Trumpism
PART IV
“Back to the Future” by Barry Blitt
January 21, 2024
Melania’s Ex-BFF is BACK with MORE TROUBLING
News For Entire Trump Family | The Weekend Show
Former friend and aide to Melania Trump, Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, joins Anthony Davis to expose the Trump family dynamic during this politically turbulent period as Donald becomes even more extreme in light of his legal troubles and as the country grapples with the threat of dictatorship.
January 26, 2024
Liz Cheney Talks Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell
Being Weak and the 2024 Election
Former Congresswoman and Vice Chair of the January 6th select committee Liz Cheney joins the pod to discuss the dangers of a second Trump term, his chokehold on the Republican party and why she thinks Nikki Haley needs to stay in the GOP primary. Plus, more on Mitch McConnellâs about-face on the bipartisan Senate immigration deal and President Bidenâs endorsement from the United Auto Workers Union.
PBS
January 30, 2024
Democracy on Trial
In March, 2024 Republican presidential nomination front-runner Trump is scheduled to begin standing trial on federal charges, including conspiracy to defraud the U.S., in connection with efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss. He says the charges against him are politically motivated.
âDemocracy on Trialâ traces the road to this unprecedented moment, and examines the implications of the historic criminal case unfolding in the midst of a presidential election year. Drawing on court documents and revelatory interviews with elected officials, former government lawyers, House Select Committee witnesses and former committee staffers, authors and journalists, the documentary reports that the work of the House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol attack provided the groundwork for special counsel Jack Smithâs indictment of Trump and may offer insights into how the trial unfolds.
The documentary chronicles how the committee built its case against Trump and tried to prove his intent, how it chose to present its case to the American public, and criticisms of its work. Key witnesses who testified before the committee and whose firsthand accounts are now evidence in the federal case speak out in the documentary â including Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, Georgia election official Gabriel Sterling and former Arizona Speaker of the House Rusty Bowers.
Gripping and illuminating, âDemocracy on Trial,â the newest film from FRONTLINEâs award-winning political team, Michael Kirk, Mike Wiser and Vanessa Fica, also examines how Trump has challenged the case. Trump has pleaded not guilty and made the legal argument, now being reviewed by an appellate court, that he has âabsolute immunityâ from prosecution for his actions while in office.
January 30, 2024
Prosecutor Who TOOK DOWN Trump
BACK for More | Burn The Boats
While serving as the Assistant Attorney General of New York, Tristan Snell prosecuted Trump University, the Trump Organization, and Donald Trump himself.
Tristanâs new book, Taking Down Trump: 12 Rules for Prosecuting Donald Trump by Someone Who Did It Successfully, talks about that case and lays out the 12 rules for prosecuting Donald Trump. In this interview, Tristan talks about Trumpâs legal strategy, how he is manipulating the legal system, and his history of lies.
February 4, 2024
The resurrection of Donald Trump
To loyal Trump supporters, their candidate can do no wrong. Donald Trumpâs 2024 run for the White House seems unstoppable despite all the controversies.
Synopsis | The Power of One (2024)
People all over the world are now wondering if, politically at least, Donald Trump is indestructible. The former United States president is facing 91 charges in four criminal trials, and the very real threat of going to prison. On top of that, last week he was ordered to pay more than $120 million in damages to a woman he defamed. For anyone else, any one of these setbacks would mean political death. But not Donald Trump, who just gets stronger, louder and more belligerent. And more likely to make a triumphant return to the White House after the US election later this year.
Amelia Adams travels to Trumpâs heartland to investigate his secret to turning scandal into success.
Itâs Way Too Easy for a Crook Like Trump to Pervert Our Legal System
If the law has one standard for the rich and powerful and another for the rest of us, it will be hard for ordinary Americans to maintain their faith in democracy.
February 5, 2024
Former President Donald Trump leaves the courtroom at the New York State Supreme Court during the civil fraud trial against the Trump Organization, in New York City on January 11.
We once again come to the start of yet another week that could, and by rights should, destroy Donald Trump. This Thursday, the Supreme Court will hear arguments in the case that seeks to bar Trump from the ballot under Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment. Meanwhile, we await word from New York Judge Arthur Engoron, who blew past his self-imposed January 31 deadline for announcing the damages heâll make the former president pay in the Trump Organization fraud case. Finally, we also sit here wondering what is taking that three-judge panel on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals so long in deciding that Trump should not be immune from prosecution.
