Nikki Haley Claims Tillerson, Kelly Tried to Convince Her to Undermine Trump

Former UN ambassador Nikki Haley claims in a memoir that top aides to the president sought to “save the country” by trying to convince her to undermine Trump.

Former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and former White House Chief of Staff John Kelly had grown deeply concerned with the president’s actions, Haley writes, and wanted her to help keep him in check. But she refused.

“Kelly and Tillerson confided in me that when they resisted the president, they weren’t being insubordinate, they were trying to save the country,” Haley claims.

“It was their decisions, not the president’s, that were in the best interests of America, they said. The president didn’t know what he was doing.”

Haley’s book, obtained by the Washington Post, is set to be released Tuesday. In it, she does not take on Trump directly, only offering mild criticisms.

“I was so shocked I didn’t say anything going home because I just couldn’t get my arms around the fact that here you have two key people in an administration undermining the president,” Haley said in an interview with the Post, referring to Kelly and Tillerson.

In response, Kelly told the Post that if providing Trump “with the best and most open, legal and ethical staffing advice from across the [government] so he could make an informed decision is ‘working against Trump,’ then guilty as charged.”

Haley, often seen by Republicans as a potential presidential contender, recently dismissed the notion that President Trump should be impeached and removed from office over the Ukraine scandal.