The Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan on Monday was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for commentary, particularly for pieces focusing on Donald Tump during the divisive 2016 presidential race.
Pulitzer Prize judges said Noonan earned the award for “rising to the moment with beautifully rendered columns that connected readers to the shared virtues of Americans during one of the nation’s most divisive political campaigns.”
In her columns, Noonan attempted to explain Trump supporters to a group of people who did not quite understand them, reflected on the 2016 campaign and how it changed America for the worse, and gets on to those who opposed Trump without offering any real reason why. She also wrote how Trump’s rise was not a result of the media but because he was a big draw himself.
“When Mr. Trump was on, ratings jumped, but it wasn’t only ratings, it was something else,” Noonan wrote in her May 5 column “Trump Was a Spark, Not the Fire.” “It was the freak show at its zenith, it was great TV — you didn’t know what he was going to say next! He didn’t know!
“It was better than everyone else’s boring, prefabricated, airless, weightless, relentless word-saying — better than Ted Cruz, who seemed like someone who practiced sincere hand gestures in the mirror at night, better than Marco the moist robot, better than Hillary’s grim and horrifying attempts to chuckle like a person who chuckles.”
Noonan, a former speech writer and special assistant to President Ronald Reagan, won $15,000 in prize money. She has written columns for the Journal since 2000.
