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Greeley paper's 1st-ever endorsement: Clinton

The 2016 senior prom will be held at Trump golf course in Briarcliff Manor.

Mark Lungariello
mlungariel@lohud.com
The editors of the Greeley Tribune, the student newspaper of Horace Greeley High School in Chappaqua, have endorsed Hillary Clinton for President. The school newspaper has never in its history endorsed a presidential candidate.  Meaghan Townsend, left, Amanda Cronin, Claire Hotchkin, editors in chief of the newspaper, and Billy Perlmutter, the paper's managing editor, were photographed Oct. 28, 2016.

CHAPPAQUA – The high school newspaper in the posh New York suburb the Clintons call home is making its first ever presidential endorsement.

And here’s a hint: It isn’t Donald J. Trump.

The Greeley Tribune, Horace Greeley High School’s student paper, will endorse hometown candidate Hillary Clinton in an edition being distributed to the student body on Monday.

The paper has never made a presidential endorsement in its history, as far as staff and administrators can tell from existing archives. The paper joins the likes of USA Today, which also decided to endorse a candidate for the first time this year.

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“Growing up in Chappaqua, with politics so close to home, I looked up to Hillary my whole life,” said Amanda Cronin, the Tribune’s editor-in-chief.

Cronin called Clinton “a symbol of female empowerment” and a role model.

The editors of the Greeley Tribune, the student newspaper of Horace Greeley High School in Chappaqua, have endorsed Hillary Clinton for President. The school newspaper has never in its history endorsed a presidential candidate.

Cronin is 17 and too young to vote, but she and her associates on the editorial board decided they could bring a fresh, youthful perspective to the endorsement, setting it apart from the 100s of others printed. They knew endorsing the hometown candidate might come as no surprise, but they injected some optimism into their article mixed in with a scathing assessment of Trump that said he “undermined our idea of basic human decency.”

“While our country harbors hatred, violence, and intolerance, there is also a simultaneous movement for more love, acceptance, and forgiveness,” the editorial states.

“As young people, we have the power to chase the future,” Cronin said. The campaign has been discussed by students in class and in the cafeteria, she said.

Hillary and Bill Clinton bought a home in Chappaqua in the late 1990s, about a half mile from the high school, and moved in after they vacated the White House when Bill Clinton’s presidency ended.

That was around the same time the members of the senior class at Greeley were born. Cronin said she doesn’t really remember Clinton as a U.S. Senator, but the former secretary of state has been a constant presence – both in the news and as a local personality, marching in the town’s Memorial Day parade.

The school itself is named for one-time presidential candidate Horace Greeley, who lost the 1872 presidential election to Ulysses Grant. Greeley founded and edited the New York Tribune, which the student paper is named after.

The student paper may be backing Clinton, but the seniors have a connection to the Republican candidate as well: The senior prom at the high school has been held at Trump National golf course in Briarcliff Manor for several years. A group of seniors who graduated in 2016 petitioned unsuccessfully to move the location after Trump announced his presidency last year.

Twitter: @marklungariello