USA Today Endorses Joe Biden

 

The Editorial Board of the nationwide daily USA Today - and for my overseas truckbuddies, I might describe it as the low-key, mild-mannered Mr. Rogers of American newspapers - has for the first time in its four-decade history endorsed a presidential candidate. Excerpt from the Board's statement:

Four years ago, the Editorial Board — an ideologically and demographically diverse group of journalists that is separate from the news staff and operates by consensus — broke with tradition and took sides in the presidential race for the first time since USA TODAY was founded in 1982. We urged readers not to vote for Donald Trump, calling the Republican nominee unfit for office because he lacked the “temperament, knowledge, steadiness and honesty that America needs from its presidents.”

We stopped short, however, of an outright endorsement of Hillary Clinton, the Democratic nominee. This year, the Editorial Board unanimously supports the election of Joe Biden, who offers a shaken nation a harbor of calm and competence. . . .

It's no secret that the Editorial Board disagrees with Trump not just on his approach to the coronavirus but also on fundamental issues, from health care and climate change to immigration and trade. Policy differences, however, are not the reason behind our first-ever presidential endorsement. Diverse views, even ones we think are wrongheaded, are a staple of American politics and something to celebrate.

If this were a choice between two capable major party nominees who happened to have opposing ideas, we wouldn’t choose sides. Different voters have different concerns. But this is not a normal election, and these are not normal times. This year, character, competence and credibility are on the ballot. Given Trump’s refusal to guarantee a peaceful transfer of power if he loses, so, too, is the future of America's democracy.

For nearly four decades, the Editorial Board has stood for certain core values: truth, accountability, civility in public discourse, opposition to racism, common-ground solutions to the nation’s problems, and steadfast support for First Amendment rights. These aren’t partisan issues, or at least they shouldn’t be.

Donald Trump has trampled each of these principles, making more than 20,000 false or misleading statements, ducking responsibility for his actions, spewing streams of invective at his critics, trafficking in racial fearmongering, governing more as the leader of the red states than of the United States, and relentlessly attacking the free press.

Everything about Biden’s nearly half-century political career suggests he would do a far better job of respecting these values. “We need to revive the spirit of bipartisanship in this country, the spirit of being able to work with one another,” the Democratic nominee said in a recent speech in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. . . .

Biden is well positioned to repair the wreckage Trump has made of the federal government, from the foreign service to the science agencies Trump has tried to politicize. As vice president in the Obama administration, Biden played a central role in the last economic recovery and is equipped to handle another one.

Even before the pandemic struck, Trump did no better than the Obama-Biden administration on job creation, the stock market and economic growth. (Remember his promise to pay off the national debt in eight years? It's now $27 trillion, up more than $7 trillion from four years ago.) Biden knows that the recovery process will require, first and foremost, a comprehensive national response to the COVID-19 crisis that has upended Americans’ lives and left large sectors of the economy reeling. 

This extraordinary moment in the history of our nation requires an extraordinary response. With his plans, his personnel picks, his experience and his humanity, Joe Biden can help lead the United States out of this morass and into the future. Your vote can help make that happen.

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