Now that former governor and UN ambassador Nikki Haley is joining the presidential race, the media is having a hard time, figuring out how to respond to her candidacy. Part of the problem is that the media is filled with anti-Republican reactionaries, rather than honest brokers.

For example, one of POLITICO’s takes yesterday was the fact that Nikki Haley had previously identified herself as Caucasian. This attack is an absolute joke of an attack, as my colleague Bonchie explained earlier today.

As to Politico’s claim that there’s something nefarious about Haley selecting “white” on a voter registration card, there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation for that. Those cards often do not provide detailed racial segmentations to check. Because of that, Indians have been known to select “white” instead of “black” or some other non-matching, uncommon descriptor. For example, in an analysis of 1990 census data, 25 percent of Indians selected “white” as their ethnicity while 5 percent selected “black.” Those differences were probably due to physical appearance, and the skin tones of Indians can vary wildly.

Meanwhile, there is a piece at the New York Times titled “Republicans Try to Challenge Trump in 2024, but Barely Say His Name.” Ron DeSantis also gets this criticism, because it’s not enough to simply not be Trump, you must engage in his tactics and attack him at every turn. For those of you who don’t remember how 2016 went… it didn’t go well for those who attempted that against Trump back then. As it turns out, he is better at playing by his own rules than others. Go figure.

Also at Politico is a piece titled “Haley enters the fray, a female candidate against a man known for mocking them.” Again, they would prefer Haley engage in the same behavior Trump does, rather than show that she can rise above that and be her own person not defined by him.

The problem here is not that Nikki Haley is a controversial candidate. Truth be told, Haley is actually a fairly run-of-the-mill conservative candidate with no real controversy in her past. But the media does not like a woman of color who is running as a Republican and who actually appeals to a wide range of people.

What we’re seeing from all the headlines involving Haley today, on a day when she officially kicks off her campaign for Republican presidential nominee in 2024, is a mainstream media that refuses to give any credit to any Republican candidate. Haley is an accomplished woman. She has quite the pedigree showing just how great an American success story can be. But what Nikki Haley lacks is a “D” behind her name instead of an “R.”

She worked for the Trump administration, but she remained her own person. She worked as the governor of South Carolina bringing important transparency to the state government. She unified the state and help them decide to take the confederate flag off the state capitol building after a racially motivated shooting at a church that made national headlines and showed there was still work to be done in America.

She is accomplished and successful. Yesterday, the Trump campaign attacked her as a “career politician” in a campaign email.

Taylor Budowich, head of Make America Great Again Inc., released the following statement Tuesday in response to Nikki Haley’s campaign announcement: “Nikki Haley is just another career politician. She started out as a Never Trumper before resigning to serve in the Trump admin. She then resigned early to go rake in money on corporate boards. Now, she’s telling us she represents a ‘new generation.’ Sure just looks like more of the same, a career politician whose only fulfilled commitment is to herself.”

However, she is not a career politician. Her political career actually hasn’t been very long. She is her own person and that drives both the Trump campaign and the Democrats and media crazy.

Nikki Haley is an important piece of the Republican puzzle going forward because she offers a unique perspective that is needed in the race. It’s a perspective Republicans have not been able to properly address before. The party really is in desperate need of new blood, new leadership, and new ideas. They are in need of perspectives that they have not really gotten previously. Candidates like Haley – or perhaps Senator Tim Scott, also of South Carolina – turn the Democrat narrative of a racist and misogynistic GOP on its head. Candidates like that can open up discussions in ways they have not been opened up before.

Here’s the problem. The GOP attempted something like this in 2016. But, there was a bull in a china shop that ran roughshod over everybody, and some of those narratives could not be heard. The field was too large, and Donald Trump was too loud and too aggressive in silencing those voices. But eight years later, we have a new opportunity. What will probably be a smaller field, coupled with better quality candidates, will make the race extremely interesting.

The Democrats and the media do not want this to be the case. They are working extremely hard to cast all Republicans as exactly the same – ultra-MAGA extremists, all of whom are devoted to Donald Trump and his way of governance. There is a story to be told by each of the candidates who are considering jumping in. The reason we need Haley in this race is to provide the perspective of a woman and a person of color with experience governing from the executive branch, working with both parties, and opening up governments to the eyes of the people that give it power.

Of course, Haley is not just a woman, nor is she just a person of color. Those identifiers are important to Democrat elitists, and Haley has never really made them part of her central identity, just part of her bio. But the perception of Haley as a woman of color and someone who has experience running a government with a conservative worldview, offering something different than the Democrats do is what makes her so valuable.

That’s why we need Nikki Haley in this race and that’s why the media and the Democrats don’t want her in the race and so, they will try to tear her down. They will tear her down from the left and make an issue of her race, and they will attack her from the right, trying to anger Donald Trump and his supporters.

These are not honest reporters. They are not objective. They have an agenda.

We cannot allow the media to dictate the terms of the Republican primary in 2024. Conservatives must be heard, and their candidates must respond to the voters, and not media reports.