New York Times columnist Bret Stephens revealed Monday his pick for president this November: Kamala Harris. Stephens, a longtime conservative writer at the Times, made the disclosure in a conversation with fellow columnist Gail Collins.
“Please don’t tell me you’re going to ask how I’m going to vote,” begins Stephens in the conversation published in the opinion pages.
“Well, Bret, why would you imagine such a thing? Just because I keep getting stopped by people on the street, demanding to know whether you’re going to support Kamala Harris. I am not making this up,” Collins replied, adding, “Come on. Give us a hint.”
Stephens then made the reveal:
Kicking and screaming, I’ll cast my ballot for Harris.
I really would rather have just sat out Election Day. But Jan. 6 and election denialism are unforgivable. And as my friend Richard North Patterson likes to say, “Donald Trump is literally bleeping crazy.” And what crazy brings in its wake is JD Vance, whom I find worse than Trump, because he’s just as cynical but twice as bright. And what it also brings in its wake is Tucker Carlson and the Hitler defenders he likes to platform.
Stephens, a former Wall Street Journal editor and one-time editor in chief of the Jerusalem Post, ended the conversation by making clear he won’t enjoy a Harris presidency. Stephens offered Harris some unsolicited advice for how to better beat Trump and added:
I also think she needs to avoid gimmicks, like her recently announced plan to extend economic help directly and preferentially to Black men, including fully forgivable loans. It’s blatantly unconstitutional, a naked political pander and economically damaging because forgivable loans reduce incentives to work and succeed. It’s also dumb politics: It alienates voters who are tired of identity politics as the dominant mode of liberal thinking and governance.
I’m really not going to like her presidency, am I?
Read the full conversation here.
