In politics, as in real life, bad people do bad things. But when good people—or those who claim to be good—shrug off a bad person doing bad things, that is inexcusable, writes Warren Kinsella.
Trudeau's disqualifying acts
Kinsella points to Justin Trudeau as an example. The Prime Minister wore racist blackface and was alleged to have groped a woman, yet his party defended him. “They shrugged. They looked the other way. They traded principles for power,” Kinsella writes. As a lifelong Liberal, Kinsella says he could not support Trudeau and left the party.
Democrats swooned over Platner
Kinsella then turns to the U.S. Democratic Party and its support for Graham Platner, the Democratic Senate nominee in Maine. Platner, a former Marine and oyster farmer, was endorsed by prominent Democrats including Senators Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Ruben Gallego, and Ro Khanna. But in October 2025, deleted Reddit posts surfaced containing demeaning comments about women, jokes about sexual assault, and racist rhetoric. Despite this, the party continued to back him.
The Nazi tattoo and further revelations
The controversy deepened when a photo of Platner shirtless revealed a Totenkopf tattoo on his chest—the symbol of the Nazi SS Death's Head Units, responsible for killing 10 to 12 million people, mainly Jews. Platner claimed he did not know what it meant. Kinsella called this disqualifying, but the Maine Democrats made Platner their nominee anyway.
Subsequently, it was revealed that Platner had been sexting minors on Kik, wished death on another soldier, lied about why he enlisted, and misrepresented his relationships with women. Several women came forward with stories of inappropriate behavior and sexual misconduct. The media, including The New York Times, minimized their accounts, even attempting to discredit one woman because she was a Republican.
Rape allegation and withdrawal of endorsements
Jenny Racicot, a Democrat who dated Platner, stepped forward to allege that Platner raped her. Only then did many Democrats withdraw their endorsements. “A credible allegation of rape, they’d concluded, was disqualifying,” Kinsella notes. He concludes with a pointed message: “Next time a candidate shows up with a Nazi tattoo? Don’t support him. And, as a general rule, don’t support bad people who do bad things.”
