrong.” He said he felt “very confident” that he wouldn’t be indicted.

At the January hearing, Willis had argued against the immediate release of the report, saying it could violate the rights of potential defendants and negatively affect the ability to prosecute those who may be charged with crimes.

“We want to make sure that everyone is treated fairly and we think for future defendants to be treated fairly, it is not appropriate at this time to have this report released,” Willis said during the hearing.

A group of news organizations, including the AP, argued in favor of releasing the report immediately in full, saying that public interest in the report is “extraordinary.”

“The discomfort of the prosecuting authority in disclosing court records isn’t enough to make them sealed,” said attorney Tom Clyde, representing the media. “It has to be significant, identifiable evidence that’s going to cause a problem.”

Willis said in an emailed statement Monday that she believes McBurney’s order is “legally sound and consistent with my request” and that she has no plans to appeal. Clyde declined to comment.

Willis and her team began investigating two years ago, shortly after the release of a recording of a Jan. 2, 2021, phone call between Trump and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. In that conversation, the then-president suggested that Raffensperger, a fellow Republican, could “find” the votes needed to overturn Trump’s narrow election loss in the state to Biden, a Democrat.

“All I want to do is this: I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have,” Trump said on the call.

Since then, the investigation’s scope has broadened considerably. The special grand jury operated behind closed doors, as required by law, but public court filings and hearings related to its work provided a window into some of the topics Willis was exploring. Those included:

— Phone calls by Trump and others to Georgia officials in the wake of the 2020 election.

— A group of 16 Georgia Republicans who signed a certificate in December 2020 falsely stating that Trump had won the state and that they were the state’s “duly elected and qualified” electors.

— False allegations of election fraud made during meetings of state legislators at the Georgia Capitol in December 2020.

— The copying of data and software from election equipment in rural Coffee County by a computer forensics team hired by Trump allies.

— Alleged attempts to pressure Fulton County elections worker Ruby Freeman into falsely confessing to election fraud.

— The abrupt resignation of the U.S. attorney in Atlanta in January 2021.

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DENVER (AP) — Democrat Adam Frisch, who nearly unseated Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert in Colorado’s 3rd Congressional District in last year’s midterm elections, announced Tuesday he will run against her again in 2024.

Frisch, a former city council member from the posh skiing town of Aspen, said in a news release that his surprisingly strong showing revealed that “Boebert is weak and will be defeated.”

He fell short of Boebert by 546 votes in November’s election, which had to go to a recount because of the close margin. The thin margin stirred discussion of the far-right Republican’s electoral vulnerability after pollsters and pundits thought she was a lock for reelection in the district, which covers the largely rural, conservative-leaning western half the state.

In a statement Tuesday, the congresswoman’s spokesperson Ben Stout said Boebert “looks forward to continuing to serve Colorado’s 3rd Congressional District, regardless of whoever runs against her.”

As a freshman lawmaker in the U.S. Capitol, Boebert built a national profile with a pugilistic political style. She most recently helped lead an obstinate group of Republicans who defied the party line and held up Rep. Kevin McCarthy’s rise to House speaker.

In the last election, Frisch targeted Boebert’s political style, dubbing it ‘angertainment,’ and ran as a Democrat on a largely conservative platform. Frisch, downplaying his party affiliation, often introduced himself as a ‘conservative businessman’ hoping to entice disaffected Republicans and build a bipartisan political coalition.

He touted using the private sector to work out kinks in health care, promoted some natural gas and oil production in the district and the nation, and supported the removal of Nancy Pelosi as speaker of the House in favor of “the next generation of leaders.”

“It was the honor of a lifetime building a coalition of Democrats, Republicans, and unaffiliated voters who rejected Boebert’s extremism with their vote in 2022,” Frisch said in a news release.

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Jesse Bedayn is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

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CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) — Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor and United Nations ambassador, announced her candidacy for president on Tuesday, becoming the first major challenger to former President Donald Trump for the 2024 Republican nomination.

The announcement, delivered in a video, marks an about-face for the ex-Trump Cabinet official, who said two years ago that she wouldn’t challenge her former boss for the White House in 2024. But she changed her mind in recent months, citing, among other things, the country’s economic troubles and the need for “generational change,” a nod to the 76-year-old Trump’s age.

“You should know this about me. I don’t put up with bullies. And when you kick back, it hurts them more if you’re wearing heels,” Haley said. “I’m Nikki Haley and I’m running for president.”

