Fox News Contributor Calls Trump ‘Unfit for High Office’ – But Might Vote for the Ex-President Because of Felony Conviction

A Fox News contributor explained the many reasons why Donald Trump is “unfit for high office” before stating that he might vote for the former president because he was criminally convicted this week.

Guy Benson, who hosts a show on Fox Talk and is a frequent guest on Special Report on Fox News, wrote a column for Townhall in which he said that while he has always voted against Trump, he is considering backing the former president. On Thursday, Trump was convicted of 34 counts of falsifying business records to conceal hush money payments to cover up extramarital affairs. Conservatives were apoplectic over the verdict while simultaneously insisting that being a convicted felon will vault Trump into the White House.

Benson called the hush money payments “very sordid business,” but said nonetheless the case should not have been brought.

“Smart legal minds from across the spectrum seem to agree that there are ample grounds for ‘reversible error’ appeals, on multiple fronts,” he wrote. “But in some important ways, that’s beside the point. The goal here, as I see it, has been to emblazon ‘convicted felon’ across Donald Trump’s forehead prior to the election, then repeat those two words endlessly until November.”

After slamming the case against the former president, Benson confessed he does not think much of Trump, calling him “fundamentally unfit for high office”:

I have found Donald Trump to be a volatile, capricious, myopic, petty man for as long as I’ve been aware of his existence. I have voted against him in two presidential primaries (and would have a third time if my state’s Republican Party hadn’t canceled its nominating contest in 2020, in obsequious deference to the incumbent). I have voted against him (third party/write-in) in two general elections. My full intention has been to do so again this November, despite my deep opposition to the governance of the Biden administration. Biden has been a far worse president than I’d expected, and my expectations were low. The reason I’ve been planning to nevertheless vote for someone other than Donald Trump once again is that he has always been fundamentally unfit for high office, in my opinion.

Benson pointed out that after the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, which he said Trump is “principally responsible” for, he wrote that his conduct was “impeachable” and said Republicans would be “demented” to nominate him again.

Nevertheless, Benson said he is considering casting his ballot for Trump this time around:

I am now strongly entertaining the possibility of voting for Trump. I stand behind, and still believe, every single thing I wrote in the preceding paragraph. What I’m grappling with now is whether the appalling lawfare so brazenly employed against Trump in this case is more dangerous than anything Trump, and his worst excesses, represent. To be clear, I don’t believe Trump is “above the law.” I’ve written about how the federal classified documents and obstruction case against him is well-grounded in evidence. Yes, I also think the lack of charges against the last two Democratic presidential nominees for similar or identical categories of crimes are a real problem, as it pertains to the even-handed application of laws to politicians at the highest level.

He went on to cite Trump’s indictment in federal court in Florida, where the ex-president has been charged with willfully retaining classified documents after leaving office and obstructing the government’s efforts to retrieve them. Benson said Trump’s actions were “clearly illegal” and said a conviction in that case “would not be a legal travesty” like the New York prosecution.

“This is as dirty as dirty politics get, even [if] the target is an unsympathetic figure to so many,” he continued. “It cannot be rewarded. It must be punished, in fact. And perhaps the only real, painful way to punish it is to elect Donald Trump as the 47th President of the United States. I do fear some of what a second Trump term might look like, particularly under these circumstances.”

Benson concluded by explaining that he tweeted an upside-down American flag not as “a sign of solidarity with Donald Trump,” but as a symbol of “profound national distress.”