What does it all add up to? This: We are forced to confront the devastating possibility that our legal and political systems have no way of punishing obviously illegal and immoral behavior when carried out by someone with enormous political and financial power.
We tell ourselves weâre a nation of laws. But what if that is a lie? What if thatâs a fairy tale? What if our system is not only imperfect, as any system designed by human beings is bound to be? What if it is designed so that rich and powerful people â even ones with horrible defense lawyers! â can wait the system out, even pervert it, and prevail?
This is what Donald Trump has done all his adult life. It goes all the way back to 1973, when the Justice Department moved against Trump and his father, Fred, for flagrantly racist renting practices. They did not rent to Black people. That isnât even disputed now. But the Trumps hired Roy Cohn, sued the government for defamation, and settled the suit painlessly two years later without ever having to admit guilt.
That was no aberration. That was our legal system atâpardon the phrase, âwork.â Weâve all seen more instances of this than we can count: A rich person or a corporation rips people off or peddles a product that doesnât work or that even causes people injury or death, and they pay a fine and donât admit guilt. This happens so often that itâs shocking when a wealthy corporate wrongdoer is truly brought to justice and sent to prison. Elizabeth Holmes, I guess. OK, thatâs one.
But when Trump entered the political world, well, I thought, now heâll see that you canât just endlessly get away with it. You canât lie and deny and pay fines and lightly dance on to the next controversy. For law-flouting real estate barons, thereâs always a way to wriggle out. But for law-flouting presidents, surely there are consequences.
There may yet be. Trump has, after all, been indicted four times. He is charged with 91 specific criminal acts. A jury of his peers (it seems rude to these people to consider this gruesome swindler their moral peer, but he is alas their legal peer) just awarded a woman, whom he repeatedly defamed, more than three times the amount of money her lawyer was seeking. And back in 2020, when he was trying to overturn the election, the courts were having none of it, even courts overseen by his own appointees.
So the legal system has some fight in it. But the battle is far from won.
Letâs consider Trumpâs current legal arguments in turn. With respect to the Fourteenth Amendment case, his lawyers contend that the president is not an âofficerâ of the United States. This is, on its face, a joke. Ask 1,000 people in the street if the president is an officer of the United States, and at least 975 of them will say of course he is.
But if you read some tortured defenses of the Trump position, you will see that our Constitution and laws are ambiguousâor perhaps the better word is malleableâenough on the matter that Trumpâs lawyers, in front of friendly judges (and Trump sure has some friends on the Supreme Court), might actually get away with saying that the president of the United States isnât an officer of the United States. (It would set an absolutely staggering precedent, it must be said, for the Supreme Court to decide that the president enjoys the unique power to order an insurrection.)
On the question of immunity, his lawyer, rather infamously, argued at the D.C. Circuit that Trump could, in fact, get away in a court of law with ordering Seal Team 6 to kill a political rival provided the Congress had not impeached and convicted him first. If Congress failed to do so, John Sauer argued, then, no, Trump could not be prosecuted for murder. Why this hypothetical rogue Seal team wouldnât simply also murder any conviction-minded senators is the part of this thought exercise that few have dared to ponder.
Again, this is as crazy-beans as it gets. And again, if you asked 1,000 people whether a president should be able to get away with murder (youâd have to ask it hypothetically, to remove the question of partisan loyalties), the overwhelming majority would say no. Iâd hope everyone would. And yet: Justice Department rulings are apparently malleable enough that this Supreme Court might uphold that logic.
What in the world is taking this three-judge panel so long? Thereâs a lot of speculation on that. Two of the judges are Biden appointees. The third, Karen Henderson, was appointed by George H.W. Bush. She has produced several pro-Trump rulings over the years, including slowing Congressâs access to Trumpâs tax records and joining a Trump judge in a decision, described as âsimply astonishingâ by Voxâs Ian Millhiser, that helped the legal position of Michael Flynn.
I still think, on balance, and most of our nationâs top legal experts think, that the three-judge panel wonât buy Sauerâs argument and that even this Supreme Court will likely uphold the Circuit, allowing all these prosecutions to continue. The Fourteenth Amendment case is far more up in the air. It will be interesting to hear Thursday what kinds of questions John Roberts, Brett Kavanaugh, and Neil Gorsuch in particular ask.
