New Hampshire Union Leader endorses Biden

The New Hampshire Union Leader has endorsed Democrat Joe Biden for president in a blow to President Trump, who is set to visit the state on Sunday.

While the president has had an antagonistic relationship with the Union Leader, he had seen New Hampshire as one of a few states that Democrat Hillary Clinton won in 2016 that he could win in 2020. Polls show him trailing Biden in the Granite State.

Four years ago, the conservative editorial board of the Union Leader endorsed Gary Johnson rather than endorse Trump or Clinton. 

{mosads}“Building this country up sits squarely within the skill set of Joseph Biden. We have found Mr. Biden to be a caring, compassionate and professional public servant,” the newspaper stated in an editorial on early Sunday. “He has repeatedly expressed his desire to be a president for all of America, and we take him at his word.”

“Joe Biden may not be the president we want, but in 2020 he is the president we desperately need. He will be a president to bring people together and right the ship of state,” it continued.

The paper noted that its policy disagreements with the former vice president “are significant” and said, despite its endorsement, it expects to “spend a significant portion of the next four years disagreeing with the Biden administration on our editorial pages.”

But it added that Biden was “among the most moderate” candidates “in the crowded 2020 Democratic primary field” and proposed “some of the lowest new spending among that increasingly left-leaning group” — a sign, it said, of the “thoughtful and pragmatic public servant” Biden would be. 

“Sadly, President Trump has proven himself to be the antithesis of thoughtful and pragmatic; he has failed to earn a second term,” the paper went on. 

The editorial said that while Trump is “not always 100 percent wrong,” he “is 100 percent wrong for America.” 

The editorial pointed to the country’s national debt, Trump’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and what it called his weaponization of the “social-media-driven political landscape” in backing up its argument he is the wrong leader for the country. 

“There is no love lost between this newspaper and President Donald J. Trump. The Union Leader was very quickly dismissed by then-candidate Trump after we failed to bestow on him our endorsement in the Republican primary four years ago,” reads the editorial. 

The comments come several years after Trump, then a Republican presidential candidate, got into a back and forth with New Hampshire Union Leader Publisher Joseph W. McQuaid after the real-estate mogul was likened to Biff Tannen in an editorial published by the paper.

“He is a consummate linguistic takedown artist, ripping apart all comers to the delight of his fanbase but at the expense of the nation,” the newspaper said of Trump at another point in the editorial. “America faces many challenges and needs a president to build this country up. This appears to be outside of Mr. Trump’s skill set.”

However, while the paper urged its readers to back Biden, it also suggested readers split the ballot and elect a “healthy dose of GOP senators and representatives,” warning “it would be a disservice to the country to send him to the White House without a backstop.”

“The best governance often comes through compromise. The civility of the Biden administration will help foster such compromise, but a blue wave would be nearly as disastrous for this country as four more years of Trump. It would result in a quagmire of big government programs that will take decades to overcome,” the paper stated.

The editorial was published hours before Trump is scheduled to hold a rally in the state, which Hillary Clinton won in the 2016 presidential race, later on Sunday.