Ronald Reagan’s atheist son roasts Trump and Republicans

by Barry Duke

Former President Ronald Reagan’s youngest son who fronted a successful TV commercial for the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) six years ago said in a CNN interview yesterday that the White House is currently in the grip of a bunch of ‘grifters.’

Ron Reagan was asked about the way Trump’s children have been involved in his administration and re-election campaign. He accused the Trumps  of mixing business with pleasure and with statecraft. "They’re using the hotels and the golf clubs to profit off the presidency."

He slammed Trump’s daughter Ivanka Trump and son-in-law Jared Kushner, both of whom he said were awarded high-level White House positions despite having “no qualifications whatsoever” for those roles. "They’re using it to make money, basically."

Trump and his inner circle have been accused of using his presidency for profit throughout his time in office. He has used his platform to promote his businesses, awarded government and campaign positions to friends and family, and pushed for government business to be conducted at his own venues.

Reagan, a liberal commentator, has been an outspoken critic of Trump in the past. In an interview published by The Daily Beast earlier this year, he said his father would have been embarrassed and ashamed to see “a squalid little man” as “incompetent and traitorous” as Trump in the Oval Office.

Despite his views being at odds with those of his conservative father, Reagan said his dad led with dignity and class.

Reagan said in his latest interview that Trump had done tremendous damage to the GOP.

When I think of my father, I think of words like integrity, decency, dignity, honor, and patriotism – not nationalism but patriotism – all of those qualities are in very short supply in this White House. And, frankly, the Republican party has been complicit in degrading those values.

He said his father would be horrified by the Republican party’s: "Spinelessness in the face of this pathological entity in the White House."

In an Interview with The Los Angeles Times in April this year, Ron Reagan, now in his sixties, revealed that’s he’s a lifelong atheist:

I was 10 years old or so when I concluded that the [Bible] story told to children had little more validity than stories about Santa Claus, another white guy who knows what you’re thinking and can punish you. If he’s sufficiently displeased with what you’re doing, he will send you to a dark corner for eternity while your family goes to a nice place. It doesn’t take a budding Einstein to realize there are some problems with this.

He continued:

Dad was happy in life to believe in what he called ‘the man upstairs.’ He was unapologetic about his beliefs, but not showy about it like some politicians, constantly crowing about how faithful they are. He never wore his faith on his sleeve.

He blames Christian conservatives for slowing progress on stem cell research and holding back the fight against climate change. "Stem cell research got me into being vocal. My mom agreed. My father would have too."

Though many networks refused to air Reagan’s FFRF ad, those that did boosted the foundation’s membership. FFRF’s co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor said: "Ron’s ad has had a huge impact. It really gets us new members. I never get tired of it. I just smile or laugh."

Meanwhile Trump, in an unheard of display of modesty, told a cheering crowd in North Carolina that he was less famous than Jesus:

Someone said to me the other day, ‘you’re the most famous person in the world by far.’ I said, ‘no, I’m not’…they said, ‘who’s more famous?’ I said, ‘Jesus Christ’.

This is remarkable coming from the hopefully soon-to-be-an-ex-President because Jesus, having gotten himself messily killed in his 30s according to mythology, easily fits Trump’s list of “losers” and “suckers.”

Trump remark came a week after his son Eric Trump claimed the President “literally saved Christianity.”