Trumpism
For the past four years, both the electronic and print media have made numerous references to “Trumpism” as if were a new governing philosophy. They seem to place it on a par with socialism or nationalism, separate and distinct from the governing principles embraced by the Republican Party. In view of Trump’s aversion to intellectual pursuits it makes me wonder just what is Trumpism and how is it likely to impact the future of the Republican Party.
There’s a great diversity among political pundits as to what Trumpism actually embraces. One characterized it as “an anti-establishment blend of economic populism, reactionary nationalism and strong militarism.” Another explained that “Trumpism rests on three pillars: namely, nationalism, religion and race.” Still another characterized it as “a fusion of pro-business party establishment with nativist, isolationist elements.” A few have found similarities between Trumpism and fascism, pointing out that they share a belief in “an unfettered leader.” Trump’s former National Security Advisor, John Bolton, finding little continuity in Trump’s words and deeds, questioned whether Trumpism even embodies a coherent philosophy.
Along that same vein, one commentator expressed the view that Trumpism is more a movement than a political philosophy, finding it based upon a combination (a) racism, (b) religious bigotry, (c) demeaning attitudes towards women, (d) attempts to intimidate the press, (e) economic uncertainty, (f) rejection of scientific findings and (g) general expressions of hatred.” The problem with this explanation is that a movement describes a group of people seeking to achieve a common goal. With Trumpism, it is difficult to identify any such goal. Trump appeals to his followers based upon common dislikes rather than common goals.
Mary Trump and Michael Cohen, two people who probably best understand Donald Trump, have suggested that he’s motivated solely by a quest for recognition and wealth. This is consistent with early reports that he had decided to run for president to gain additional notoriety to enhance his business endeavors. Cohen also revealed that Trump idolizes Vladimir Putin for the simple reason that he believes that Putin is the richest man in the world. Cohen explained that Trump credits Putin with being the true owner of the wealth possessed by all of the Russian oligarchs because Putin placed them in charge of Russia’s largest companies and can just as easily remove them if they don’t comply with his wishes. Like Putin, Trump is prepared to use any and all means at his disposal to achieve what he wants and that, in a nutshell, is his governing philosophy.
Setting aside for the moment what Trumpism actually is, it clearly carries considerable political power. In the 2020 election, Trump received more than 74 million votes which is roughly five million more votes than any candidate had received in any prior presidential election. What may be even more indicative of Trump’s impact is that he was largely responsible for Joe Biden’s receiving almost 12 million more votes than any prior presidential candidate. The extent to which anti-Trump sentiment powered Biden’s victory is evidenced by the fact Biden was largely unable to help Democratic candidates in down-ballot races. In short, those who were motivated to vote for Biden did so, not so much because they were enamored with Biden or even with the policies of the Democratic Party, but rather because they harbored a strong dislike for Trump and fear for what his continued tenure as president would mean for our nation.
Another indication of Trumpism’s enormous political power is the fact that since the time Biden was declared the president-elect by the mainstream media (including Fox News) President Trump has been able to raise well over $200 million to help him overturn the election’s result. Until recently, many presidential candidates could not even raise that much money prior to an election. More importantly, this money was largely raised from small donations and not from wealthy Republican donors. To fully appreciate the enormity of this feat, you have to understand that the courts are highly reluctant to overturn election results in the absence of proven irregularities. That reluctance is evidenced by the fact that Trump’s legal team lost all but one of the more than 50 lawsuits it initiated and its only victory did not change a single vote. In addition, much of that money was raised after it had become clear that there were no serious irregularities in the election. This was confirmed a few days after the election when Christopher Krebs, the Director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, announced that the election was essentially free of all fraudulent activity. That Trump as able to convince his supporters to give him so much money for a clearly lost cause is truly astounding.
Yet another indication of the power of Trumpism is the fact that 126 members of the Republican House caucus signed on as amicus curiae in support of the litigation brought in the U.S. Supreme Court by Ken Paxton, the Attorney General of the State of Texas. In that action, Paxton sought to overturn the election results in the States of Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin because of the voting procedures utilized in those states. This was a wholly frivolous effort largely designed to bring attention to Paxton’s support for Trump’s quest to remain in office. Paxton is currently under investigation by the FBI for accepting bribes and apparently hoped that this effort would enhance his chances of receiving a presidential pardon. His complaint, however, was so specious that the Court rejected it in less than two days in a 9-0 decision set forth on a single page. Even though the 126 Republican House members who joined this litigation must have undoubtedly realized that Paxton’s action was without merit they nevertheless felt compelled to add their names to it. Although lemmings throwing themselves off Norwegian cliffs and into the sea is a myth, what these House members are reported to have done actually happened.
In a very real sense, Donald Trump is a modern embodiment of Meredith Willson’s “The Music Man.” He burst upon the political scene and immediately captivated the base of the Republican Party, much in the same way Harold Hill, a traveling salesman, won over the hearts and minds of the citizens of River City, Iowa. Like Hill who purported to be a musical authority, Trump proclaimed to be a successful businessman; and, like the entrancing Professor Hill, Trump proclaimed that he could extricate the nation from the dangers that were undermining it and its citizens. In both cases, the perceived threats were imaginary and the proposed solutions were unrealistic. In the case of Professor Hill, the threat was the introduction of a pool table that would corrupt the minds of the town’s youth. In the case of President Trump, it was the caravans of murders, rapists, and drug dealers that Mexico was sending across our southern border. Professor Hill’s solution was to create a boys’ band under his tutelage that would occupy the town’s wayward youth in a socially acceptable endeavor. Trump’s solution was to build a great wall and get Mexico to pay for it.
The success of both men can be attributed to their efforts to play on the hopes, fears, and prejudices of the people they were trying to manipulate. In the case of the River City townsmen, it was their fear that their way of life would be disrupted by the likes of unruly young men from the wrong side of the tracks. In the case of conservative voters in 2016, it was the realization that the quality of their lives had been declining over the past four decades and that the federal government was doing nothing to help them. Trump, boasting that he alone could reverse the situation, appealed to their distrust of the government, their racial prejudices and their xenophobia which was heightened by Al Qaeda’s attack on 9/11.
On the campaign trail, Trump said he would reverse the loss of mining and manufacturing jobs to overseas competitors with lower labor costs and he would drain the swamp in Washington where special interest groups were undermining the nation’s agenda. In an appeal to latent racial prejudices he said he would “make America great again.” This was puzzling to many Americans as the U.S. was by far the most powerful nation on earth, both economically and militarily. Some simply assumed this was a pledge to attack increasing wealth and income inequality that was slowly eroding living standards of 90% of all Americans. To members of African-American communities, however, this was an unmistakable appeal to white supremacists who since the enactment of the Civil Rights Act in 1964 had been suppressing their bigotry under the weight of notions of political correctness.
While it’s easy to dismiss The Music Man as a fantasy designed to amuse and entertain, Trump’s election in 2016 was no fantasy and has had real repercussions on American politics and democracy. It raises the question of what would make over 61 million Republican voters so quickly embrace a man who seemed so alien to their conservative values. Trump had been married three times; he had bankrupted five businesses; he had a reputation for shady business practices, bribing politicians and short-changing his suppliers and tradesmen; he had been accused of unwanted sexual advances (if not sexual assault) and had demonstrated a total disregard for legal restrictions and social norms. In short, he was a total anathema of the party that advocated law and order, sound fiscal policies and family values.
One answer is that Trump, with seven years of experience playing a business tycoon on “The Apprentice”, had become an accomplished entertainer and even today frequently brags about his TV ratings. He had also developed a knack for manipulating the media. Throughout the 2016 primary and general election campaigns he would call into television news programs and make outlandish statements. The TV stations loved to engage him because his appearances enhanced their viewership. Even MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” program (which today lambasts Trump on a daily basis) gave him countless hours of free television exposure while being careful not to offend the man who was instrumental in building the show’s ratings.
Another answer is that Trump gave full voice to the messages of hate and fear that the Republican Party had been quietly delivering for the previous two generations. There was no ambiguity in his words as he proclaimed “The American carnage stops right here.” Trump eschewed the notion that we are all Americans. He gave full recognition to the fact that our nation is divided and did his best to widen that divide while leaving no doubt as to whose side he would be championing. Whereas the Republican Party had been winning the votes of racists by subtle and socially-accepted messaging, Trump proudly proclaimed that those marching through Charlottesville chanting “Jews won’t replace us” were “very fine people” while he condemned those protesting the murder of George Floyd. Similarly, he appealed to those in middle America who felt denigrated by eastern liberals and college-educated elites by his open and outspoken hostility to those groups. He warned that Joe Biden was a puppet of Progressive Democrats and would turn America into a socialist country. He also cautioned that judges appointed by Democrats could not be trusted to rule fairly and that Muslims entering the country posed a serious danger. It was Trump’s uncompromising rhetoric that caused the Republican base to quickly come to view him as the person most likely to reverse their waning fortunes.
To be sure, Trump got some help from the disinformation campaigns directed by the Russia, from James Comey’s violations of the Justice Department’s protocols about publicizing investigations of political candidates during an election and from Hillary Clinton’s own mistakes in conducting her campaign. Those, factors only explain why Hillary Clinton received 7 million votes fewer than Barack Obama did in his two presidential elections. They don’t explain why Trump received in 2016 more votes than George W. Bush, John McCain and Mitt Romney (all mainstream Republicans) did in their presidential campaigns. Nor do they explain how Trump came to receive over 74 million votes in the 2020 election after having completely mismanaged the coronavirus pandemic and caused severe damage to the nation’s economy.
Although Trump had been a registered Democrat for many years, having no real political convictions, he easily made the transition into the Republican Party. He shared with his new party a desire to reduce taxes on businesses and wealthy individuals and to cut social welfare programs. He also shared with Republicans an anti-immigrant agenda as well as a willingness to suppress African-Americans both politically and economically. He was even willing to champion his new party’s support of the fossil fuel industry and become a climate change denier. Not all of Trump’s political preferences were known when he became the Republican presidential nominee in 2016 because of his often-stated view that discussions of policies are “boring.” Still, his business failures, his three marriages and his literally thousands of lawsuits were well known as well as his prior associations with New York City crime bosses. Even though he came with much political baggage, he had won the popular support of the Republican Party’s base and could be counted on to support the party’s efforts to cut taxes, business regulations, and social safety net programs. He could also be relied upon to appoint judges recommended by the Federalist Society. Considering his proclivity for becoming involved in legal actions, the thought of appointing scores of federal judges had an instant appeal to him. Therefore, despite his lack of governmental experience and a penchant for creating chaos, the consensus among the party’s leaders was that he could serve as a “useful idiot.”
That conclusion seemed to hold true through the first three years of his term even though Trump had an unusually high turnover among his political appointees and their replacements were being chosen, not for their expertise, but rather for their willingness to do his bidding. Still, despite Trump’s obvious deficiencies and dangerous tendencies, in January 2020 when the Senate had to consider the impeachment allegations brought against him, Senate Republicans chose to stick with the man who had brought them to the dance. It wasn’t just because of the Party’s ethos of demonstrating unquestioned loyalty to its leaders, but also because by then Trump had obtained a firm control over the hearts and minds of the party’s political base, and turning on him might have meant disaster for the party in the upcoming elections. This was no small consideration as Trump had previously displayed his penchant for taking vengeance on those who had been disloyal to him.
This brings us back to the question of what is Trumpism. It’s not a political philosophy for governing the nation because Trump seems to care little about doing that, a predilection amply displayed in his handling of the coronavirus pandemic. Moreover, the Republican Party did not even present a political platform for the 2020 election, implying that the party would support whatever Trump wanted to do. Nor is it a political movement as Trump seems more interested in destroying Obama’s political legacy than establishing his own. While Trump aspires to be a leader with unquestioned power (an earmark of fascism), he has displayed little desire to actually lead the nation in solving its problems. Most of his efforts seem to be devoted to protecting his public image and finding ways to use his presidential powers to enhance his personal wealth. Thus, Trumpism can best be described as a personality cult where the end product is the exaltation of the leader rather than the attainment of any particular goal or belief.
There have been a number of examples in the past one hundred years of personality cults. They include Mussolini, Hitler, Stalin, and Mao Tse Tung. A key element of a personality cult is to build the image of the cult’s leader into a superhuman. This is done through careful management of the leader’s persona and usually involves rewriting history and manipulation of the media that help to build that image. It also involves coercive means to get people to treat the leader as if he (yes, it’s invariably been a male) is superior to the remainder of humanity. Although all political leaders try to brandish their public images, the confirmation of the existence of a cult can only be found in the way the cult leader is perceived by the cult’s members. They become willing to accept the truth of whatever the leader says and reject all reports that question the leader’s accomplishments or otherwise denigrate him. They are also willing to take actions at his requests even if those actions place them in jeopardy or in violation of accepted law. That type of blind support is generally created by a constant retelling of lies, something Trump has achieved through his Twitter account and with the help of right-wing news organizations.
Throughout his entire life, Donald Trump has focused on building his personal image as a successful businessman and as someone who can achieve the unachievable. When he has failed, he has vehemently denied those failures and he has taken steps to prevent the truth from being revealed. He makes all those in his service sign non-disclosure agreements; he refuses to disclose his tax returns, and he threatens or brings libel suits against all who criticize him. In fact, he may be the only man in U.S. history to sue his college to prevent the disclosure of his academic record or to pen a glowing recommendation of his health for his doctor to sign.
He gets those around him to shower him with effusive praise. Recall the first meeting of his cabinet (which was televised). Each person sitting around the table, without exception, stated that it was an honor, not to be selected to help run the nation’s government, but to be able to serve under the leadership of Donald J. Trump. Similarly, at the press conferences held last spring of the Coronavirus Task Force, each person appearing thanked the president for his leadership in guiding their efforts even though we now know that he was largely disinterested in fighting the spread of the virus and the orders that he gave to prematurely restart the nation’s economy caused a major disaster. Among his greatest achievements in this regard was his causing Sarah Huckabee Sanders and Pat Robertson to say that his presidency was a gift from God.
Of course, not everyone in his administration played by his rules, and each who failed to do so was promptly terminated and, in many cases, also harangued in a series of presidential tweets. These actions served as a warning to others that they would suffer a similar fate should they in any way act in contravention of the president’s wishes or even in a manner that might diminish the president’s public image. You need only think of James Comey who refused to pledge his loyalty to the President and Alexander Vindman who responded truthfully in the president’s impeachment proceedings. Jeff Sessions’ sin was his wholly appropriate decision to recuse himself from the Russia investigation for which he earned the president’s opposition when he tried to run for the Senate seat he had given up to become Trump’s attorney general. The 126 members of Congress who joined Ken Paxton’s lawsuit undoubtedly did so out of fear that they too would become the subject of the president’s insatiable thirst for vengeance had they failed to support him.
When Trump first began his campaign for president he boasted that he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and no one would do anything about it. While this was taken as just another of Trump’s many boasts, we have all come to learn that he has mastered the skill of getting people to accede to his wishes no matter how inappropriate or illegal they may be. The Senate’s dismissal of the impeachment charges against him is further evidence of the control he exerts over his followers. I find further evidence of Trump’s cult-like control even among my acquaintances. Almost no week goes by in which I do not encounter a Trump supporter who adamantly refuses to acknowledge any Trump’s many failures, simply asserting that what I bring up is “fake news.” Most of them simply terminate our conversation saying “let’s agree to disagree.” This type of blind faith is the true measure of the existence of a cult.
I don’t wish to imply that all 74 million Americans who voted for Trump in the 2020 election are members of a cult. A number of them simply believe that they were casting their vote in their own self-interest. Some have amassed some wealth and are afraid that the Democrats will raise their taxes and take other actions that will leave them less financially secure. Other Trump supporters were undoubtedly frightened by the irrational prospects that the Democrats would turn this country into a socialist nation or allow lawless mobs to control the streets of our cities and towns. And yes, among Trump’s supporters are those “deplorables” that Hillary Clinton spoke of whose racial prejudices coincide with those that Trump openly espouses. All of these are people who voted for Trump, not because they feel that he could do no wrong, but rather because his messages of hate and fear resonate with them. Still, there are many others who get all of their information from right-wing social media and Fox News and who have come to accept the President’s lies. This explains why more than 70% of Republicans now harbor the belief that Biden won the election through fraud when that claim is disputed by the election officials in each of the contested states, many of whom are Republicans.
While Trump has been defeated at the polls, Trumpism remains alive and well. This means that Trump will be able to continue to parlay the unquestioning devotion of his followers into additional avenues for achieving wealth. To do that, he will need to serve as the principal spokesperson for the Republican Party and recent events have shown that there will be few within the party who will be willing to oppose him. As long as that remains the case, the Republican Party will be hard-pressed to nominate another candidate to run for president in the 2024 election; and with Trump as their candidate, the Democratic base will be fully energized to make sure he and other Republicans are not elected.
It’s hard for me to feel sorry for the GOP. The Republicans built their popular base on hate and fear and now find themselves captive to a man who has proven himself a master at manipulating those emotions. The best they can now do is to hope that the Democrats destroy Trump politically for being the con man that he is.