Historians rank Trump near the bottom of U.S. presidents in terms of leadership

Donald Trump is ranked near the bottom of all U.S. presidents by a group of historians, getting the lowest grades for leadership of any commander in chief who has served in the White House in the past 150 years.

The ratings of presidents on 10 leadership qualities, the fourth in a series conducted by C-SPAN, includes assessments by 142 historians and professional observers of the presidency.

The findings underscore the duality of Trump’s standing, unprecedented among his fellow presidents. After his upset victory in 2016 and his defeat in 2020, historians hold him in the lowest regard of any president since soon after the Civil War. But he continues to be the face of the Republican Party and its most influential figure, and he is viewed as a potential contender for the GOP’s presidential nomination in 2024.

Among other modern presidents, Barack Obama has risen to No. 10, compared with No. 12 in the last C-SPAN historians’ survey, in 2017. Ronald Reagan is ranked at No. 9; Bill Clinton at No. 19; George H.W. Bush at No. 21, and George W. Bush at No. 29.

Richard Nixon, the only president forced to resign the office amid scandal, is rated No. 31.

Ranking Donald Trump

Trump is the only president ever to be impeached twice by the House of Representatives, first for demanding political favors from Ukraine in exchange for military aid, then for inciting the mob that stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6 in an attempt to stop the Electoral College results from being certified by Congress.

The Senate voted to acquit him in both impeachment trials.

In the past, Trump has described himself as “a big history fan,” but he also has routinely ridiculed and discounted criticism from historians and other “elites” as unwarranted and unfair. Experts “can’t see the forest for the trees,” he complained in a 2016 interview.

The historians rate Trump as the worst president in history on two of 10 qualities, “moral authority” and “administrative skills.” His strongest standing is on “public persuasion,” on which he was ranked No. 32.

Source: Yahoo News

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