When interviewing for a new job, it’s generally not a good strategy to insult a potential employer or show open contempt for the company. But apparently Donald Trump never got that professional pro-tip.
Trump regularly raves about loving the country but most voters don’t believe he respects it or them. More than half of the country doubts his respect for American democracy. That’s a rough reputation for a candidate applying to become the leader of the free world.
According to a recent Pew Research poll, 56 percent of voters say that the celebrity candidate “has little or no respect for democratic institutions and traditions.” And fewer than half say he respects women, minorities, or immigrants.
Part of that report is unsurprising. The Trump brand has become synonymous with brazen disruption. He became the “chaos candidate” by upending the Republican party and promising voters that he’d do the same to a political system that’s forgotten them. Disdain for elites and their politically correct values fueled the populism that swept him into the nomination.
But his constant promises to “Make America Great Again,” have left the majority of the country wondering what he thinks about the underlying institution.
That temperament combined with Trump’s recent threat to disregard the results of the election, have given the Clinton campaign an easy opportunity to label him as dangerous to democracy.
With less than two weeks before Election Day, Hillary Clinton wondered aloud whether the New York businessman had “ever read the Constitution.” She quipped to a Florida gymnasium that if Trump did the reading, “he certainly doesn’t remember it and he doesn’t understand it.”
Voters aren’t as uneasy with Clinton as they are with Trump. The same Pew Research poll shows that 63 percent of Americans believe the Democrat has “a fair amount or great deal of respect for democratic institutions and traditions.”
Those numbers are a testament to the Clinton team. In a triumph of branding, they’ve successfully whitewashed her track record of brazen indifference to Democratic institutions. From the governor’s mansion in Little Rock to the State Department, Clinton has ignored or utilized government to her own advantage.
Philip Wegmann is a commentary writer for the Washington Examiner.
