Influential Koch network backs Nikki Haley as best GOP alternative to Donald Trump
The massive political network founded by the Koch brothers endorsed GOP presidential candidate Nikki Haley on Tuesday, giving her a potential boost in her increasingly competitive primary battle against Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and front-runner Donald Trump.
The network, Americans for Prosperity Action, could be a vehicle for bolstering Haley’s ground game in the months leading up to voting in Iowa and New Hampshire, where the former UN ambassador has been building her presence.
The Koch network has already spent millions of dollars attacking Trump in the Republican primary battle, and this endorsement marks its decision on who would be the best GOP alternative to him.
Haley “has what it takes to lead a policy agenda to take on our nation’s biggest challenges and help ensure our country’s best days are ahead,” Americans for Prosperity Action said in its announcement. “With the grassroots and data capability we bring to bear in this race, no other organization is better equipped to help her do it.”
Charles and David Koch, who are the sons of Fred Koch, the founder of Koch Industries, have spent hundreds of millions of dollars in the past two decades building think tanks and political apparatuses to influence public opinion toward libertarianism.
Haley expressed gratitude at the endorsement, saying she is “honored” by the group’s support and its “millions of grassroots members all across the country.”
“AFP Action’s members know that there is too much at stake in this election to sit on the sidelines,” the 51-year-old former South Carolina governor said. “This is a choice between freedom and socialism, individual liberty and big government, fiscal responsibility and spiraling debt. We have a country to save, and I’m grateful to have AFP Action by our side.”
DeSantis’ team immediately sent out a memo blasting the endorsement, claiming Trump actually got the group’s backing because “every dollar spent on Nikki Haley’s candidacy should be reported as an in-kind to the Trump campaign.
“Congratulations to Donald Trump on securing the Koch endorsement. Like clockwork, the pro-open borders, pro-jail-break-bill establishment is lining up behind a moderate who has no mathematical pathway of defeating the former president,” DeSantis communications director Andrew Romeo said in a statement. “Every dollar spent on Nikki Haley’s candidacy should be reported as an in-kind to the Trump campaign. No one has a stronger record of beating the establishment than Ron DeSantis, and this time will be no different.”