'Political arsonist' Trump has left Republicans with no choice but to boot him in November: conservative

In his column for the Daily Beast, conservative Matt Lewis -- who abandoned the Republican Party over Donald Trump -- said that the president has made it impossible for conservatives to vote for him in November because he has "destroyed" everything he has touched.

As Lewis sees it, the president's descent into overt racism following the murder of George Floyd instead of reading the room and seeing Americans across the board were outraged, handed a major victory to Democrats and gave conservatives who were on the fence a reason to flee him.

Writing, "His nastiness and belligerence has turned off many Americans, both moderate and otherwise apolitical people. As Trump forces them to make a binary choice between him and BLM, they choose BLM, even if they don’t agree with the entirety of its agenda," Lewis suggested that anyone, from former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) would have handled it better.

Adding to that, he noted, is the president's history of hurting the "conservative cause" which makes it near impossible to support him because of his volatility and desire to play to the worst elements of the far-right.

"Not only is Trump not an effective fighter in the culture war, he actually hurts the conservative cause, inasmuch as conservatism is about conserving things and not burning them down," he wrote. "That’s partly because agreeing with Trump is a thankless task. First, people assume you agree with all the horrible things Trump has ever said in the past. Second, he cuts your legs out from under you when he says something crazy or racist five minutes later."

After writing, "Those seeking a centrist return to normalcy are left with Joe Biden," Lewis admitted. "Biden won his party’s primary by ignoring the radicals in his own party—the woke left that dominates Twitter—and by trying to speak in ways that could unify the country."

"Trump has no such inspiring or unifying 'American Dream' story. If white privilege is a thing, then Donald J. Trump is the perfect encapsulation of it," he added.

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