Chris Suprun is a paramedic from Dallas, Texas. A Republican member of the Electoral College, he has previously voiced his support for PEOTUS and poorly dressed meatball Donald Trump. In the last month, however, Suprun has changed his mind.
On Monday, the New York Times reports, Suprun announced that he would no longer cast his ballot—one of Texas’s 38 electoral votes—for Trump. He declares, succinctly, “I am here to elect a president, not a king.”
A number of factors have influenced this elector to change his vote. Trump’s flagrant attacks on the First Amendment and the electoral process, together with his defiant continued pursuit of business interests, were paramount in the decision.
“I was told if we elected Donald Trump he would transform his personality into being presidential. He isn’t,” Suprun told the Times. “I wanted him to be presidential, but since the election he hasn’t grown into our institution, he’s attacked them.”
One wonders at the vastness of transformation necessary to reform someone who has bragged about sexually assaulting women, does not comprehend the first thing about being president (or human), and fusses on Twitter about his portrayal on Saturday Night Live. Perhaps Suprun and some of Trump’s other disappointed supporters assumed the president-elect would undergo personality modification. Or worse: that Trump was not really who he said he was over and over and over again.
In any case, Suprun now hopes that other Texas electors will rebel as he has. But before you scoop your shattered hopes from the dustbin, know that Suprun will not vote—or encourage others to vote—for Hillary Clinton. Rather, he is contemplating Ohio governor John Kasich.
Ultimately, he explains, “I’m looking for someone we can all unify behind.”
At this summer’s state Republican convention, Suprun and the other electors pledged in writing to vote for the party nominee. However, that pledge is not legally binding, and Texas law does not require that electors cast votes according to the state’s results. So Suprun and his fellow electors are at liberty to vote for someone else.
Yet again, we are met with election news that carries significance in a larger context but is unlikely to shift the outcome. Though we wail and gnash our teeth, Trump will almost certainly be inaugurated on January 20. But it’s important that Suprun has publicized his intention not to vote for president-elect. He knows this is the case as well, even if it means contending with Trumpeter wrath.
“I’m expecting backlash, but that has been par for the course this campaign,” says Suprun. “People are unhappy. They’re angry. But I’m angry too.”
Read Chris Suprun’s New York Times editorial elaborating on his decision here.