The University of Connecticut College Republicans say they cannot back GOP nominee Donald Trump for president.
“Entrusting the nuclear codes, supervision of the U.S. economy, and responsibility for conducting foreign policy to a person so mentally unstable as Donald Trump would be dangerous,” the group said in a statement on Facebook late Monday.
{mosads}The group isn’t backing Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton in the presidential race either.
The Connecticut group isn’t the first band of college Republicans to split with Trump.
Harvard University’s Republican Club announced earlier this month it could not support the billionaire due to his “flirtations with fascism.”
Yale Republicans recently revealed that they plan on supporting Trump as they are “dedicated to achieving victory” this November.
UConn’s College Republicans said they reject Trump because his remarks and positions run counter to constitutional values.
“Someone who employs divisive, outright bigoted rhetoric, and who pits Americans against each other in an effort to scare voters into embracing his candidacy is not worthy of our support,” they said.
“Based on his rhetoric and his stances on public policy, he would guide the United States in a direction astray from constitutional, limited government and toward a direction defined by ugly nationalism and authoritarianism.”
Paul DaSilva, the group’s president, confirmed in a separate interview Monday it would also shun Clinton.
“We’re not going to support Hillary Clinton, and we’re not going to support Donald Trump,” he told The Daily Campus, a student-run newspaper at UConn.
“It seemed to me that an overwhelming majority of the [College Republicans] didn’t support Trump,” he said of his group. “There’s been a lot of noise and publicity that has been given to the way that the party has just kind of come apart this election.”