George W. Bush’s decision not to endorse in presidential race is principled
Cynthia M. Allen is a columnist for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.
During every election cycle, cross-party endorsements snag a few headlines.
There is something oddly satisfying about the once-politically faithful finding their respective party's candidate so deficient that it compels them to publicly voice their protest before crossing the aisle on Election Day.
Donald Trump has driven that sentiment to another level, with almost daily defections of former Republican administration officials hitting the chyron.
But the one prominent Republican voice that has been notably absent from the current political fray is that of former President George W. Bush.
Indeed, he's said nary a word about the election, instead keeping his head down and his focus on the good work of his Dallas-based foundation and library.
When asked whether he planned to endorse in this election cycle — a likelihood some thought would increase after his former Vice President Dick Cheney and his former attorney general, Alberto Gonzales, threw their support behind Vice President Kamala Harris — Bush's office simply said "no."
"President Bush retired from presidential politics years ago," his office added.
The former president hasn't endorsed any candidate since Sen. Mitt Romney in 2012, and that was little more than a passing comment offered from an elevator just before the doors slid shut. Hardly an attempt to assert political influence in the presidential race.
There's something undeniably refreshing about a politician who recognizes that his or her role as an influencer should have a shelf life.
And after carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders for so many years while receiving mostly criticism for it in the media, it doesn't seem unfair or unpatriotic for Bush to wish to live out his post-presidential days in apolitical peace.
Indeed, it is rather fun to imagine Bush in his library offices housed on the Southern Methodist University campus, characteristically chuckling to himself as he reads the daily paper, delighted to not be one of its regular subjects.
Alas, some people are trying to get him back into the headlines, dogging him mercilessly for his silence on the candidacy of Trump and insisting that he take a stand.
"By the way, shouldn't Springfield, Ohio, be the final straw for George W. Bush, who refused to demonize immigrants?" wrote Bill Kristol, the founder of the now defunct conservative magazine The Weekly Standard, following the recent presidential debate in which Trump's comments about Haitian migrants went off the rails.
Speaking at the Atlantic Festival in Washington recently, Kristol told an audience pointedly: "George W. Bush really should say he's voting for Kamala Harris," insisting that his endorsement, as compared to Cheney's backing, perhaps, would have some sway.
That may be true. After so many years of relative silence on national politics, Bush weighing in could have an impact on the small crop of undecided moderate voters in swing states who will likely decide the election.
But at what cost to his own principles?
Kristol is a long-time Never Trumper, a position to which many true conservatives — like Bush — can relate, given Trump's proven lack of principles on conservative policy issues, from abortion to foreign affairs.
His distaste for Trump, however, has manifested in other, less relatable ways. One is his endorsement of Harris, a candidate whose record in the Senate was among the most progressive — lest we forget that on issues from health care to fracking, Harris' record belies her sudden attempt at political moderation.
But some former conservatives seem to think the two — denouncing Trump and endorsing his opponent — are indivisible, that one must naturally follow the other.
And for his part, Kristol seems to have made it his personal mission to get the former president to agree.
To be clear, Bush and Trump are hardly friends, and Bush has criticized Trump for past comments and actions. The former president was not present at the GOP convention in August.
But it's one thing to denounce Trump for his personal transgressions, his lack of fitness for office, or whichever of the man's vices strike you on a given day.
It is another entirely to endorse a candidate who stands for policies and values that are diametrically opposed to your own and those that you pursued (and presumably maintain) as your life's work.
Bush and the former first lady, Laura Bush, reportedly supported neither of the major party candidates in the 2016 or 2020 presidential elections. George W. Bush told People magazine in 2021 that he wrote in the name of his former national security adviser and secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, in 2020.
He could do so again next month with his conscience clear.
In the meantime, everyone should just leave him alone.