Haley, 51, is the first in a long line of Republicans who are expected to launch 2024 campaigns in the coming months. Among them are Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former Vice President Mike Pence, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina.

President Joe Biden has said he intends to seek reelection in 2024, stalling any jostling for the Democratic nomination.

Haley has regularly boasted about her track record of defying political expectations, saying, “I’ve never lost an election, and I’m not going to start now.”

If elected, Haley would be the nation’s first female president and the first U.S. president of Indian descent.

The daughter of Indian immigrants, Haley grew up enduring racist taunts in a small South Carolina town and has long referenced that impact on her personal and political arc.

She was an accountant when she launched her first bid for public office, defeating the longest-serving member of the South Carolina House in 2004. Three terms later and with little statewide recognition, Haley mounted a long-shot campaign for governor against a large field of experienced politicians.

She racked up a number of high-profile endorsements, including from the sitting South Carolina governor, Mark Sanford, and former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, a tea party darling.

With her 2010 victory, Haley became South Carolina’s first female and minority governor — and the nation’s youngest at 38. She earned a speaking slot at the 2012 Republican National Convention and gave the GOP response to President Barack Obama’s State of the Union in 2016.

The defining moment of Haley’s time as governor came after the 2015 murders of nine Black parishioners in a Charleston church by a self-avowed white supremacist who had been pictured holding Confederate flags.

For years, Haley had resisted calls to remove the Confederate flag from the Statehouse grounds, even casting a rival’s push for its removal as a desperate stunt. But after the massacre and with the support of other leading Republicans, Haley advocated for legislation to remove the flag. It came down less than a month after the murders.

In the 2016 presidential primary, Haley was an early supporter of Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, later shifting to Texas Sen. Ted Cruz. She ultimately said she would back the party’s nominee.

Shortly after Trump’s victory, he tapped Haley to be his U.N. ambassador, a move that rewarded Henry McMaster, the lieutenant governor who was the nation’s first statewide elected official to back Trump’s 2016 campaign. Haley’s departure cleared the way for McMaster to ascend to the governorship he had sought, since losing a bruising primary to none other than Haley seven years earlier.

With her Senate confirmation, Haley became the first Indian American in a presidential Cabinet.

During her nearly two-year tenure, Haley feuded at times with other administration officials while bolstering her own public persona.

One of her most memorable moments as U.N. ambassador came in 2018 after National Economic Council Director Larry Kudlow suggested Haley had suffered “momentary confusion” when she said Russian sanctions were imminent.

“With all due respect, I don’t get confused,” she responded. The first half of the quote became the title of her 2019 memoir.

Her departure from the job later that year fueled speculation that she would challenge Trump in 2020 or replace Pence on the ticket. She did neither.

Instead, Haley returned to South Carolina, where she bought a home on the wealthy enclave Kiawah Island, joined the board of aircraft manufacturer Boeing Co., launched herself on the speaking circuit and wrote two books, including the memoir.

After the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection, Haley initially cast doubts on Trump’s political future but said she wouldn’t challenge him in 2024. She later shifted course, citing inflation, crime, drugs and a “foreign policy in disarray” among her reasons for considering a White House campaign.

During his South Carolina stop last month, Trump told WIS-TV that Haley had called to seek his opinion on running for president. Trump pointed out her earlier pledge not to run against him but said he made no attempts to stop her.

“She said she would never run against me because I was the greatest president, but people change their opinions, and they change what’s in their hearts,” Trump said. “So I said, if your heart wants to do it, you have to go do it.”

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Meg Kinnard can be reached at http://twitter.com/MegKinnardAP

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NEW YORK (AP) — Former President Donald Trump has called for parents to elect and fire school principals. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has banned instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity in kindergarten through third grade. And Nikki Haley, the former U.N. ambassador who is expected to announce her White House candidacy this coming week, is among the Republicans taking aim at critical race theory.

In the opening stages of the 2024 GOP presidential race, the “parents’ rights” movement and lessons for schoolchildren are emerging as flashpoints.

The focus on issues related to racism, sexuality and education is a way for potential White House hopefuls to distinguish themselves in a crowded field, suggesting new and deeper ways for government to shape what happens in local classrooms.

But the effort has prompted criticism from LGBTQ advocacy groups, teachers’ unions, some parents and student activists and those worried about efforts to avoid lessons about systemic racism. Democrats have cast the efforts as race-baiting and improperly injecting politics into schools.

“What we’re seeing now, at least in this period, is much more focus on so-called ‘culture war’ issues,” said Jeffrey Henig, a professor of political science and education at Columbia University’s Teachers’ College.

