NORTH AUGUSTA, South Carolina — Nikki Haley has found her closing message in South Carolina: Russia, Russia, Russia.

In interviews, on social media and on the stump, the former U.N. ambassador has repeatedly seized on the death of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny to launch a fusillade against former President Donald Trump.

Haley jabbed Trump for taking three days to acknowledge Navalny’s death and then for failing to condemn Russian President Vladimir Putin for it. She’s cast her former boss as “weak in the knees” when it comes to Russia. She’s slammed him for criticizing NATO at a time when many in the West see Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as a threat to European stability. And at a Wednesday afternoon rally on the Georgia border, Haley unleashed some of her most pointed criticism yet of Trump’s relationship with Putin.

“Trump is siding with a dictator who kills his political opponents,” Haley said. “Trump sided with an evil man over our allies who stood with us on 9/11. Think about what that told them.”

Haley is turning Russia — and Putin, specifically — into a cudgel at a crucial moment in the Republican presidential primary. She’s running far behind Trump. And the former South Carolina governor is poised to get blown out in her home state’s primary on Saturday.

Her focus on Russia, in addition to providing a new line of attack on Trump, has........

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