New York Times: Trump ‘speaks and acts in the interests of himself and no one else’

The New York Times editorial board is going after President Trump, claiming that he has shown he “speaks and acts in the interests of himself.”

In an op-ed published Tuesday, the editorial board criticized Trump’s decision to pardon former Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Arizona.

The editors initially cite comments from Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.

{mosads}When asked during an interview Sunday about the president’s values and response to the racially charged violence at a white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Va., Tillerson said Trump “speaks for himself.”

“Coming from the man the president picked to represent the nation around the world, it was a stunning admission, devastating in its simplicity and painful in its accuracy,” the editorial board wrote.

“Mr. Trump, we are reminded every day in ways we would not have imagined the day before, speaks and acts in the interests of himself and no one else.”

The editorial board then pointed to Trump’s pardon of Arpaio. The president issued the pardon “in his cowardly way, as the nation was riveted to the impending landfall of Hurricane Harvey,” the editors wrote.

They also blasted Arpaio, saying he is an “abomination to the rule of law, the principle of equal justice and plain decency” to most people who know anything about Arizona politics. 

But Trump has a different view on Arpaio, the editorial board wrote.

“Yet to President Trump, Mr. Arpaio is a role model: a man for whom the ‘rule of law’ means that he can do what he wants when he wants, who humiliates those weaker than him and mocks those who try to constrain him, who evades scrutiny and accountability — in short, a perfect little tyrant.” 

The editorial board called the pardon “morally reprehensible” and said it was “in line with Mr. Trump’s broader attitude toward law enforcement.”

“This is Donald Trump’s rule of law — a display of personal dominance disconnected from concerns about law and order, equality or the Constitution,” the editorial board wrote.

“That distorted understanding of justice is cleaving the nation between the majority who support the principles of American democracy and those who support only him.”

The White House late last Friday announced Trump’s pardon of Arpaio.

In a statement, the White House talked of Arpaio’s service to the country and called him a “worthy candidate for a presidential pardon.”