Nikki Haley Complains She and Her Family Were Booed by ‘Patrons’ During NYC Pride. Twitter Tells Her Why.

‘Patrons Saying Hateful Things’

UN Ambassador Nikki Haley took to Twitter Sunday evening to complain that she and her family were out having lunch and were booed by “patrons” as she and her group were leaving a restaurant during New York City Pride. “Our country is better than this,” she tweeted. 

It’s actually unclear who was doing the booing – Pride attendees or the restaurant patrons, or both. 

Haley has a tenuous relationship with the LGBTQ community. In 2010 she made clear that to her, marriage was between a man and a woman, only.

As Governor of South Carolina Haley in 2013 defended her state’s ban on same-sex marriage. “The citizens of South Carolina spoke,” she said, “spoke something that I, too, believe, which is marriage should between a man and a woman.”

In 2016 she delivered the Republican rebuttal to President Obama’s State of the Union address. “We would respect differences in modern families,” she said of the GOP, “but we would also insist on respect for religious liberty as a cornerstone of our democracy.”

Some saw it as a softening from her and Republicans, on marriage equality. 

Haley has never come out in direct support for same-sex marriage or full LGBT civil rights. 

In April she became the first and still only Trump administration official to fully denounce the abduction, torture, and murder of gay men in Chechnya’s gay concentration camps. In that statement she said: “We are against all forms of discrimination, including against people based on sexual orientation.”

But how far that extends is unknown.

Also how much she was actually booed is up for debate. The Advocate’s Lucas Grindley reports “there seems to be a dispute about the amount of booing that Haley experienced,” and points to this tweet from a New York City talent agent:

On Twitter, many responded to Haley’s complaint of being booed, explaining why it might have happened:

As it turns out, Haley has some experience being booed. In April she attended the Women in the World summit, also in New York. She was subjected to booing there too over trump administration policies and lack of action over Syria.

To comment on this article and other NCRM content, visit our Facebook page.  

Image by United Nations via Flickr and a CC license