On the recordJanuary 6, 2021
it has been hard, at times, to find the words to describe the full harm that Donald Trump has inflicted on our country. We can spend hours dissecting how his policies have made us less safe and less healthy, but his Presidency has also been a profound moral failure. Let me tell you a story. A few years ago, a father from Hawaii joined me at one of my talk-story sessions in my office, and he asked me a question that struck me hard at that time and has stuck with me until today. He said: How can I tell my son that lying is not OK when the President of the United States lies every single day? I struggled to answer his question then, and I am not sure I could offer an adequate answer now. But this conversation remains a clear example of how we do not live in normal times. How is it normal as we and the world watched in horror as an angry mob stormed the U.S. Capitol? Blood was shed. People were hurt. Vandalism occurred. It is not normal when we have a President who lies every single day. And even in the face of this vandalism, this mob, he really doesn't have much to say except: I love you. You should go home now. It is not normal when, in the middle of a pandemic that has claimed the lives of over 350,000 Americans, which is nearly the combined population of the islands of Maui and the Big Island, we have a President who only seems to care about spreading conspiracies to undermine confidence in our elections and our democracy.…