Nowhere is the drive more visible than in Florida, where DeSantis has made an aggressive push against what he calls “woke” policies.

He gained national attention last year for signing the so-called Don’t Say Gay bill into law, barring instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity for young elementary schoolers, as well as material deemed not age-appropriate, which critics have argued is vague and could stifle classroom discussions. He also signed the “Stop WOKE” act in 2022, a law that restricted teaching that members of one race are inherently racist or should feel guilt about past actions by other people of the same race, among other things.

DeSantis has also extended his political influence to local school board races, endorsing candidates last year in what had been nonpartisan contests and flipping at least three boards from a liberal majority to a conservative majority.

More recently, he blocked high schools from teaching a new Advanced Placement course on African American studies, contending it was a violation of a state law and historically inaccurate. Beyond K-12 schools, he appointed six conservative trustees to the board of a small liberal arts college and he has announced plans to restrict state colleges from having programs on diversity, equity and inclusion, and critical race theory.

Critical race theory, a way of thinking about America’s history through the lens of racism, has been a top target. The theory, which DeSantis has called “pernicious,” was developed by scholars in the 1970s and 1980s in response to what they viewed as a lack of racial progress following the civil rights legislation of the 1960s. It centers on the idea that racism is systemic in the nation’s institutions, which function to maintain the dominance of white people in society.

As DeSantis emerges as the most formidable potential challenger to Trump, who has staked out his own positions on the same issues and recently released a nearly 5-minute video outlining what his campaign called a “Plan to Save American Education and Give Power Back to Parents.”

Declaring that “public schools have been taken over by the radical left maniacs,” and warning about “pink-haired communists teaching our kids,” Trump pledged, if elected president again, that he would cut federal money for any school or program promoting “critical race theory, gender ideology or other inappropriate racial, sexual or political content on to our children.”

Trump said he planned to create a national credentialing organization that would certify teachers “who embrace patriotic values, support our way of life and understand that their job is not to indoctrinate children” and would set up favorable treatment for states and school districts that adopt reforms such as allowing parents to directly elect school principals.

“If any principal is not getting the job done, the parents should have the right and be able to vote or to fire them and to select someone else that will do the job properly,” Trump said at a campaign appearance in South Carolina.

Former Vice President Mike Pence, who is considering a presidential campaign, is using a group he formed to rally conservatives against transgender-affirming policies in schools. The group’s plans to run ads, hold rallies and canvass in early voting state Iowa comes as a federal appeals court is set to consider a case involving an Iowa school district’s policy to support transgender students.

In the U.S., public education is run by states and largely paid for by state and local taxpayers. The federal government does not, for instance, certify teachers or regulate how schools hire staff. And Washington also doesn’t control curriculum standards like those DeSantis has backed in Florida. But Congress or the Department of Education can incentivize certain education practices by tying them to federal money.

So it’s not unheard of for presidential candidates to talk about education.

George H.W. Bush declared he wanted to be known as the “education president” and started a push for national standards and goals. His son, George W. Bush, centered his message in the 2000 campaign in part on education reform and during the first year of his administration, signed into law the No Child Left Behind Act, which ignited a national debate over the proper use of standardized testing in schools.

The more recent divisive shift to social issues in schools is an outgrowth of Glenn Youngkin’s successful bid in 2021 to become the first Republican in more than a decade to be elected as Virginia’s governor. Youngkin, himself a potential presidential candidate in 2024, campaigned on parental rights. He appealed to parents frustrated over school closures during the pandemic and said he would ban the teaching of critical race theory in public schools.

Once in office, his administration began the process of rewriting the state’s model policies for the treatment of transgender students, issuing guidance for school divisions that would roll back some accommodations and tighten parental notification requirements.

Kristin Davison, a strategist for Youngkin’s gubernatorial campaign, said Youngkin focused on education after the pandemic thrust parents into the classroom, leading to frustrations with remote learning to the curriculum itself.

“Voters want their leaders to understand the issues that they’re talking about at their kitchen table,” she said. “Right now, families are sitting at their kitchen table looking at report cards, looking at homework assignments, frustrated at curriculum.”

The debate over education still carried weight during last year’s elections, potentially giving Republican presidential candidates a reason to stay focused on the issue. Half of voters in 2022 said their local K-8 schools were teaching too much about gender identity issues, according to AP VoteCast, a national survey of the electorate. Only about one-quarter said schools teach too little on the subject.

