Bret Stephens, the Never-Trumper conservative writing for The New York Times editorial page, announced in a recent column that he will vote for Kamala Harris in this election. He will do so not because Donald Trump is a fascist and not because he didn’t preside over a successful presidency — Stephens admits he oversaw a thriving economy and peace around the world — but because the writer somehow knows he will do much worse this time around.
His arguments are ridiculous and highlight the plight of those (there are many) who have resolutely opposed and underestimated the former president, happily left him for politically dead two years ago, and are mortified that they may be embarrassed all over again on Nov. 5.
As the GOP has slipped the chokehold of establishment elites who backed the war in Iraq and cheered harmful globalism, Stephens has been left behind.
First, Stephens writes that Trump tried to politicize justice. He cites his effort to have Ukraine’s President Zelensky probe Joe Biden’s questionable business activities in that corrupt country, as well as his Justice Department’s efforts to block a merger between Time Warner and AT&T out of animus toward CNN.
Forgive me, but those infractions pale in comparison with the Biden-Harris lawfare against Donald Trump and his associates.
Consider the flimsy cases; the corrupt local officials encouraged by the White House to pursue sketchy investigations; the imprisonment of Steve Bannon and Peter Navarro; the politically motivated lawsuits attacking Elon Musk; the censorship of opponents. The Biden-Harris record of politicizing the Department of Justice and the legal system is horrifying.
Second, Stephens says that a Trump presidency will only exacerbate our fiscal problems, adding more to the deficits than Harris. He cites estimates from the Committee for a Responsible Budget showing that Trump’s numerous campaign proposals would increase our nation’s debt by $7.75 trillion over 10 years, while Vice President Harris’s economic plan would boost debt by $3.95 trillion through 2035. It is worth noting that the watchdog group acknowledges its projections are highly uncertain, ranging from $300 billion to $8.3 trillion for Harris’s agenda and $1.65 trillion to $15.55 trillion for the Trump program.
What is not uncertain is that the Biden-Harris White House has lofted federal spending way above historical norms, to more than 23 percent of GDP from 21 percent. There is every indication that Harris would continue on that path, whatever she is saying now. Securing votes from key constituents like young people through forgiving student debt, appealing to minorities and climate zealots with programs designed to win their support — that’s what Democrats do.
The Trump-Vance team is talking about reforming the federal government, with the help of Elon Musk, who boldly claims he can cut $2 trillion out of a $6 trillion budget. That’s almost certainly optimistic, but a serious review of our bloated bureaucracy could likely save taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars each year. Reducing the waste, fraud and sheer inefficiency of our government would be a huge win.
Neither Biden nor Harris, nor any of their Democratic colleagues, has ever conceded that their outrageous multitrillion-dollar spend-a-thon was responsible for igniting the worst inflation in decades. They are unrepentant; at least Trump and Vance acknowledge we have a problem.
Stephens’s third issue is “freedom.” He points to Trump’s oft-expressed admiration for strong men like Vladimir Putin or North Korea’s Kim Jong Un and warns that he only managed to resist emulating their authoritarian instincts because he was surrounded by the likes of Jim Mattis and John Bolton who, he says, “didn’t let him get away with his worst policy impulses.”
The Times writer tosses Secretary of State Mike Pompeo aside, charging he was responsible for the “dishonorable negotiation with the Taliban” that led to Biden’s disgraceful withdrawal from that country. That is debatable. It is unlikely that Trump, who negotiated the plan to withdraw, would have greenlighted the dark-of-night retreat from Bagram Air Base, or the abandonment of billions of dollars of armaments and weapons. Biden overrode his generals, directing the operation, and it was a catastrophe. That is hardly on Trump.
Stephens ignores Pompeo’s tough stance on China, Trump’s sanctions on the Nord Stream 2 Pipeline, and his administration’s formal Missile Defense strategy that “significantly expands the role and scope of U.S. missile defenses, with a distant potential to undermine Russian and Chinese strategic retaliatory capabilities,” according to a European security group.
Most important, he ignores Trump’s successful efforts to starve Iran of funds, reducing the threat posed by the Middle East’s greatest sponsor of terror — efforts undermined by the Biden-Harris White House with disastrous results. The ring-fencing and impoverishing of Tehran led to the extraordinary success of the Abraham Accords, which laid the groundwork for long-term stability and peace in the Middle East. Again, undermined by the Biden-Harris White House.
Stephens ignores, especially, the cataclysmic invasion of Ukraine by Putin under the Biden-Harris administration, and the stop-start support of Israel which has only prolonged the suffering in the region. It is impossible to argue that Harris, who has claimed she would continue Joe Biden’s policies, has been more successful on the international stage than Trump.
No conservative with a lick of common sense can vote for Harris. She and her backers envision enlarging the welfare state, continuing to disarm our law enforcement agencies, welcoming unlimited numbers of migrants into our country and pursuing a globalist agenda that puts the U.S. at a disadvantage.
As for freedom, I’ll put freedom of speech — which is under assault from the left — freedom of religion and school choice ahead of worrying about Trump’s so-called “authoritarian” instincts. Yes, Jan. 6 was a terrible day, but Biden became president, and our country’s many safeguards proved resilient.
For over eight years, Bret Stephens has belittled and despised Trump, once referring to his presidency as “an unsightly pimple on our long republican experiment.” Stephens got left behind when the GOP became the party of common-sense working-class Americans.
The good news is, those people don’t read The New York Times.
Liz Peek is a former partner of major bracket Wall Street firm Wertheim and Company.
