The USA Today railed against Trump and declared him “unfit for the presidency” in a scathing editorial — the first time in the newspaper’s 34-year history that it took a position in a presidential election.
“From the day he declared his candidacy 15 months ago through this week’s first presidential debate, Trump has demonstrated repeatedly that he lacks the temperament, knowledge, steadiness and honesty that America needs from its presidents,” the paper said. It then went on to compile a long list of Trump’s deficiencies, but also made it clear that its editorial stance does not “represent unqualified support for Hillary Clinton, who has her own flaws [though hers are far less likely to threaten national security or lead to a constitutional crisis]”.
The Washington Post meanwhile lashed out at Trump for “providing cover” for overt bigotry. “One of the most disturbing aspects of the presidential candidacy of Donald Trump is the legitimisation it has provided for extremist discourse,” the newspaper wrote in an editorial. “Rhetoric that properly has been taboo in this country for a generation — overt racism, sexism... has begun to seep back into politics, with Mr Trump and his closest associates providing cover.”
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel took note of Trump’s alleged tax evasion and said the scandal might disqualify him from presidency: “Trump is the first candidate from a major party since 1976 to refuse to release his tax returns. He claims he cannot release them because he’s under audit. But his son, Donald Jr, probably was closer to the mark when he noted in an interview... that releasing the tax returns would ‘distract’ from his father’s message.”
The New York Times itself chose to focus on a fiscal comparison of a Clinton and Trump presidency and said: “Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump agree that the nation’s roads, bridges and other infrastructure need an expensive overhaul. But voters should not assume that the candidates are equally capable of delivering results. The ability of any president to carry out a plan for repairs and new projects costing hundreds of billions of dollars depends on how the plan meshes with the administration’s other tax and spending proposals. An infrastructure overhaul cannot be done in isolation. Mrs Clinton’s approach has a shot at doing some good; Donald Trump’s approach would be fiscally untenable.”
It went on to identify areas where the Republican lags behind Clinton: “So far, Mr Trump has proposed some cuts to federal spending to partly offset the cost of the tax cuts, but his targets are poorly chosen... He has proposed, in effect, to cut spending on infrastructure as part of his plan to borrow for spending on infrastructure.”
The Guardian weighed in on the presidential debate last week and said: “Some will say neither candidate is worthy. In the end, though, one of them will be president of the United States in January. Mr Trump came into [last] week’s debate with an opportunity to show that there is more to his candidacy than the recklessness, rudeness, falsehood and appeal to racism that has marked it over the last months. On Monday he blew his opportunity.”
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