The Conservatives of Conscience
In the tradition of leaders across history who stood up for truth amid the fog of tribalism—and who refused to be complicit in the face of evil—hundreds of prominent Republicans and conservatives are standing up for American democracy by endorsing Joe Biden. Please consider sharing their words with friends and family who may be reluctant to vote Democratic, but whose support America now needs.
More than 130 senior Republican national security officials, including former Senators and directors of the C.I.A., F.B.I., and N.S.A., in an open letter: "Trump has demonstrated that he lacks the character and competence to lead this nation and has engaged in corrupt behavior that renders him unfit to serve as President... Trump has disgraced America’s global reputation and undermined our nation’s moral and diplomatic influence... Joe Biden should be elected the next President of the United States."
230 officials from the George W. Bush administration: "As a nation, we have lost our moral compass... We need to get back to basics: facts matter, there is right and wrong. We can do that with Joe Biden in the Oval Office."
George Will, the conservative icon, who warns that conservatism today has become "unAmerican" and has called for Trump's defeat in all 50 states: "Senate Republicans must be routed [too], as condign punishment for their Vichyite collaboration."
Garry Kasparov, the chess legend and democracy activist who foresaw the autocratic threat posed by Vladimir Putin: "Anything other than landslide victory for the Democratic ticket may lead to [a] doomsday scenario... Giving Trump any chance of surviving politically and staying in power would be disastrous for America."
More than 100 ex-staffers for John McCain: "President Trump’s inept leadership of the federal government’s response to the covid-19 pandemic has cost many more lives than it should have... His disinterest in American values, his tolerance for despots and his hostility to allies leave us uniquely vulnerable while our adversaries take every advantage of absent American leadership."
Cindy McCain, widow of John McCain: “My husband John lived by a code: country first. We are Republicans, yes, but Americans foremost. There's only one candidate in this race who stands up for our values as a nation, and that is Joe Biden.”
A group of nearly 100 Republicans and Independents, including Republican presidential candidate Bill Weld: “Donald Trump’s daily assaults on our nation’s founding principles pose an existential threat to the future of the Republic.”
Jeff Flake, former Arizona Senator: "It is because of my conservatism, and because of my belief in the Constitution and the separation of power... that I stand here today, proudly and wholeheartedly, to endorse Joe Biden." He adds, "Don't let anyone tell you that by casting your vote for Joe Biden you are not being conservative. This year, the most conservative thing you can do is put country over party."
Peter Wehner, who served in the previous three Republican administrations: "Conservatism places a premium on prudence, human dignity, respect for the law and institutions, commitment to truth and reality, and a reasonable and reasoning governing temperament. In all of these respects, and others, Mr. Biden is more truly conservative than Mr. Trump."
Bruce Bartlett, former economic adviser to Ronald Reagan: "This election is literally a matter of life and death. Voting for Trump or not voting is voting for death." He adds, "After the war, Germany underwent a process called 'denazification' to clean out all remnants of the Nazi Party in government and society. After Trump is gone, we will need to undergo detrumpification. We should study the German experience."
Colin Powell, former Secretary of State under George W. Bush: "With Joe Biden in the White House, you will never doubt that he will stand with our friends and stand up to our adversaries—never the other way around."
George Conway, Reed Galen, Steve Schmidt, John Weaver, and Rick Wilson, advisors of the Lincoln Project: “This November, Americans will cast their most consequential votes since Abraham Lincoln’s reelection in 1864… Publicly supporting a Democratic nominee for president is a first for all of us… The nation cannot afford another four years of chaos, duplicity and Trump’s reality distortion.” Galen, Weaver, and Wilson have also written that “the United States faces a… threat not from abroad, but from within. The Republican Party… no longer deals in principle, morality, or the pursuit of the common welfare. It is no longer a party driven by a commitment to the rule of law, the preservation of individual liberty, or adherence to the Constitution… It is a dark mirror of the authoritarian regimes we once fought.”
Tom Nichols, nuclear expert and professor at the U.S. Naval War College: "The time for sentimentality is over... The only decent, sensible, and conservative position is to vote against this Republican Party at every level, and bring the sad final days of a once-great political institution to an end... Trump’s few conservative achievements are meaningless when compared with his war on American democracy."
Steve Schmidt, John McCain's 2008 campaign manager: "The conman who said, 'I alone can fix it'... has birthed an era of death, suffering, economic collapse and total chaos across government at an hour of maximum testing and crisis for the nation... He is a disaster and lacks the capacity morally, mentally and intellectually to fulfill the duties of his office." Schmidt has also written, "I have spent much of my life working in GOP politics. I have always believed that both parties were two of the most important institutions to the advancement of human freedom and dignity in the history of the world. Today the GOP has become a danger to our democracy and values."
Evan McMullin, former C.I.A. officer and 2016 independent presidential candidate: "I'd rather deal with the fact that a Democratic president doesn't always agree with me than sacrifice all of my core principles and the health of the republic to support a dangerously incompetent conman because he happens to call himself a Republican. This isn't complicated."
Jennifer Rubin, conservative columnist: "Let's be honest: There is no conservative movement or party today. There is a Republican Party thoroughly infused with racism and intellectually corrupted by right-wing nationalism... For now, the objective remains removal of Trump and obliteration of a party that has grievously betrayed democracy and abandoned simple decency and honesty."
