Letters to the Editor | Oct. 2, 2026

The political depths to which the Republican Party has descended may be best demonstrated by the Republican senators who questioned former special counsel Jack Smith. There is incontrovertible evidence that Donald Trump took classified documents with him to Mar-a-Lago after he left office (the photos of boxes of these documents prove it), and that he egged on his followers as they attacked the U.S. Capitol to prevent the certification of Joe Biden’s win. But during the recent hearings, Smith was insulted and demeaned as the GOP members of the committee showed their obeisance to Trump. Instead of trying to stop an unpopular war or regulating AI, the GOP can only persist in defending a very unpopular president. Not only is it necessary that the Democrats control both houses of Congress, but they also must win control of as many state legislatures and governorships as possible to prevent the Republicans from carrying out the agenda of their master — Trump — on the state level. We have, I believe, the worst president in our history — and one whose sanity is increasingly called into question. He must be stopped.

David C. Harrison, Philadelphia

The recent article about Pete Hegseth saying that national security forces will guard U.S. election systems during next month’s midterm elections should concern us all. When the press allows political spin to rewrite facts, it creates a dangerous blueprint for democratic subversion. With the midterms a few weeks away, Donald Trump’s designs on election interference are on full display. Under the guise of voter integrity, the president has ordered a series of disturbing actions by government agencies that actually amount to voter suppression: seizing ballots and records, purging voter registries, restricting mail voting, and stoking illegal voting myths.

Driven by a cadre of experienced election deniers embedded within the federal apparatus, this bureaucratic overreach claims to protect the electorate. Nonsense. This is election rigging of the highest order.

Democracy is undermined when the media ignores a core journalistic principle: to serve as a watchdog over government. To prevent the electorate’s most fundamental right from being forever compromised, the press must shatter the illusion of “voter integrity” and call it what it truly is: democratic subversion.

Jim Paladino, Tampa, Fla.

Knowledge is a powerful tool under any circumstance. I congratulate The Inquirer for “The Art of the Steal” — its series of editorials about President Donald Trump’s expanding wealth. The journalists who contributed to this section were thorough and brilliant. Now the only problem we have is whether any MAGA follower is going to push aside their beliefs, take the time to read it, and maybe have an “aha” moment. Each editorial is based on facts, not a conspiracy theory or “fake news.”

I challenge every follower of MAGA to read this.

It seems that all the MAGA disciples wake up every morning and forget what happened the day before — and what’s been going on for years.

They complain about the rest of us suffering from TDS, but they have their version, too: Trump denial syndrome.

Sad.

Alan Golombek, Langhorne

I must thank The Inquirer editors for devoting the entire Sunday Opinion section to “The Art of the Steal.” It should be required reading for all high school seniors and college freshmen who may be voting for the first time this November. It would also help if all voters were to read it.

Paul Cosdon, Solebury

I just want to say what a great series of editorials “The Art of the Steal” was. The writers did a wonderful job of capturing all the corruption of the entire Trump family.

The thing is, we all know this has been going on, and yet so many people just look the other way. Whether you’re a Democrat or a Republican, you can’t deny that the man is just corrupt, and those who can do something about it won’t. But on Nov. 3, we can.

Evelyn Lare, Plymouth Meeting

Jenice Armstrong’s fine column on the regrets of 1619 Project author Nikole Hannah-Jones about keeping her daughter in a failing public school is a cautionary tale of what happens when innocent people fall victim to someone else’s ideology.

Hannah-Jones states that there are only two viable educational options for Black parents: send your child to a failing public school in the naive belief that you can rescue it, or spend thousands of dollars to attend a private school that enrolls few Black students.

But there is a third way, and both Armstrong and Hannah-Jones have seen its benefits: Catholic school. It is an open secret that many of America’s parish Catholic schools no longer attract the number of students they need to remain open. Instead, many upwardly mobile Black families have been filling those seats. They are attracted to the structure, discipline, and high expectations that Catholic schools provide.

An example: While Ms. Hannah-Jones is shocked to realize her daughter did not get homework in middle school, my grandson gets homework regularly in his Catholic school — and he’s in kindergarten.

There are also private religious schools, such as the Gesu School in North Philadelphia and St. James (Episcopal) School in East Falls, which are nearly 100% Black and offer scholarships. Children thrive there.

Saving city schools requires a multigenerational fix. In the meantime, reasonable alternatives exist. Ms. Hannah-Jones should send her child to the best school she can — and then volunteer to be on the board of her local public school, where she can share her extensive expertise.

Rosemary McDonough, Narbeth

I appreciate Nikole Hannah-Jones’ New York Times essay regarding the consequences of sending her daughter to a mostly Black and brown underresourced Brooklyn public school. But I’m surprised there is so much chatter about it — and why there are so many questions asking why the Hannah-Jones family made the choice they did. The attention should instead be directed to finding the remedies and solutions for the generations of Black and brown students who are being grossly undereducated.

For decades, the dilemma the Hannah-Jones family faced is what many Black families attempting to provide quality education for their children have faced, except most Black and brown families do not have the resources to have a choice.

But as indicated in the essay, the “haves” in our communities have figured out many ways to ensure they bypass our failing public schools. However, many of the “haves” in our community who seemingly advocate for quality education for the “have-nots” have done little to rectify the continuing issue of a failing education system for the “have-nots.”

In Philadelphia, in reality, very little has changed regarding state educational test scores. (Check out the state test scores published in U.S. News and World Report.)

Local media and school officials are complicit because they continue to mostly provide nuanced information that doesn’t really show just how poorly Philly public school students are doing.

What is also troubling to me is that most of our elected officials are not adequately sharing the dire conditions in our public schools — is that because of their allegiance to the teachers’ union?

Another reality that is often overlooked is that children attending private K-8 schools are transferring to the few high-performing high schools in the city, thereby blocking students who come through the public school system.

Scholar, writer, and parent Nikole Hannah-Jones has put the issue of failing schools on full blast. The question now is, what are we going to do about it?

Karen Warrington, Philadelphia

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