Nikki Haley Quotes

I think George W. Bush has a warm, engaging personality. But, you know, the presidency is more than just a popularity contest.

Some people put down all presidents. If you say anything good about any of them, they think you're supporting everything they do.

Thomas Jefferson once said, 'We should never judge a president by his age, only by his works.' And ever since he told me that, I stopped worrying.

Perhaps the mistake I made at the start of my mandate is not understanding the symbolic dimension of the president's role and not being solemn enough in my acts. A mistake for which I would like to apologise or explain myself and which I will not make again. Now, I know the job.

In the execution of Presidential decisions work to be true to his views, in fact and tone.

I don't think Reagan is primarily funny, and I don't think he's primarily marvelous; he's complicated.

One right decision doth not a great president make.

This issue, if not addressed, leaves any President, including George Bush, open to the criticism that they are essentially ignoring the destruction of the nation and I believe that with all my heart.

When it comes to the president, we have to respect him, we have to protect him, and we have to correct him. And in my career, since he'd been on the national stage at least, I've had - I've always respected the president.

If 'Mystery Train' is my Nixon book and 'Lipstick Traces' my Reagan book, 'Invisible Republic' is my Bill Clinton book. I really liked Clinton. He made me proud to be part of this country again. For all of his failings, the way he put all that he'd done in jeopardy, I supported him from beginning to end.

Every President has to have a scapegoat.

The President has become increasingly the depository of all national ills, especially if things go wrong.

[President John F.] Kennedy must be a strange character—obstinate, sensitive, ruthless and highly sexed.

I have no more obligation to spin. When you’re in the White House, you spin.

I talk to the press five days a week … The president—how often does he talk to the press? His press secretary talks to the press every day, okay. But I happen to think the public should demand he should. I think he should; I think that’s his job.

He appeals to their imagination; I do not. He is a real vivid person whom they have seen and shouted themselves hoarse over and voted for, millions strong: I am a vague, conjectural personality, more made up of opinions and academic prepossessions than of human traits and red corpuscles.

A President has a character, and the whole administration takes its character from the President's.

The man [Richard Nixon] has no style. No style at all.

In the modern presidency, the Chief Executive is expected to respond to anxious national moments with words that stabilize the country. President Trump chose a different route. He did not give a stirring speech of unity or create a national gathering point around common ideals. He spent his passion on other things.

Part of the bigger problem with Donald Trump is, when you sit and talk to him one-on-one, he's reasonable, he comes across as caring, he's open-minded, but then, all of that just is thrown out the window when he tweets and when he communicates with the media - and when he communicates at all.

I think it's really tough being in Donald Trump's shoes, when you've got the media looking to put the worst possible spin to everything that you say.

George Washington didn't have to make us laugh; he just had to establish precedents and avoid chopping down more cherry trees than he could possibly help. But somewhere along the line, Americans began expecting their presidents to do more than just govern. They also had to make us laugh.

Opponents criticize Trump for not acting presidential enough; all the while, Obama created and perpetuates the presidential code to demean, disdain and diminish others in light of esteeming himself.

Ignore Trump's tweets. Yes, it's unrealistic. But we would all be better off if the media reported them more rarely, reacted to them less strongly, and treated them with less alarm and more bemusement.

For years, I have been trying to persuade people that George W. Bush, although no Einstein, is not stupid.