Former Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele just can't stomach voting for either major-party presidential candidate. "I was damn near puking during the debates," Steele said Thursday at a dinner in San Francisco in honor of the 40th anniversary of Mother Jones.
Steele, who led the RNC from 2009 to 2011 as the first black GOP chairman, said he won't be casting a ballot for his party's nominee Donald Trump, and he won't vote for Democrat Hillary Clinton either. He cannot support Trump because he has "captured that racist underbelly, that frustration, that angry underbelly of American life and gave voice to that," Steele said. He also argued that Trump only represents about 30 percent of the Republican Party.
Steele is the fifth former RNC chief to refuse to support the GOP nominee. Per Politico's tally, former RNC chiefs Marc Racicot, Mel Martinez, Bill Brock, and Ken Mehlman have all said they will not vote for Trump.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Aimee Betro: the Wisconsin woman who came to Birmingham to killIn the Spotlight US hitwoman wore a niqab in online lover's revenge plot
-
Facial recognition vans and policingThe government is rolling out more live facial recognition technology across England
-
Dive in! The best children's books to spark a love of readingThe Week Recommends These gripping stories will keep kids hooked until the last page
-
Trump picks conservative BLS critic to lead BLSspeed read He has nominated the Heritage Foundation's E.J. Antoni to lead the Bureau of Labor Statistics
-
Trump takes over DC police, deploys National GuardSpeed Read The president blames the takeover on rising crime, though official figures contradict this concern
-
Trump sends FBI to patrol DC, despite falling crimeSpeed Read Washington, D.C., 'has become one of the most dangerous cities anywhere in the world,' Trump said
-
Trump officials reinstating 2 Confederate monumentsSpeed Read The administration has plans to 'restore Confederate names and symbols' discarded in the wake of George Floyd's 2020 murder
-
Trump nominates Powell critic for vacant Fed seatspeed read Stephen Miran, the chair of Trump's Council of Economic Advisers and a fellow critic of Fed chair Jerome Powell, has been nominated to fill a seat on the Federal Reserve Board of Governors
-
ICE scraps age limits amid hiring pushSpeed Read Anyone 18 or older can now apply to be an ICE agent
-
Trump's global tariffs take effect, with new additionsSpeed Read Tariffs on more than 90 US trading partners went into effect, escalating the global trade war
-
House committee subpoenas Epstein filesSpeed Read The House Oversight Committee has issued a subpoena to the Justice Department for its Jeffrey Epstein files with an Aug. 19 deadline