About 4 in 10 voters said too little is taught on racism in the U.S., while about one-third said schools were teaching too much on related issues. Roughly one-quarter of voters said the focus on each is “about right.”

There was broad agreement among Republicans — about 8 in 10 of whom said gender identity is taught too much in schools. A smaller majority, 56%, said that about racism.

Among Democrats, about two-thirds said there’s too little taught about racism. But there was less consensus around teaching gender identity. About 4 in 10 said too little is taught, about 2 in 10 said too much is taught and about 4 in 10 said schools handle it about right.

Celinda Lake, a Democratic pollster and strategist who worked on President Joe Biden’s 2020 campaign, said the GOP messages about protecting children seem to be aimed at trying to win over suburban women, who have drifted away from Trump and the GOP, particularly after the Supreme Court ended constitutional protections for abortion last year.

“I think it’s getting extra energy because of its appeal or its presumed appeal to women voters,” she said.

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CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) — Few have navigated the turbulent politics of the Trump era like Nikki Haley.

In early 2016, the then-South Carolina governor said she was “embarrassed” by candidate Donald Trump and decried his reluctance to condemn white supremacists. Nine months later, she agreed to join his Cabinet, serving as a key validator as Trump sought to win over skeptical world leaders and voters at home.

And shortly after Trump left the White House, Haley, whose resume by then included an ambassadorship to the United Nations, vowed not to step in the way if he ran for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination. Yet on Wednesday, she is poised to become the first major Republican candidate to enter the race against him.

“It’s going to be quite the high-wire act,” said veteran Republican strategist Terry Sullivan. “She says she’s always been an underdog. She will be again.”

The 51-year-old Haley may be the first to take on Trump, but a half-dozen or more high-profile Republicans are expected to join the GOP’s 2024 presidential nomination contest over the coming months. Some would-be competitors may be more popular than Haley even in South Carolina, where she lives and has established a campaign headquarters.

Likely rivals include Sen. Tim Scott, a fellow South Carolinian and perhaps the most celebrated elected official in a state where Trump has already locked up endorsements from the governor and its senior senator, Lindsey Graham. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former Vice President Mike Pence could also be formidable foes should they run, as widely expected.

Indeed, on the eve of this week’s announcement, there is broad agreement that Haley — the only Republican woman of color expected in the 2024 contest, a politician who loves to remind people that she has never lost an election — is about to be tested as never before.

Trump has stepped up his attacks on Haley in recent weeks. But allies describe the former governor, who is the daughter of Indian immigrants, as a savvy executive uniquely positioned to lead a new generation of Republicans. They understand that the fight ahead could get ugly.

“She took the bull by the horns and said, ‘That doesn’t matter to me, I’m going to run,’” said longtime supporter Gavin J. Smith. “She did that when she ran for governor, and that’s what you’re going to see when she runs for president.”

Perhaps more than anyone this young presidential primary season, Haley personifies the Republican Party’s shifting views on Trump. Her reversal on whether to challenge the former president was based less on concerns about his divisive leadership or policy disagreements than the growing belief within the GOP that Trump is losing political strength.

Haley, like the vast majority of her party, largely supported Trump even after he inspired a violent attack on the U.S. Capitol. It was not until Trump-backed candidates across several key states were defeated in last fall’s midterm elections that a wave of high-profile Republicans began to openly weigh 2024 bids against him.

New York-based Republican donor Eric Levine says he’s convinced that another Trump Republican nomination would lead to his party’s destruction. Haley, he said, is among the three favorite Trump alternatives.

“I think as a woman of color and a daughter of legal immigrants from India, she’d give the Democratic Party no reason to exist. All their woke crap goes out the window,” Levine said. “I think she’s a spectacular candidate.”

Haley’s announcement will take place Wednesday in Charleston, the historic coastal city where her campaign will be based. Almost immediately, she’ll travel to meet voters in New Hampshire and Iowa.

She’s entrusted her campaign to a collection of senior staff led by longtime aides. Betsey Ankney, who heads up Haley’s PAC, will manage the campaign, with the PAC’s development director, Mary Kate Johnson, as finance director, Haley’s team told The Associated Press.

Longtime Haley adviser Chaney Denton and Nachama Soloveichik, who was a spokeswoman for recently retired Pennsylvania Sen. Pat Toomey, will head up communications. Strategist Jon Lerner will serve as senior adviser, and Barney Keller of Jamestown Associates will be Haley’s media consultant.

