Republican presidential hopeful Nikki Haley told a US radio program that she believes Texas has the right to break from the federal government. “If Texas decides they want to do that, they can do that,” the former Governor of South Carolina said.
“If that whole state says ‘We don’t want to be part of America anymore’ – I mean, that’s their decision to make.”
However, the 52-year-old candidate emphasized that she does not think Texas will actually leave the union. “I think, you know, states are going to make decisions. But let’s talk about what’s reality. Texas isn’t going to secede. That’s not something that they’re going to do.”
Regardless of what Haley, also a former UN ambassador, says, the 1869 Supreme Court ruling Texas v. White affirmed that states do not have the right to break off from the United States.
There is also the small historical note of the US Civil War, during which Texas and ten other southern states attempted to secede from the United States and the federal government fought a war to force them back in while also ending slavery.
However, Haley seems to have a tenuous grasp of the history of that war, so perhaps she was unaware of its conclusion.