Trump supporters on social media are absolutely outraged by the way he was treated on Thursday by US Magistrate Judge Moxila Upadhyaya, the judge overseeing his latest indictment. What did she do? Well, she showed her incredible bias against him by referring to him as Mr. Trump instead of President Trump.
Quelle horreur!
Trump himself was also reportedly “sour and dejected” after the hearing, and particularly irked by the fact that the judge called him Mr. Trump.
“I am told that the former president, one thing that irked him particularly was during that hearing today — that lasted about 27 minutes — was when the magistrate judge referred to him as simply 'Mr Trump,'“ CNN’s Kaitlan Collins reported, adding, “That may not sound odd to anyone else, but he is still referred to by his former title 'President Trump' when he's at his Bedminster golf club in New Jersey, as he is tonight, or at Mar-a-Lago.”
To be fair, many of those referring to him that way are of the opinion that he is still legally the President of the United States.
Now, it doesn’t actually matter whether or not Judge Upadhyaya has any “bias” against Trump, as she’s only overseeing his arraignment, not the actual trial — but was this a pointed insult? Should she have referred to him as president and was this something a normal judge would do for a former president he or she did respect?
My initial instinct was “No,” because it would just make sense that in a legal setting, only the current president would be referred to as “President,” but despite my large collection of antique etiquette books, I am still but an amateur.
So, I busted out my copy of Amy Vanderbilt’s New Complete Book of Etiquette, an enormous tome with many chapters on important everyday dilemmas such as “An Audience with the Pope,” “Suggested Menus for Maidless Dinners,” “General Procedure and Correct Dress for a Ship Launching” and what to do when your kid starts smoking cornsilk. Unfortunately, while the book includes about 30 pages on how to address practically every person of every rank on earth, even Ms. Vanderbilt only included advice on what to call the current president. Perhaps she would have gotten around to it at some point had she not defenestrated herself in 1974. We may never know.
Emily Post, however, was on it.
When addressing a former President of the United States in a formal setting, the correct form is “Mr. LastName.” (“President LastName” or “Mr. President” are terms reserved for the current head of state.) This is true for other ex-officials, as well. When talking about the person to a third party, on the other hand, it’s appropriate to say, “former President LastName.” This holds for introductions, as well: A current state governor is introduced as “Governor Tom Smith,” while you’d introduce an ex-governor as “former Governor Jim Bell.”
However …
Now, let’s look a little closer. In an informal setting (such as a private lunch), it’s acceptable to use the title the ex-official held. Here, you could refer to former President Jimmy Carter as either “President Carter” or “Mr. Carter.” In reality, many people ignore this convention and refer to former Presidents as "President Last Name" when they are in settings where nearly everyone would afford them the honor of the title. Technically, this is still incorrect but there are enough former Presidents allowing this that it has become a somewhat common mistake.
As Stephen has previously noted, Miss Manners said the same thing.
Terribly shocking that the classiest, most gracious person on earth, Donald Trump, did not know this — though it probably won’t be half as disappointing to him as when he finds out that you’re not supposed to chew with your mouth open, either.
Point of fact: I am a PhD which means that I am an actual DOCTOR (of Philosophy with a concentration in Southern Literature). However, I do not insist that people refer to me with the honorific and have actually told people to not refer to me as Dr. because I am NOT A PREENING PRETENTIOUS NARCISSISTIC ASSHOLE.
It’s worth noting that throughout President Obama’s entire Presidency the Republican Party referred to him as ‘Mr Obama’.