Pa. Republican ex-congressman backing Biden
A now-retired Republican congressman who was one of the few GOP representatives in Pennsylvania to not vote for Donald Trump in 2016 announced Wednesday he won’t do it this year, either.
But this time, former U.S. Rep. Charlie Dent won’t just write in someone else’s name. He’ll vote for a Democrat.
Mr. Dent, who represented the Lehigh Valley area from 2005 until his retirement in 2018, endorsed former Vice
President Joe Biden on Wednesday, writing in an op-ed for CNN that Mr. Biden is “fundamentally a decent and honorable man who respects the American tradition, supports the rule of law, embraces America’s friends and allies, and will restore some semblance of normalcy to the functioning of government.”
Though he anticipates having policy disagreements with the Democrat, Mr. Dent said Mr. Trump was “never part of [the] great tradition” of the Republican Party he grew up in, when he looked up to conservatives like Richard Thornburgh, Arlen Specter, John Heinz and Tom Ridge.
And what’s worse, Mr. Dent alleged, is Mr. Trump has “spent the better part of his presidency undermining the international order — methodically and carefully built, defended and repurposed on a bipartisan basis after World War II and again after the Cold War.”
At home, Mr. Trump has “been destructive” to institutions, Mr. Dent added.
“He attacks the independence of the judiciary, abuses his authority with executive actions, tramples on Congress’ constitutionally granted ‘power of the purse’ authority under Article I, and detests a free press,” Mr. Dent wrote. “In short, he is a threat to the rule of law and functional democracy.”
The Trump campaign could not be reached for comment.