Andrew Sullivan, conservative author: "[Trump] has delegitimized capitalism by his cronyism, corruption, and indifference to dangerously high levels of inequality. He has tainted conservatism indelibly as riddled with racism, xenophobia, paranoia, misogyny, and derangement. Every hoary stereotype leveled against the right for decades has been given credence by the GOP’s support for this monster of a human being. If moderates have any chance of defanging the snake of wokeness, and its attempt to deconstruct our Enlightenment inheritance, we must begin with removing the cancer of Trump from the body politic... Removing it will not be enough. But not removing it is democratic death."
William H. McRaven, a retired four-star Navy admiral: "Our Republic is under attack from the president," whose authoritarian mindset is "the greatest threat to democracy in my lifetime.”
John Kasich, former Republican governor of Ohio: "I’m a lifelong Republican, but that attachment holds second place to my responsibility to my country."
Olivia Troy, former top aide and coronavirus adviser to Mike Pence, endorsing Biden on account of Trump's "flat-out disregard for human life."
Christine Whitman, former Republican governor of New Jersey: "This isn’t about a Republican or Democrat. It’s about a person, a person decent enough, stable enough, strong enough to get our economy back on track."
Max Boot, a foreign policy adviser to three Republican presidential candidates: "We have to destroy the Republican Party in order to save it... America needs a sane center-right party. It doesn’t need an extremist party that undermines democracy, caters to White grievances, and rejects science and reason. The only way Republicans will come to their senses is if they see that the path they are on leads to electoral oblivion."
Rick Snyder, former Republican governor of Michigan: "President Trump lacks a moral compass. He ignores the truth. Facts and science matter."
Tom Ridge, former Republican governor of Pennsylvania and secretary of homeland security under George W. Bush: “I will cast my vote for Joe Biden... [Trump] lacks the empathy, integrity, intellect, and maturity to lead... Our country has paid dearly in lives lost, social unrest, economic hardship, and our standing in the world.”
20 Republican former federal prosecutors, including a F.B.I. and C.I.A. director under Ronald Reagan: Trump is “a threat to the rule of law in our country.”
Peter Keisler, Robert Kruger, Alan Charles Raul, J. Michael Shepherd, and Nicholas Rostow, all lawyers in the Reagan White House: "Mr. Trump’s lawless, amoral and dishonorable ethos makes a mockery of the democratic accountability that is fostered through respect for law and our constitutional principles... Joe Biden can help reverse the un-American miasma foisted upon the country by Donald Trump.”
Jennifer Horn, former chair of the New Hampshire Republican Party: "Trump has destroyed the foundations of traditional conservatism and the American institutions upon which our democracy is built. He does not deserve your loyalty, and neither does the party that has allowed it to happen. The only way we can reclaim our principles and build a conservative future is to first defeat him... This I know in my heart to be true: If we do not stand together, cast aside our partisan differences and defeat a hateful dangerous president, we will live forever with the shame of having abandoned our principles, our democracy and generations to come."
Benjamin Ginsberg, who spent four decades practicing election law for Republican candidates: "This is as un-American as it gets... Challenging voters at the polls or disputing the legitimacy of mail-in ballots isn’t about fraud. Rather than producing conservative policies that appeal to suburban women, young voters or racial minorities, Republicans are trying to exclude their votes... My fellow Republicans, look what we’ve become. It is we who must fix this. Trump should not be reelected. Vote, but not for him."
Other notable efforts:
81 Nobel laureates, in an open letter: "At no time in our nation's history has there been a greater need for our leaders to appreciate the value of science in formulating public policy... As American citizens and as scientists, we wholeheartedly endorse Joe Biden for President."
Scientific American, endorsing a presidential candidate for the first time in its 175-year history: "We do not do this lightly. The evidence and the science show that Donald Trump has badly damaged the U.S. and its people—because he rejects evidence and science... [W]e urge you to vote for Joe Biden, who is offering fact-based plans to protect our health, our economy and the environment."
780 retired national security officials, in an open letter: "our allies no longer trust or respect us, and our enemies no longer fear us... Joe Biden must be the next President of the United States."
The New England Journal of Medicine, breaking with a two-century tradition of avoiding politics: "When it comes to the response to the largest public health crisis of our time, our current political leaders have demonstrated that they are dangerously incompetent. We should not abet them and enable the deaths of thousands more Americans by allowing them to keep their jobs."
More than 2,000 historians, in an open letter: "President Trump’s numerous and flagrant abuses of power are precisely what the Framers had in mind as grounds for impeaching and removing a president."
The Atlantic, endorsing for only the fourth time in 163 years: "Trump has brought our country low; he has divided our people; he has pitted race against race; he has corrupted our democracy; he has shown contempt for American ideals; he has made cruelty a sacrament; he has provided comfort to propagators of hate; he has abandoned America’s allies; he has aligned himself with dictators; he has encouraged terrorism and mob violence; he has undermined the agencies and departments of government; he has despoiled the environment; he has opposed free speech; he has lied frenetically and evangelized for conspiracism; he has stolen children from their parents; he has made himself an advocate of a hostile foreign power; and he has failed to protect America from a ravaging virus. Trump is not responsible for all of the 220,000 COVID-19-related deaths in America. But through his avarice and ignorance and negligence and titanic incompetence, he has allowed tens of thousands of Americans to suffer and die, many alone, all needlessly. With each passing day, his presidency reaps more death."
The Economist, issuing perhaps the sternest warning in its history: "Donald Trump has desecrated the values that make America a beacon to the world."
Nature, the prestigious science journal: "We cannot stand by and let science be undermined. Joe Biden’s trust in truth, evidence, science and democracy make him the only choice in the US election."