South Carolina’s Indian-American governor Nikki Haley has called a fellow Republican who has accused her of ethics violations “racist, sexist bigot who has tried everything in his power to hurt me and my family,” according to media reports.
In her surprise testimony before a House ethics panel Thursday, Haley said that at her only meeting with powerful fund raiser John Rainey, while she was running for governor, he was demanding and demeaning, and she told her staff she did not want any campaign contributions from him, South Carolina’s thestate.com reported.
“He wanted me to prove certain things so that if I took the oath, they wouldn’t find out later that my family was related to terrorists,” Haley said. “I’m still very offended by that,” she was quoted as saying.
Denying that she had done anything wrong, Haley, the first governor ever to appear before a South Carolina House ethics committee hearing, said: “I just want the truth out there.”
“I know exactly what my frame of mind was. I know exactly what actions I took. I know the situations that were at hand. I have done nothing wrong. I’ve done nothing wrong,” she said.
Rainey, who has accused her of illegally lobbying on behalf of a hospital and an engineering firm while she was a House member from 2005 to 2010, declined to comment Thursday, thestate.com said.
However, one of his attorneys said Thursday’s hearing was a “farce.”
IANS