'The time is now': Trump critics call out 4 ex-presidents for their silence

20 February

The United States has four living ex-presidents — Republican George W. Bush and Democrats Barack Obama, Bill Clinton and Joe Biden — and not one of them is a supporter of President Donald Trump.

Obama, Clinton and Biden all supported Democratic nominee Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election. And even though Bush did not endorse either Harris or Trump, some ex-members of his administration endorsed Harris — including former Vice President Dick Cheney and former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

In an article published on February 20, The Hill's Amie Parnes stresses that Bush, Obama, Clinton and Biden "have barely uttered a word about President Trump's actions a month into his second term to the dismay of Democratic critics who say their voices are badly needed."

Democrats interviewed by The Hill argued that Trump is disregarding the rule of law — and that the four ex-presidents need to be speaking out.

A former senior Obama aide told The Hill, "I don't know what they're waiting for. The time isn't when Trump ignores court rulings. The time is now."

Democratic strategist Joel Payne, similarly, told The Hill, "No one knows more about the importance of our presidents respecting separation of powers and showing restraint than former presidents. Given Trump's ongoing power grab, those voices and perspectives of our ex-presidents would be critical to the public discourse at this moment."

Parnes notes that Obama did criticize the gutting of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) in a February 6 post on X, formerly Twitter — writing, "USAID has been fighting disease, feeding children, and promoting goodwill around the world for six decades…. Congress should resist."

But on the whole, Parnes adds, the four ex-presidents are staying silent.

GOP strategist Susan Del Percio, a Never Trump conservative who is often featured on MSNBC, believes that if Bush, Obama, Clinton or Biden forcefully condemned Trump at this point during his second presidency, it wouldn't have much of an impact.

"If they lend their voices to the conversation," Del Percio told The Hill, "they'll just be taken down by Trump. If they speak out, it'll be for the history books, not to affect the Trump presidency now. No one can influence Trump right now because he doesn't care what anyone thinks."

Del Percio added, "It seems to me, given his actions, he acts as if he knows best. There's no influencing. These presidents know that. If anything, they understand better than anybody the power of the presidency."

Read The Hill's full article at this link.

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