COLUMBIA, S.C. — During a recent stroll past South Carolina's Statehouse, Michael Haley glanced at the platform on which his wife will become governor and reflected on its meaning for a two-decade relationship that has survived financial trials and bruising politics.
"As a family, I can't be more proud," he said, looking at the plastic-sheathed structure where his wife will become South Carolina's first woman governor and he the first "first gentleman."
"There's no question about that."
Nikki Haley quickly took to the media spotlight during her history-making gubernatorial campaign. Her gender, her Indian-American background and her vow to take on the state's establishment weave a compelling biography. But husband Michael has remained in the background.
Just days away from accompanying his wife as she takes the helm of the state, the 40-year-old Army National Guard officer told The Associated Press in his first extensive interview about how the incoming first couple's partnership enabled them to weather tough times and continue to raise two children.
Getting here, he said, has "been a whirlwind to begin the story; an amazing ride and a terrific ride."
Michael Haley is from Kenton, Ohio, about halfway between Toledo and Dayton. His family had always vacationed in Hilton Head. So, after his father sold his steel business, they relocated to South Carolina in 1984, just in time for Michael to enter high school.
He met his future wife at Clemson University in October 1989 after spending a year at Anderson College rooming with an old high school friend of the then-Nikki Randhawa. When he transferred to Clemson, his former roomie introduced them during a night out with friends. He was 19; she was a 17-year-old freshman.
"And from that point on — history," Michael Haley recalled.
He worked his way through school. He said jobs were scarce. He spent two years in the kitchen at a Western Sizzlin' steakhouse and then took a job in a Charlotte, N.C., company's rebate department. He finished his bachelor's degree in business administration at the University of North Carolina-Charlotte.
The Haleys married in 1996 and both worked in her family's clothing business. He helped launch the men's clothing business with his brother-in-law and was so welcomed by his extended family and his wife's doting mom that an intended one-year stint stretched into seven.
"Working with the family was great. I learned a lot and I ended up staying a few more years than I thought because of it," he said.
The young couple's political interests grew out of involvement in civic and community groups, Haley said. "Anything we've ever done the majority of our lives we've done together," he said, including his wife's successful 2004 bid for the state House, unseating the chamber's longest-serving Republican.
"It was just another step for her to take," Haley said. "When it comes time and we're passionate about something we just forge ahead and get it accomplished."
But the incumbent was passionate, too. Mailings went out disparaging Nikki Haley's background.
He watched how his wife shrugged off the shots — something she's been accustomed to doing since being raised in Bamberg County, where community organizers asked her as a little girl to leave a beauty pageant because they couldn't decide whether to put her or her sister in the white or black competition.
"Nikki's grown up with it, and that's why she's able to handle it so well. She lets a lot of it roll off her back and she proves herself through her actions," Haley said. "And that's something I've learned from her and her family."
The gubernatorial campaign brought more of the same, including racist remarks from a state senator and unproven allegations by a political blogger and by a lobbyist of separate extramarital affairs.
Michael Haley said the campaign had prepared months ahead of time — going over worst-case scenarios, including potential fabrications like infidelity.
"When Nikki decided to run, we sat down and said, 'What are the issues? What's going to come out? What are the potential — the possibilities — that people are going to throw at us?' And that was one of them," he said.
It was all fiction, Haley said: "Zero basis. Zero fact."
Revelations about tax penalties harkened to the family's rocky financial times, but were not personal failings, he said.
"There was a period of years where Nikki had gone into the House and so there was some income that we had lost from that from her serving. So we had taken that hit. A couple of years after that, I decided to go into the military. At that time, our income drastically reduced. So it was just a matter of playing catch-up. We abided by all of the laws and regulations and fulfilled them."
As first gentleman, Haley said his top job is being an ambassador with his wife for the state. He said he has no plans to attend daily staff meetings, unlike prior first spouse Jenny Sanford. But he does want to focus on education initiatives, such as getting more money into classrooms, that his wife pushes. For his part, he'll work to expand a National Guard program for at-risk youth that aims to improve graduation rates.
Michael Haley joined the Army National Guard as a medical service corps officer at 36. After the inauguration, he'll continue to serve full-time and help care for the couple's 12-year-old daughter, Rena, and 9-year-old son, Nalin.
"I think the family as a whole is extremely excited," he said. "The kids are really pumped now. They're getting really excited, so it's all good stuff."