For Haley, this week’s launch marks a significant step on a long road that began in South Carolina’s “Good Old Boys Club,” she wrote in a Friday fundraising appeal.

“People thought I was too brown … too female … too young … too conservative … too principled,” she wrote.

Born in 1972 in rural South Carolina, Haley has long spoken of a Southern rural childhood in which she felt she didn’t fit. She was raised in the Sikh faith with a mother who wore traditional saris, and a father clad in a turban.

“Nikki has been regularly underestimated,” said Catherine Templeton, a Republican who served Haley in two roles, leading South Carolina’s labor and public health agencies. “But it makes her work harder.”

In her first campaign in 2004, Haley, formerly an accountant, defeated the longest-serving member of South Carolina’s House. After six years in the Legislature, she was considered a longshot when she mounted her 2010 gubernatorial campaign.

The GOP field was filled with more experienced politicians, and at times, she faced blatant racism. Then-state Sen. Jake Knotts appeared on a talk show and used a racial slur in reference to Haley. He apologized, saying it was meant as a joke.

Still, Haley became the first woman and person of color elected South Carolina’s governor — and the nation’s youngest state executive. After winning reelection in 2014, her second term was marred by crisis.

She spent weeks attending funerals of Black parishioners gunned down by a self-avowed white supremacist at a Charleston church in 2015. Later that year, she pushed for and signed legislation to remove the Confederate flag from the Statehouse grounds, where it had flown for more than 50 years.

Haley’s political skills were tested in a different way in 2016, as Trump went from late-night television punchline to serious Republican presidential contender.

She endorsed Florida Sen. Marco Rubio ahead of South Carolina’s high-stakes Republican primary, then backed Texas Sen. Ted Cruz once Rubio was knocked out.

Then, Haley described Trump as “everything a governor doesn’t want in a president.” She also said she was “embarrassed” by his attacks against former President George W. Bush and condemned Trump’s reluctance to disavow the KKK.

But shortly after Trump won the presidency, Haley agreed to serve as the new administration’s ambassador to the United Nations, a Cabinet-level position.

“I proudly serve in this administration, and I enthusiastically support most of its decisions and the direction it is taking the country,” Haley said in a 2018 op-ed.

Later that year, Haley abruptly announced her departure from the U.N. in the wake of an ethics probe, fueling speculation that she might challenge Trump in 2020 or replace Pence on the ticket. Neither happened.

Instead, Haley returned to South Carolina, joined the board of aircraft manufacturer Boeing Co. and hit the lucrative speaking circuit, reportedly commanding fees as high as $200,000. She also penned two books.

Her public support for Trump continued even after the attack on the Capitol.

“I’m really proud of the successes of the Trump administration. Whether it was foreign policy or domestic policy, we should embrace those,” she tweeted three weeks after the insurrection.

But it’s unclear whether such platitudes will give Haley much cushion in a party that, for now, remains dominated by Trump and his supporters. Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York, the No. 3 House Republican, has already endorsed Trump’s 2024 bid. While she declined to comment directly on Haley’s candidacy, she insisted that Trump would defeat any Republican challenger “by massive margins.”

“It is time for Republicans to unite around the most popular Republican in America,” she said of Trump.

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NEW YORK (AP) — The on-again, off-again Super Bowl interview between President Joe Biden and a Fox Corp. streaming service appears to be off again.

A White House official said Friday evening that it was “inaccurate” to say the interview had been rescheduled, contradicting a Fox Corp. spokesperson who said earlier in the day that it was happening.

The statement appeared to signal the definitive end of a pingpong saga over whether Biden would sit down with Fox interviewers ahead of the Super Bowl on Sunday. Presidents traditionally grant an interview to the network that’s broadcasting the football game — in this case, Fox.

However, this year negotiations broke down.

The back-and-forth began Friday with a tweet from White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.

“The President was looking forward to an interview with Fox Soul to discuss the Super Bowl, the State of the Union, and critical issues impacting the everyday lives of Black Americans,” she wrote. “We’ve been informed that Fox Corp. has asked for the interview to be cancelled.”

Fox Soul was created in 2020, and it’s geared toward Black viewers.

Hours later, a Fox Corp. spokesperson released a contradictory statement.

“After the White House reached out to Fox Soul Thursday evening, there was some initial confusion,” the spokesperson said. “Fox Soul looks forward to interviewing the President for Super Bowl Sunday.”

