During the 2016 general election, newspaper editorial boards began sounding unprecedented alarm bells on Donald Trump. That would include USA Today, which strenuously noted that they were breaking their own tradition with a voting recommendation while declaring Trump to be “unfit for the presidency.” And on Tuesday night — although the piece quickly got buried by Doug Jones’ surprise win against Roy Moore — USA Today broke character once more while eviscerating Trump in a scathing piece by the editorial board called “Will Trump’s lows ever hit rock bottom?”
It’s worth nothing that USA Today‘s editorial board is centrist-to-conservative in makeup and rarely does takedown pieces against any figure. However, this op-ed was sparked by Trump’s suggestion that Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, who had called for his resignation, would “do anything” for donations, which did not sit well with the board:
“Rock bottom is no impediment for a president who can always find room for a new low. A president who would all but call Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand a whore is not fit to clean the toilets in the Barack Obama Presidential Library or to shine the shoes of George W. Bush.”
The piece does go on to acknowledge the flaws of both Obama and Dubya, but the board maintains that both of those previous presidents never lost track of their “basic decency.” However….
“Donald Trump, the man, on the other hand, is uniquely awful. His sickening behavior is corrosive to the enterprise of a shared governance based on common values and the consent of the governed. A president who shows such disrespect for the truth, for ethics, for the basic duties of the job and for decency toward others fails at the very essence of what has always made America great.”
Not only did the board take a shot at Trump’s MAGA motto, they also take umbrage with Sarah Huckabee Sanders’ dismissal of the Gillibrand insult as a “misunderstanding” because Trump also says such things about male politicians. However, USA Today reminds everyone that Trump often “pours the gasoline of sexist language and lights the match gleefully,” including the time when he said Megyn Kelly was bleeding from her “whereever” during a debate. You can read the full USA Today editorial board piece here.
(Via USA Today)