South Carolina governor to be keynote speaker at Tennessee GOP event


              FILE - In  this Jan. 9, 2016 file photo, South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley speaks to the crowd at the Kemp Forum in Columbia, S.C.  Haley and South Carolina’s military boosters want to end taxes on military retirement benefits. Haley’s budget calls for slicing $10 million from the state’s coffers to pay for the cut. The plan would ultimately cost the state $33 million every year.(AP Photo/Sean Rayford, File)
FILE - In this Jan. 9, 2016 file photo, South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley speaks to the crowd at the Kemp Forum in Columbia, S.C. Haley and South Carolina’s military boosters want to end taxes on military retirement benefits. Haley’s budget calls for slicing $10 million from the state’s coffers to pay for the cut. The plan would ultimately cost the state $33 million every year.(AP Photo/Sean Rayford, File)

NASHVILLE -- South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley will be the keynote speaker at this year's Republican Statesmen's dinner, Tennessee Republican Party officials announced today.

State GOP Chairman Ryan Haynes said in a news release that attendees at the party's event "have come to expect dynamic messengers for the party and Gov. Haley certainly fits that role.

"I look forward to hearing from the governor about her solutions to unite our country and heal the divisions we've witnessed over the last seven years," Haynes added.

Haley, a South Carolina native whose parents emigrated from India, is South Carolina's first female governor. She was reelected in 2014.

Republicans' largest annual fundraiser this year will also honor the legacy of the late U.S. Sen. Fred Thompson, who died in November.

Haynes also announced that Dr. Manny Sethi, the President of Healthy Tennessee and an orthopaedic trauma surgeon at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, will serve as the Statesmen's Dinner chairman.

"Mainstream conservative leadership has become a hallmark of the Tennessee Republican Party," Sethi said. "That's exactly the sort of principled leadership Governor Haley is known for. The 2016 Statesmen's Dinner is going to be a phenomenal success for our Party and I am proud to be a partner in this endeavor."

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