The spokesperson added that the interviewers — Vivica A. Fox, the actress and host of “Cocktails with Queens,” and sportscaster Mike Hill — had arrived in Washington after flying in from the Los Angeles.

But the White House statement later Friday added another twist.

“As we said earlier, we had arranged an interview with FOX Sports Host Mike Hill & Vivica A. Fox with the President ahead of the Super Bowl and Fox Corp. had the interview cancelled,” the statement said. “Fox has since put out a statement indicating the interview was rescheduled, which is inaccurate.”

In 2021, Biden spoke to CBS News anchor Norah O’Donnell prior to the game, and last year he spoke with NBC News’ Lester Holt.

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LOS ANGELES (AP) — California’s U.S. Senate race is unfolding at a furious pace, with candidates reporting seven-figure fundraising and holding competing rallies and campaign events more than a year before the 2024 primary election.

The fight for the safely Democratic seat held by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, who at 89 is the oldest member of Congress, is shaping up as a marquee match-up between nationally known rivals and is likely to become one of the most expensive Senate races in the country next year.

On Saturday, Democratic U.S. Rep. Adam Schiff, who rose to prominence as the lead prosecutor in former President Donald Trump’s first impeachment trial, gathered hundreds of supporters in a union hall parking lot for a rally in his hometown of Burbank, California, where he implored the cheering crowd, “Let’s go win this thing.”

Schiff, who announced his candidacy last month, said he was running for Senate after two decades in Congress “to build an economy that works for everyone, a democracy that will last for all time and a planet that doesn’t melt beneath our feet.”

A day earlier, Democratic U.S. Rep. Katie Porter brought her Senate campaign to Los Angeles, where she met with local leaders to discuss pollution in lower-income neighborhoods. She said such areas are often overlooked in Washington and Sacramento, where residents’ complaints about unhealthy conditions go unheard.

Porter, a leader in Congress’ progressive wing, built a reputation for her tough questioning of CEOs and other witnesses at congressional hearings — often using a whiteboard to break down information.

Other potential contenders for the seat include Democratic Rep. Barbara Lee, a former chair of the Congressional Black Caucus. If she runs and is elected, Lee would be the only Black woman in the Senate.

Feinstein has yet to say if she will seek a seventh term. In recent years, questions have arisen about her cognitive health and memory, though she has defended her effectiveness. However, her reticence about her future has created a publicly awkward dynamic — the race to replace her is rapidly taking shape, even as the senator remains unclear about her intentions.

Schiff’s rally, held on a nippy, mostly overcast morning, marked the start of a two-week statewide tour, with stops to include San Diego, Sacramento, Fresno and San Francisco.

He was joined by his wife Eve, one of his two children, Alexa, and David McMillan, whom the congressman mentored as a youth and considers part of his family.

After recounting his career as a federal prosecutor, state legislator and member of Congress, Schiff made clear he would anchor his campaign to his role as impeachment manager and Trump’s chief antagonist in Congress. He has been a frequent target of conservatives — Trump in particular — since the then-GOP-led House Intelligence Committee he served on started investigating Trump’s ties to Russia in the 2016 election.

He mentioned “democracy” more than a half-dozen times in the speech. He’s selling T-shirts and coffee mugs on his campaign website, with the slogan “Democracy Matters.” He called Trump, who has announced his 2024 campaign for the presidency, “a demagogue bent on destroying our democracy.”

“We investigated Trump. We impeached him. We held him accountable and then we defeated him at the ballot box,” Schiff said to cheers. “And we will defeat him again, if the GOP is foolish enough to nominate him. He will never see the inside of the Oval Office, never again.”

Trump was impeached in December 2019 on charges he abused the power of the presidency to investigate rival Joe Biden and obstructed Congress’ investigation. The Republican-led Senate acquitted Trump of both charges. In 2021, he became the first president in U.S. history to be impeached twice, this time for inciting the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol after he lost the 2020 election. He was again acquitted by the Senate.

Schiff’s other foundational issues include fighting climate change and improving the economy.

“Too many people are working multiple jobs but cannot pay the rent, afford groceries or pay for lifesaving medication,” he said. “Too many children are growing up in poverty and hungry.”

Schiff and Porter, both prolific small-dollar fundraisers, already are dueling over campaign dollars and endorsements. Former Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco is backing Schiff, providing Feinstein retires, and Porter is supported by Massachusetts Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren.

Democrats are expected to dominate the contest in the famously liberal state — a Republican hasn’t won a statewide race in California since 2006, and the past two Senate elections had only Democrats on the November ballot.

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