When GOP presidential candidate Nikki Haley says that her campaign for president has never been about her, you can rest assured that is exactly what it is about.

Politicians running for office say that all the time. They are running not for themselves but to fight for you, even if they end up fighting each other.

Not that there is anything wrong with it. Politicians have big egos, and the man Haley is running against, frontrunner Donald Trump, has the biggest ego of them all.

So why else would she continue to challenge Trump for the Republican nomination if not for ego, considering that she has lost to him everywhere, including in her home state of South Carolina where people know her best?

It is a state where she was twice elected governor.

Yet that did not count for much to Haley last Saturday when Trump handily defeated her by 20 points in the state’s GOP presidential primary. He also won 47 of the state’s 50 convention delegate votes.

Despite having been governor for six years and having spent millions in campaign advertising for the primary, Haley ended up with three of the state’s convention delegates.

Talk about snatching defeat out of the jaws of victory.

If she cannot carry her home state, where else can she possibly win?

Nowhere, most likely. But that has not stopped Haley from claiming victory every time she is defeated, as she did at the Iowa caucus and the New Hampshire primary, both of which Trump won along with the Nevada caucus.

And she got her clock cleaned in Michigan on Tuesday as well.

As for South Carolina, Haley attempted to make something out of nothing, claiming that the 40% of the vote she got there and the vote she got in New Hampshire “is not some tiny group.”

She said, “There are huge numbers of voters in our Republican primaries who are saying they want an alternative” and that is why she will continue to run.

While most Republican voters do want an alternative, they want an alternative to Joe Biden, not Donald Trump. Haley’s main problem is that on the issues she sounds like a younger version of Trump.

“This has never been about me or my political future,” Haley said following her South Carolina defeat.

She said, “From the start of this campaign, I have made clear that I’m running for president to save America.”

To do so, however, she will have to save herself first. And that means winning something somewhere, while ignoring accusations that by continuing to attack Trump in a contest she cannot win, she is only helping Joe Biden.

And she will stubbornly continue to campaign through Super Tuesday on March 5 when 16 states will hold their GOP primaries, even though Trump is expected to sweep all of them.

Joe Biden and the Trump-hating Democrats love her campaign and her attacks on Trump. It is the best thing Biden has going for him.

Haley, the politicized U.S. Justice Department, along with Democratic prosecutors in New York and Georgia are all doing Biden’s work for him.

The Democrats love Haley. If you don’t think so just check out Gavin Newsom, the foppish Democrat governor of California, who is waiting in the wings for Biden to exit.

He said Democrats were happy that Haley was in the race attacking Trump. He described her as “one of the best” surrogates Biden has on the campaign trail.

“She’s making points (against Trump) I’m applauding every single day about his temperament, capacity, his unraveling in real time.”

“And so, I think she’s been incredibly effective. So, I hope she stays in personally,” Newsom said.

Haley would have added some heft to her campaign if she differed with Trump over some big issue, like immigration or the economy. Instead, she says that unlike her, Trump and Biden are just too old to be president.

Haley has no big issues, only a big ego.

Trump, meanwhile, has all the big issues and an ego as big as the country.

Peter Lucas is a veteran political reporter. Email him at peter.lucas@bostonherald.com