Herald editorial: An open letter to Donald Trump

Mr. Trump,

Welcome to Rock Hill! Our city has been fortunate to play host to many presidential hopefuls from both parties this primary season, and now your name can be added to the list.

Winthrop University has been a big part of this process, providing a venue not only for individual candidates but for a televised forum that featured three top Democratic contenders. The exposure to the candidates has been a boon to local residents, especially students, who, we hope, are now more likely to participate in the political process.

These events help energize and inform the community about the issues that will dominate the campaign season. Your visit is no exception.

We suspect many local voters will get to know you at least a little better by the time you move on to the next campaign stop. So, what do you hope to show them?

Clearly, you have effectively tapped into the anger and apprehensions of many voters, their disgust with the dysfunction of Congress, their distrust of the political establishment, their fears that America is in decline. And you have promised to “make America great again.”

But, as the numbers indicate, the state of the union is not all that bad. The nation has seen steady, if unspectacular, economic growth for the past six years. National unemployment now is around 5 percent. Interest rates remain extremely low and inflation is nonexistent. The annual deficit has been significantly reduced. Even the manufacturing and construction sectors, especially the auto industry, are humming along.

Despite the disclaimers, America still “makes stuff.”

As for the Palmetto State, Gov. Nikki Haley would tell you that today, like many others, is a great day in South Carolina. Unemployment here has been sharply reduced, and the state ended the year with a revenue surplus. Just last month, Chester County, the county to our south, landed the biggest industrial project in state history – although county officials won’t tell you what it is.

Sure, the nation and this state have intractable problems – income inequality, gun violence, unequal access to education, lingering racism, crumbling infrastructure, to name some of the more prominent ones. But we are doing better than much of the rest of the world.

So, putting aside the negativity and appeals to our worst fears for the moment, how would you tap into America’s natural optimism, productivity and open-spirited nature to make America even greater?

If you choose to address that question, real facts would be appreciated. You have a well-documented habit of ignoring them – and then shrugging your shoulders when confronted with the truth.

The nonpartisan PolitiFact project rated 76 percent of 77 statements made by you as mostly false, false or “pants-on-fire.” That includes statements ranging from claims of watching Muslims in New Jersey cheering the bombing of the World Trade Center to the egregiously inflated claim that the percentage of whites killed by blacks in 2014 was 81 percent (the correct figure is 15 percent).

We hope your accuracy rate is higher today.

We also hope you will tone down the insults and character assassination. Politics in South Carolina occasionally can be a contact sport, and our public officials don’t always conform to the guidelines of political correctness, but we’re usually civil here. Good manners are important to many.

Vilifying opponents and testing the limits of propriety might appeal to some voters, but many will be offended. It might just provoke them to look for another candidate with more self-restraint.

We hope you enjoy your visit to South Carolina. And while we learn more about you, we hope you also learn more about South Carolina and what’s important to its voters during your stay here.

This story was originally published January 8, 2016 at 10:10 AM with the headline "Herald editorial: An open letter to Donald Trump."