CNN chief political correspondent Dana Bash welcomed former Ambassador to the U.N. and South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley to the 2024 GOP Major on Tuesday’s Inside Politics by claiming that’s “fascinating” that the non-white Haley would come with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and different non-white progressives whereas embracing GOP “tradition wars” in her announcement video.

Host John King was extra targeted on the horse race facet of Haley’s announcement. After enjoying a clip of the video the place she highlighted her Indian-American heritage and emphasised the necessity for racial unity, he requested:

Once more, it is, you recognize, that a part of her biography is compelling. Will she select or will she attempt to be all issues to all slices of the Republican major? As a result of if she’s a basic election candidate, her argument and her workforce argues we will get again a variety of these suburban ladies who simply can’t vote for Trump, we will get again independents who’re on the lookout for fiscal conservatives, possibly are pro-life on abortion, however don’t desire somebody hitting them within the head with it. The place is her lane?

Bash responded by claiming that Haley is as an alternative competing within the activist lane, “Effectively, such as you have been saying, it isn’t the place she’s going proper now, which I suppose in a lot of the way is comprehensible as a result of that is not the voters she’s interesting to, it is Republicans.”

Returning to the video, Bash identified, “The half proper after what you performed within the video, she talks about the necessity to not discuss the variations a lot and speak about similarities when it comes to race and different components of America, she has a picture of AOC wanting indignant and he or she has one other picture of an African-American girl.”

What Bash omitted is that this second girl was on MSNBC speaking about The 1619 Undertaking. Nonetheless, Bash declared, “I assumed that was completely fascinating as a result of she is a girl of shade.”

How is that fascinating? Are folks simply to uncritically settle for The 1619 Undertaking or AOC’s newest ramblings within the title of racial unity? Apparently so, as Bash elaborated, “And she or he’s making an attempt to point out that she’s with the Republicans when it involves the tradition wars and the whole lot that Ron DeSantis and you title it have been speaking about in terms of making an attempt to exploit the variations on ethnicity and race versus bringing them collectively.”

Or possibly AOC and The 1619 Undertaking are those exploiting racial variations and Haley, DeSantis, and others are merely pointing this out. 

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Here’s a transcript for the February 14 present:

CNN Inside Politics with John King 

2/14/2023

12:22 PM ET

JOHN KING: Once more, it is, you recognize, that a part of her biography is compelling. Will she select or will she attempt to be all issues to all slices of the Republican major? As a result of if she’s a basic election candidate, her argument and her workforce argues we will get again a variety of these suburban ladies who simply can’t vote for Trump, we will get again independents who’re on the lookout for fiscal conservatives, possibly are pro-life on abortion, however don’t desire somebody hitting them within the head with it. The place is her lane? 

DANA BASH: Effectively, such as you have been saying, it isn’t the place she’s going proper now, which I suppose in a lot of the way is comprehensible as a result of that is not the voters she’s interesting to, it is Republicans. 

The half proper after what you performed within the video, she talks about the necessity to not discuss the variations a lot and speak about similarities when it comes to race and different components of America, she has a picture of AOC wanting indignant and he or she has one other picture of an African-American girl. I assumed that was completely fascinating as a result of she is a girl of shade. And she or he’s making an attempt to point out that she’s with the Republicans when it involves the tradition wars and the whole lot that Ron DeSantis and you title it have been speaking about in terms of making an attempt to exploit the variations on ethnicity and race versus bringing them collectively.