Donald Trump attempted to punish the Des Moines Register on Friday for publishing a critical editorial calling for the real estate mogul to to drop out of the presidential race.
The Iowa newspaper claimed on Friday that Trump barred one the paper’s reporters and columnists from attending a Saturday event. Trump’s campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, told the paper that it had been denied press credentials because of the paper’s Monday editorial, according to the Des Moines Register.
“We’re not issuing credentials to anyone from the Des Moines Register based on the editorial that they wrote earlier in the week,” he said, according to the Register.
Amalie Nash, editor and vice president for audience engagement at the Des Moines Register, criticized Trump’s “unusual” move.
“We are disappointed that Mr. Trump’s campaign has taken the unusual step of excluding Register reporters from covering his campaign event in Iowa on Saturday because he was displeased with our editorial,” she said in a statement. “As we previously said, the editorial has no bearing on our news coverage. We work hard to provide Iowans with coverage of all the candidates when they spend time in Iowa, and this is obviously impeding our ability to do so. We hope Mr. Trump’s campaign will revisit its decision instead of making punitive decisions because we wrote something critical of him.”
The paper published an editorial on Monday calling for Trump to drop out, labeling him a “bloviating side show.”
“By using his considerable wealth, his celebrity status, and his mouth to draw attention to himself, rather than to raise awareness of the issues facing America, he has coarsened our political dialogue and cheapened the electoral process,” the editorial said about Trump. “He has become ‘the distraction with traction’ — a feckless blowhard who can generate headlines, name recognition and polling numbers not by provoking thought, but by provoking outrage.”
Shortly after the paper published the editorial, Trump issued a statement condemning its “dishonest reporting.”
“I am not at all surprised by the Des Moines Register’s sophomoric editorial,” he said in a Tuesday statement. “The Des Moines Register has lost much circulation, advertising, and power over the last number of years. They will do anything for a headline, and this poorly written ‘non-endorsement’ got them some desperately needed ink.”
