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Divided We Stand

Divided We Stand
New book about the 2020 election.

Thursday, August 27, 2020

The Permission Ramp Gets Sturdier

In Defying the Odds, we discuss the 2016 campaign. The 2019 update includes a chapter on the 2018 midterms. The 2020 race, the subject of our next book, is well underway

  An unusual aspect of the campaign is the number of high-profile Republicans supporting Biden.


Camilo Montoya-Galvez at CBS:
Republican aides who worked in the George W. Bush administration and for the late Senator John McCain and Mitt Romney vouched their support for 2020 Democratic nominee Joe Biden on Thursday, joining other GOP officials in rejecting President Trump's reelection campaign on the final day of the Republican National Convention.

...
"Given the incumbent president's lack of competent leadership, his efforts to aggravate rather than bridge divisions among Americans, and his failure to uphold American values, we believe the election of former Vice President Biden is clearly in the national interest," more than 100 former McCain staffers wrote in a public letter.

Romney's former staffers were more forceful in their rebuke of Mr. Trump, saying that while some of them voted for him in 2016, they are all now worried about the GOP transforming into a "toxic personality cult" under the president's leadership. Romney himself has frequently crossed the White House since arriving in the Senate, and was the only GOP senator to vote to convict Mr. Trump in his impeachment trial.
"Since 2017, the results of that disastrous decision have been on full display for the world to see. Now, with a pandemic crippling our economy and strangling our national spirit, every corner of America is suffering at the hands of President Trump's erratic, inept, self-absorbed governing style," more than 30 former Romney aides wrote in their letter.
...
"Joe's kindness is sorely needed right now. He famously treats the train operator with the same dignity as his fellow senators. As former public servants, we believe that decency in government must not be allowed to die on the vine," 230 Bush alumni wrote in their letter. "We must take a stand and insist that it returns to the Office of the President."