Washington Post columnist George Will has urged Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., a presidential candidate Will’s own wife is advising, to drop out of the race and endorse fellow GOP candidate Nikki Haley.
In a column for the Post on Tuesday, Will attempted to persuade Scott to do the "statesmanlike" thing by withdrawing from the race and supporting Haley. The columnist claimed it would give her enough momentum to defeat former President Donald Trump in the Republican primary.
At the outset of his piece, however, Will had to disclose that his wife, Mari Will, is an adviser to Scott. He wrote, "Disclosure: The columnist’s wife, Mari Will, an adviser to Republican presidential candidate Sen. Tim Scott (S.C.), disagrees with this column."
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After getting that out of the way, Will made his pitch to Scott, stating, "There is national incredulity, exhaustion, embarrassment, disgust and fatalism about the political parties’ inability to generate palatable presidential choices. Tim Scott could alter this with a trifecta of statesmanlike acts."
He named those acts, stating they include the U.S. senator "withdrawing from the competition for the Republican presidential nomination, challenging others to do likewise and exhorting them to join him in supporting Nikki Haley."
Some in the Republican Party have been searching for a candidate to deny former President Trump the nomination, who commands a huge lead in the GOP primary.
The former South Carolina governor’s recent bump in the polls has prompted some party members to see her as the main threat to Trump’s re-election efforts and advise other GOP candidates to drop out, allowing Haley more share of the anti-Trump GOP vote.
Will was the latest to make this argument, claiming that Scott will better serve his country by supporting Haley rather than pursuing an election bid that won’t amount to much.
He continued, stating, "This is the South Carolina senator’s choice: He can acknowledge that his energetic campaigning has failed to enkindle sufficient enthusiasm and depart as he campaigned, cheerfully. Or he can try to become someone whom, to his credit, he has no aptitude for being — another peddler of synthetic anger, stoking today’s rage culture."
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Will declared it’s not the senator's time, adding, "Scott someday could be, a fine president. Scott is not, however, the man for this season."
The columnist then advised Scott on his strategy going forward, saying, "By catalyzing a coalescence around Haley, Scott could transform the nation’s political mood. As long as the Republican race pits Donald Trump against a cluster of lagging pursuers, the nominating electorate cannot ponder a binary choice. When, however, it is Trump against one experienced, polished, steely and unintimidated adversary, voters can internalize this exhilarating reality: There is a choice suitable for a great nation."
Will admitted that the recent GOP primary debates have been "miserable" and added that Scott’s endorsement of Haley "could mercifully end" them. He further described the debates as "caricatures of real ones" that "diminish everyone involved."
He spent the rest of his column touting Haley as the right candidate for the job, saying she "has established policy preeminence among her Republican rivals," particularly in the realm of foreign policy. "Haley’s policy preeminence among the Republican aspirants must become political preeminence, quickly," he urged.
Will then warned what would happen if Scott and the other candidates didn’t rally around Haley, saying, "With every passing day, the probability of a national disgrace — a Trump nomination — increases. And with it the probability of another disgrace, a Biden-Trump rematch, which might mean the probability of another Trump presidency."
Scott's campaign has not immediately responded to Fox News Digital's request for comment.
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