Nikki Haley agrees with almost everything Donald Trump has done and they get along great. Is this because she is romantically involved with the US president? "No", says Haley, who adds that rumours of an affair are "offensive" and "disgusting."
Rumours of an affair between Trump and Haley spread after Michael Wolff, author of Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House, hinted in an interview that the president was having an affair with someone detailed in his book.
Haley, is one high-profile politician who is mentioned in the book as being close to Trump. Wolff writes that loyalists to former White House strategist Stephen K Bannon fear “Haley’s hold on the president”.
He also writes in his book that Haley had "become a particular focus of Trump's attention, and he of hers....The president had been spending a notable amount of private time with Haley on Air Force One, and was seen to be grooming her for a national political future".
Haley shot down the rumours during Politico's Women Rule podcast on Thursday, saying there's absolutely no truth in these claims.
She also hit back at Wolff's assertion that she has been spending a lot of alone time with Trump.
"I have literally been on Air Force One once and there were several people in the room when I was there," Haley said. "He says that I've been talking a lot with the president in the Oval office about my political future. I've never talked once to the president about my future and I am never alone with him."
As to the perpetrators of these rumours, Haley said some men weren't comfortable with strong-willed women.
"Most men respect women but there is a small group of men, that if you just do your job and you try and do it well and you are outspoken about it, they resent it. And they think the only option is to bring you down," she said.
Wolff's Fire and Fury has sole more than 1.7 million copies.
