USA Today Breaks 34-Year Non-Endorsement Tradition, Says Don't Vote for Donald Trump

USA Today has broken with a 34-year tradition of not taking sides in the presidential race, publishing a scathing editorial that doesn’t exactly endorse a candidate, but instead advises its readers not to vote for one… Donald Trump.

“This year, the choice isn’t between two capable major party nominees who happen to have significant ideological differences,” the paper explained in its endorsement. “This year, one of the candidates — Republican nominee Donald Trump — is, by unanimous consensus of the Editorial Board, unfit for the presidency.”

The paper’s editorial board lists eight reasons for its decision including the fact that the GOP nominee is “erratic,” “traffics in prejudice,” has a “checkered” business career, speaks “recklessly,” and is a “serial liar.”

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The editorial board also makes a point to say it does not have a consensus for a Clinton endorsement, who according to the paper “has her own flaws.”

While some on the board believe she’d “serve the nation ably as its president,” other members “have serious reservations about Clinton’s sense of entitlement, her lack of candor and her extreme carelessness in handling classified information.”

The non-endorsement ends with this line: “Whatever you do, however, resist the siren song of a dangerous demagogue. By all means vote, just not for Donald Trump.”

Hillary Clinton's 5 Best Donald Trump Attack Lines (Photos)

Hillary Clinton has spent the last week criticizing Donald Trump, and we asked experts which of her attack lines might land with voters.
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5. "So let's take a look at what he has done. He's written a lot of books about business -- they all seem to end at Chapter 11," Clinton said in a speech Monday, drawing huge applause from her supporters.

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Politico national politics reporter Eli Stokols told TheWrap that this is a crafty approach, but it could get old.

“It’s the kind of line that is good the first time because it has a ring to it, it’s kind of clever and she’s sort of saying something with a wink and a nod,” Stokols Said.

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“She’s going to make to is to redefine him not as a private entrepreneurial success, but as more of a poster child for some of the bad business excesses. It’s a really interesting strategy,” University of Southern California clinical professor of communications Gordon Stables told TheWrap.

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4. “Just like he shouldn’t have his finger on the button, he shouldn’t have his hands on our economy,” Clinton said referring to Trump’s foreign policy ideas and his economic proposals.

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“It’s about his character… she obviously wanted to highlight that there is something about his disposition or his temperament that basically says, ‘he doesn’t have the patience or wisdom or character to occupy the kind of crisis in the White House,’” Stables said.

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3. “I had my researchers and my speech writers send me information” on Trump “and then I’d say, ‘Really? He really said that?’ And they’d send me all the background and the video clip,” Clinton said.

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“I actually thought that was the most effective thing that you heard from her in terms of articulating this, because it personalizes it, it conveys that she’s someone who is a real person,” Stokols said. "It’s something that some voters will be able to relate to personally and it seemed convincing.”

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2. "I have this old-fashioned idea that if you're running for president, you should say what you want to do and how you'll get it done”
Stables feels that she could be looking to reach Bernie Sanders supporters that still feel frustrated.

“There are voters with a different economic critique… there is something they don’t like with the way Trump did business and she’s going directly at it,” he said.

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1. "The Chamber of Commerce and labor unions, Mitt Romney and Elizabeth Warren, economists on the right and the left and the center, all agree: Trump would throw us back into recession," Clinton said.
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“Clinton is defining the campaign on her terms… she’s positioning herself to make the argument she’s going to make in November. Trump is still fighting to define and differentiate what to say. He ran a very smart campaign to defeat the other Republican primary competitors,” Stables said.
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If you enjoyed this, check out Donald Trump’s 5 best Hillary Clinton attack lines.

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