“It’s an idea whose time is inevitably coming for Republican presidential candidates — pardoning former President Donald J. Trump.”
That was National Review editor Rich Lowry in Politico this week, echoing others on the right who have decided that if Trump is convicted of any of the crimes he’s been accused of, he should be pardoned — get this — for the good of the country.
As Lowry puts it, “the idea of pardoning Trump is a sensible one that, depending on the exact circumstances, truly could serve the public interest ... having a former president stand trial in a federal criminal case, and potentially spend the rest of his life in jail, is only going to make things more intense and the country more divided.”
Lowry’s hardly alone. At least two of his opponents in the Republican primary have suggested the same.
Vivek Ramaswamy has floated the idea of making every GOP presidential rival pledge to pardon Trump should he be convicted, and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley says she would be “inclined in favor of a pardon,” because, “When you look at a pardon, the issue is less about guilt and more about what’s good for the country.”
A Washington Post column penned by two American Enterprise Institute conservatives suggests President JOE Biden needs to “deliver on his promise to heal the country,” by pardoning Trump.
Let’s be clear about one thing: Donald Trump should not be pardoned.
Trump is accused of multiple criminal offenses, and potentially has more awaiting him. He was one of the most divisive, self-absorbed, abusive, and power-hungry presidents in history, and one who almost never put the country or the Constitution before his own overweening ego.
He spread dangerous lies that put Americans in real danger, and he incited violence that led to a rise in right-wing extremism and even actual violence on Jan. 6, 2021. He continues to lie about the 2020 election, and foment hate against his political opponents, the criminal justice system, the intelligence community, the media, and anyone else who would get in his way.
He’s alleged to have threatened national security by willfully mishandling classified documents. And he promoted and embraced anti-American autocrats like Russia’s Vladimir Putin, Hungary’s Victor Orban, and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un.
None of this should be pardoned. These aren’t minor infractions, they’re some of the worst offenses a leader can commit. It’s a joke — an offensive one — to argue any of this should be forgiven.
But it’s an even bigger joke to pretend this would be “for the good of the country.”
The idea that pardoning Trump would do anything to make things less “intense,” Americans less “divided,” or the country “good” is absurd. Trump and his supporters will continue their war of retribution, their dangerous conspiracy theories, their destructive rhetoric, their politics of revenge, and their obsession with owning the libs whether he’s in jail or shuffling around Mar-A-Lago bragging about the classified documents he used to keep in his bathroom.
A fantasy to reverse a decade of destruction
Just imagine everything that would have to happen to buy into this Pollyanna fantasy that a pardon would heal the country.
In this fictional world, Trump drops all the talk of election rigging, apologizes for the terrible things he’s said and the criminal things he’s done, and stops fomenting hatred and inciting violence to avenge his perceived political persecution.
Then imagine Republicans in Congress like Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene and Paul Gossar stop trafficking in bigoted and antisemitic rhetoric, stop pushing bills meant to punish women, LGBTQ, religious minorities and immigrants.
Then imagine his friends in QAnon dropping all their conspiracy theories about Democratic pedophile rings and the resurrected JFK Jr. running with Trump in 2024, and suddenly decide that facts do matter after all.
Then imagine his buddies in the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers, the neo-Nazis, antisemites, and the white supremacists give up on their projects to purify the American ethno-national identity, and instead embrace our ethnic, racial and religious diversity.
Then imagine all the right-wing talk radio and cable news personalities stop pedaling divisive culture wars nonsense and autocratic garbage like book bans, where Fox News refrains from chyrons calling the incumbent president a “wannabe dictator,” and primetime hosts don’t lie to their viewers, by their own admission.
Does anyone truly believe that pardoning Trump, after convicting him and potentially jailing him, would trigger this social, cultural, and political undoing? That it would reverse the decade of destruction Trump has carefully nurtured? That it would suddenly endear Biden or Democrats to Trump, his supporters, Republicans, right-wing media, QAnon, white supremacists, and all the disparate groups determined to keep the country divided?
With all due respect, that is one magic pardon.
S.E. Cupp is the host of “S.E. Cupp Unfiltered” on CNN.
Send letters to letters@suntimes.com
