Can Trump ever go too far?
Democrat, Republican, or Independent, can’t we all agree? This is the craziest presidential campaign we can remember. The two oldest presidential candidates ever. The two least popular candidates ever. The most qualified and least qualified candidates ever. And the first time ever that one candidate could say anything — anything — and get away with it.
Indeed, more than anything else, the history of the 2016 presidential election will be remembered for the number of times the political commentariat has solemnly declared: “This is it! Donald Trump has finally gone too far” — only to be proven wrong. And within days they were forced to respond to an even more outrageous outburst.
It started in 2011, when Trump made himself a household name by leading the “birther movement,” a racist conspiracy whose sole aim was to discredit the first African-American president of the United States. Even when Obama released his long-form birth certificate, Trump denounced it as a forgery, alleging that private detectives he’d dispatched to Hawaii had made “absolutely unbelievable discoveries” and accusing Obama’s grandparents of planting a fake birth announcement in Hawaiian newspapers. And even when he finally admitted Obama was born in the United States, Trump blamed Clinton for starting the birther movement, which is an outright lie.
On June 16, 2015, he famously launched his presidential campaign by labeling all Mexican immigrants “criminals” and “rapists,” promising to keep them out by building a massive wall that Mexico would pay for. Three months later, he threw gasoline on the anti-Latino flames by vowing to deport 12 million immigrants who came to this country illegally. This was quickly matched by his continuing pledge to ban all Muslims from entering the country, even legally.
If that wasn’t enough to derail the Trump campaign, surely his scorn of Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., would do it. How could you ridicule a genuine American war hero and get away with it? Donald Trump did. Just like he got away with denouncing the parents of a Muslim U.S. Army captain killed by a suicide bomber in Iraq 12 years ago. For Trump, even Bronze Star recipients and Gold Star families are fair game. And so, apparently, is Pope Francis, whom Trump also insulted.
It doesn’t stop there. He has called President Obama the “founder” of ISIS. He suggested that Second Amendment crazies would know how to prevent a President Hillary Clinton from nominating new members of the Supreme Court — and more recently suggested we take away her Secret Service protection and “see what happens.” All the while praising Vladimir Putin as the kind of leader we need in this country and urging the Russian government to hack Clinton’s emails.
The combination of Trump’s personal insults, disregard for the truth and basic ignorance about important policy issues has lifted this campaign far beyond normal partisan considerations. This week, 375 leading scientists, including 30 Nobel Laureates, released a letter warning of the dangers of a Trump presidency, alarmed by his pledge to pull the United States out of the Paris Climate Agreement. Later in the week, 75 retired senior diplomats of both parties announced their opposition to Trump, stating that his understanding of foreign policy was based on “the most ignorant stereotypes” of foreign countries.
They follow the lead of 50 prominent national security experts, including many veterans of the George W. Bush administration, who last month came out publicly against Trump, asserting he would be “the most reckless president in American history.” Their numbers include two former heads of the Department of Homeland Security under President Bush, Tom Ridge and Michael Chertoff, and former NSA and CIA Director Michael Hayden.
And they are joined by scores of top Republicans who have refused to endorse the Republican Party’s nominee for president, including two former presidents, George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush; former GOP nominee Mitt Romney; former Secretary of State Colin Powell; former presidential candidates Jeb Bush, Lindsey Graham, Ted Cruz and John Kasich; and GOP Senators Jeff Flake, Ben Sasse, Susan Collins and Mark Kirk.
There’s no doubt that any one of Trump’s outrageous statements would have sunk any other candidate for president. Ed Muskie, remember, was forced out simply for shedding a few tears. Rick Perry, for one brain fart. Yet Donald Trump has neither apologized for nor backed away from anything he’s said — and nevertheless gets a free ride from the media.
So why the double-standard? Even if no single statement would do it, shouldn’t the whole bunch of Trump’s incendiary remarks be enough to disqualify him?