Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley announced on Sunday that her ailing father had passed away earlier in the day.
“This morning I had to say goodbye to the smartest, sweetest, kindest, most decent man I have ever known,” Mrs. Haley said in a post on social media platform X.
Her tribute was accompanied by a photo of her embracing her late father, Ajit Singh Randhawa.
“My heart is heavy knowing he is gone. He taught his kids the importance of faith, hard work, and grace,” she said. “He was an amazing husband of 64 years, a loving grandfather and great grandfather, and the best father to his four children. He was such a blessing to all of us. Happy Father’s Day Dad. We will miss you dearly.”
She did not disclose his age.
Mr. Randhawa and his wife, both devout Sikhs, immigrated from the Punjab region of India to Canada and then to rural South Carolina in 1969, after Mr. Randhawa received a PhD from the University of British Columbia in Vancouver.
Mr. Randhawa would go on to become a professor of biology at the historically black Voorhees College in Denmark, South Carolina.
Mrs. Haley’s mother, Raj Kaur Randhawa, was a teacher who later became a successful businesswoman with her own fashion boutique.
The couple had four children. Mrs. Haley was born in Bamberg, South Carolina, on Jan. 20, 1972.
In a speech at the 2020 Republican National Convention, Mrs. Haley said she was the proud daughter of Indian immigrants. She said her parents “came to America and settled in a small southern town. My father wore a turban. My mother wore a sari. I was a brown girl in a black and white world.”
“We faced discrimination and hardship, but my parents never gave into grievance and hate,” she said.
Mrs. Haley served as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations from 2017 to 2018 during the Trump administration. During this time, she advocated for strong Israel-U.S. relations and led the U.S. withdrawal from the U.N. Paris Climate Agreement on behalf of President Donald Trump.
In February 2023, Mrs. Haley announced her run for president in the 2024 election, an endeavor greatly supported by her father and mother.
While campaigning in January, Mrs. Haley had to take time away from the campaign trail to care for her father in her home state of South Carolina, her campaign said at the time.
Mrs. Haley announced the end of her presidential campaign in March after a clear victory by former President Donald Trump in the Super Tuesday Republican primaries. She has since taken up a position at the conservative think tank, the Hudson Institute, as its Walter P. Stern chairperson.
