Nikki Haley Endorses Marco Rubio for President

Days before the South Carolina primary, Marco Rubio got a much needed endorsement from a rising political figure gunning for the VP slot: Nikki Haley, governor of South Carolina.

Haley became South Carolina's first female governor in 2010. Born to Indian immigrant parents, Haley is also the state's first minority governor and the youngest serving governor in the country. Haley's profile grew last year due to the mass shooting in a black church in Charleston and her signing of a controversial bill to remove the Confederate flag from state grounds. 

Haley has stuck with hardline conservatives in opposing the expansion of Medicaid and the admission of Syrian refugees. 

Marco Rubio's parents are also immigrants, and he and Haley are not even a year apart. So the real question is: Is the GOP changing changing or are they?

"It was [my Sikh] community that taught me that when you feel different, find the ways that you're similar and unite through the ways that are together, as opposed to the things that divide us," Haley told the crowd at a Sikh Religious Society ceremony in Chaplin, South Carolina, in 2014. Haley was born and raised a Sikh, but identifies as Christian today. She has also identified herself as white on her voter registration document as early as 2001. 

No Democratic presidential candidate has won South Carolina in a general election since 1960, though it is considered a swing state. 

Watch Nikki Haley thank the Sikh community in Chaplin, South Carolina: