https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/lost-cause-of-the-trumpocracy-by-elizabeth-drew-2020-11
The Lost Cause of the Trumpocracy
Nov 12, 2020ELIZABETH DREW
Donald Trump's insistent denial of reality
following his loss in the 2020 US presidential election threatens to do still
more damage to American democracy, even though it comes as no surprise. Like
the southerners who never could get over their loss in the American Civil War,
Trump has nothing left but his own mythomania.
WASHINGTON, DC – Joe Biden’s clear defeat of
President Donald Trump, announced on Saturday, November 7 after four days of
counting, is – a week later – still not enough for Trump to affirm Biden’s
victory. Biden’s win supposedly ended what had been called the most
consequential US election of modern times, but for reasons of his own, Trump is
still holding out.
Under the guise of insisting that he was the
victim of voter fraud – he has been advertising for months that he’d make this
argument if he lost – Trump is denying Biden, and the country, the chance to
begin an orderly
transition of power.
That Biden is the most experienced person in modern history to enter the
presidency will help, but he faces the toughest situation confronting a new
president since Franklin D. Roosevelt took office in 1933, in the midst of the
Great Depression. Given the raging pandemic and economic collapse, Biden’s
challenge may even be more difficult.
Most of Trump’s opponents recognize that the
election didn’t fulfill their ardent desire for an overwhelming repudiation of
a president they despise. They must also face the fact that Trump retains
an exceptionally
large following.
Almost ten million more people voted for Trump this time around than in 2016.
The Democrats fared much worse in the elections for the Senate and the House of
Representatives than the polls had predicted (they were wrong again), with the
Senate probably remaining in the hands of the Republican
master strategist Mitch McConnell – unless the Democrats sweep two run-off
elections to be held in Georgia in early January.1
The most alarming conclusion about Trump’s
presidency is how perilously close the United States came to a breakdown of its
constitutional system. If Trump had succeeded in his efforts to reverse the
election (clearly futile from the outset), US democracy could have been
destroyed. So perhaps the biggest lesson from Trump’s presidency is how fragile
the US Constitution is, and that timorousness before those who would undermine
it enhances the dangers.
It may take a while before Trump’s genuine, if
feral, political talent is fully understood. Trump succeeded in politics
largely by appealing to Americans’ basest instincts and exploiting the
country’s ingrained racism. The first words he uttered as a candidate were a
vicious denunciation of Mexican immigrants as rapists. Trump understood, as do
his fellow “populist” leaders around the world, that a great many people are
drawn to bombast. He also benefited from his P.T. Barnum-like showman’s
instincts; the image of Trump and his wife descending a golden escalator in
2015 is indelible.
Though he was politically damaged by it, Trump
didn’t pay the price he deserved for his disastrous mishandling of the
pandemic, because he understood, and played upon, the contempt that many of his
supporters have for “experts.” He pressed for policies reflecting his
understanding that people didn’t want to be secluded in their homes; that
parents wanted their kids back in school; that small businesses wanted to
reopen; and that a lot of people don’t want to be ordered to wear a mask.
Being spectacularly denied another term as
president, the greatest reversal of Trump’s life, has landed him in the camp of
those he holds in the most contempt: “losers.” Although Trump is far from the
first presidential candidate to take a loss badly (some never get over it), his
reaction has been volcanic (though he has largely been cooped up in his office
or playing golf). The sham campaign that Trump is running ostensibly to nullify
the vote is clearly intended to avoid that “loser” tag. If, in the process of
salving his ego, Trump delegitimizes not only the election but the American
political system, so be it.
Trump continues to wield government power until
the inauguration on January 20 next year, which gives him many opportunities
for mischief. On the Monday after the vote, he began a purge of the Department
of Defense, dismissing Secretary of Defense Mark
Esper with a tweet and replacing him with a relatively inexperienced loyalist.
Other senior Pentagon officials have also been sacked and replaced by people
Trump trusts more.
Do the sackings simply reflect Trump’s ample
capacity for spite, or is there a darker plan afoot? Esper, for example, had
openly opposed Trump’s desire to use federal troops to put down violence in the
streets of what he terms “Democrat-run” cities. There is also a brutal
internal war within
the administration over declassifying intelligence that Trump believes will
absolve him of the charge that he received Russian help in 2016.
Because Trump remains the dominant force in
their party, Republicans – some with an eye on the 2024 presidential election –
are reluctant to object openly to his tearing at the sinews that hold the
country together. Trump’s eschewing of the ritual congratulatory telephone call
to Biden – thus setting an example for other Republicans – was the least of it.
It’s clear that Trump and his allies are up to
something larger. On the eve of Barack Obama’s first inauguration in 2009,
Republican leaders met in the Capitol and decided on the unprecedented goal of
defeating his every initiative as president. Trump is going further, appearing
bent on crippling Biden even before he’s sworn in.
The danger that Trump presents to the American
republic, if not the world, won’t disappear after January 20. At that point,
there are no inhibitions on him other than those imposed by his ambitions. One
worry among current and
former intelligence officials is that, though Trump didn’t pay much attention to his
intelligence briefings, he possesses information that would be of great
interest to America’s adversaries. Might some of them be willing to help bail
him out from the deep financial hole he’s in (he must soon begin repaying $400
million in personally guaranteed loans)?
Trump out of power will have other worries, too.
Even if he pardons himself before leaving office, that will save him only from
federal prosecutions. He would still be vulnerable to
prosecutions stemming
from investigations underway in various states.
The astonishing outburst of jubilation that
broke out across the US – and in countries around the world – following Trump’s
defeat was a testament to how frightened people have been by his presidency.
The relief may be premature. Axios reported recently that Trump has
already discussed with aides the possibility of running for president again in
2024.
This might well be a Trumpian ruse. As of now,
Trump seems more focused on creating another “lost cause” myth – like the
self-glorifying one concocted by unreconstructed Southerners after the US Civil
War. Such incendiary mythology could prove useful to Trump in countless ways in
the years ahead, including keeping him relevant and on TV. It may be a long
time before the US and the world have seen the last of Donald Trump.
Writing for PS since 2015
64 Commentaries
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Elizabeth Drew is a Washington-based
journalist and the author, most recently, of Washington Journal: Reporting
Watergate and Richard Nixon's Downfall.
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