Doing it his way
Yesterday, in these printed pages and online, we published an op-ed from Nikki Haley and one from Biden campaign surrogate California Congressman Ro Khanna making the arguments for those presidential candidacies; both are worth reading. As our Editor’s Note said, the Trump campaign was provided the same opportunity and declined. It’s a shame, as it would have also been worth the read. While we are not insulted, the slight goes beyond the readers of the Daily News, as the op-ed project was also undertaken by a great many of our sister newspapers across the country, ranging from the Boston Herald to the San Diego Union-Tribune, for example.
Massachusetts and California are just two of the 15 states that are holding presidential primaries or caucuses on Super Tuesday, now only three days away, and the op-eds allowed voters of both parties to see the stands and positions of the candidates. But not Donald Trump
The op-ed refusal is in line with Trump’s refusal to debate his Republican Party challengers for the nomination. Over the last six months, all but Trump engaged in five televised showdowns as the field shrank from eight non-Trump contenders (like Mike Pence and Chris Christie) to just Haley and Ron DeSantis.
We understand well that the goal of any campaign, including Trump’s, is to win and if skipping op-eds or ducking debates works for him, so be it.
Trump hasn’t been hiding and has been very visible, substituting the debate stage for voluntary court appearances in Manhattan, where there have been four separate cases. The three civil trials of E. Jean Carroll defamation I ($5 million judgment), E. Jean Carroll defamation II ($83.3 million judgment) and Attorney General Tish James for business fraud ($354.9 million judgment, plus another $100 million in interest) and his Stormy Daniels payoff criminal case.
Yesterday, while Haley was on the campaign trail ahead of Super Tuesday, Trump was in Florida for his purloined classified files case prosecuted by Special Counsel Jack Smith (Florida is not voting on Super Tuesday).
His strategy may serve him well, carrying him through to a sweep of the 16 states, racking up evermore delegates towards the nomination, but it does not serve the voters and the rest of the public. They should have a chance to hear the likely GOP standard-bearer on important matters of the economy and war and peace, not just that he’s the victim of witch-hunts and is being railroaded by crooked prosecutors in league with the Democratic National Committee.
The Republican National Convention is in four months and Trump has many a court date before then, including his first criminal trial, here in Manhattan. Those proceedings, starting on March 25, will keep him in the news, while he’s in the dock.
The front porch campaign was used successfully by presidential candidates at the end of the 19th century by the likes of William McKinley and others, who sat at home and had the people come to them. Trump is trying something new, a front table campaign, where he sits in court with his defense lawyers. So far for Trump, it’s performing well.
But what benefits candidate Trump does not benefit democracy or our system of fair and impartial justice, as he makes a mockery of both.