But we are left wondering: What if Trump skates away again? What if, in other words, itâs still 1973 in this country, and he gets away with it? Again: By any commonsensical standard, Trump as president was obviously an officer of the United States. He obviously incited an insurrection. It is obvious that no president should have total immunity from prosecution for anything he does. Into the bargain, he obviously stole classified documents he wasnât entitled to have, he obviously tried to rig the Georgia vote, and he obviously paid Stormy Daniels hush money. And finally, itâs obvious that if he wins, the minute heâs president, heâll nullify all these prosecutions of himself.
When we talk about the failures of American democracy, we talk about the Electoral College, we speak of the unequal Senate, and gerrymandering, and so on. We rarely talk of the law. We should. Americans see all the time that the law cuts deals with rich and powerful people. Is that supposed to make them think we live in a truly democratic society? It makes them think we live in a rigged society, and that on the question of democracy, the law is agnostic.
So, in the nine months between now and Election Day, we will see whether we have a system of laws that is capable of stopping an obvious lawbreaker. If we do, great. We at least live in a nation where the legal class finally rose up and said to one lawless and dangerous man, âEnough. We are stopping you.â And if we donât? Weâll spend the next four yearsâat leastâlearning the full price of the lawâs democratic agnosticism.
February 6, 2024
Trump’s Presidency: The first year as it happened
History, as it happened. A reminder of what happened in Donald Trump’s first year in office. Itâs the reality that millions of Americans struggled to accept. Following a tumultuous campaign filled with chants, sledges and accusations, Donald Trump came out on top and officially became the 45th President of the United states. His campaign was a strong indicator for what was to follow with Trump in the White House as Donald Trump wasted no time in taking action on his many promises.
In this documentary, we relive the first year of the Trump administration, through the 7NEWS team’s coverage of all key moments, with additional new commentary from 7 News anchor Mike Amor, who was the US Bureau Chief reporter during the first year of 45’s reign.
Februray 6, 2024
Is the USA on the Brink of Another Civil War?
Vice president of George Fox Digital, Dr. Brian Doak, speaks with university president Dr. Robin Baker and renowned historian Dr. Allen Guelzo about the American spirit, the removal of Civil War monuments, and the prospect of a major national conflict in light of the 2024 presidential election. Why do we still see Confederate flags flying, what is really behind the erection and removal of Civil War era statues, and are the conditions right for another violent schism in our time?
February 19, 2024
Trump fake elector in Wisconsin describes
how he says he was tricked
Andrew Hitt, who signed a phony electoral certificate for former President Trump in 2020, tells 60 Minutes that he and other Wisconsin Republican electors were tricked.
MARCH 1, 2024 * A JOURNAL FROM AMERICAâS HEARTLAND * Vol. 30, No. 4
An Incurable Disease?
The Mystery of MAGA
How is it possible that people cheer and celebrate the most transparent fraud, the most outrageous liar, the most straitjacket-ready psycho ever visited on the body politic?
By Hal Crowther
Like nearly every self-appointed critic of the American political system, I never imagined that I would still be typing that dread-laden five-letter word in February of 2024. The one that begins with âtâ and ends with âpâ, of course, and it isnât âtulip.â Iâve prayed, Iâve fasted, Iâve made burnt offerings to the neglected god of common sense, a deity so many Americans have left behind. And still the T-word and the man who embodies all its mystery and menace persist.
Arguments against the presidential candidacy of Donald Trump are like arguments against infanticide, or microwaving kittens. When you offer one, and there must be hundreds, you canât conceive of an objection or rebuttal. The case against this creature was closed nearly a decade ago, though more damning evidence seems to turn up every day. The New York Timesâ Michelle Goldberg, not a writer given to heated overstatement, refers to him as a âfreakish madmanâ and an âonrushing nightmare.â Yet indictments for 91 felonies havenât kept him from winning Republican primaries and drawing crowds of passionate believers. One Times headline reads âTrump Tightens Grip on National Psyche.â And another, âTrumpâs Connection With Supporters Has Little Precedent: Victory Reveals a New Depth of Devotion.â
The New York Historical Society
March 18, 2024
Confidence Man with Maggie Haberman // The American Story
How does a man like Donald Trumpâsimultaneously hailed as an all-American hero and condemned as a harbinger of the end of American democracyâbecome not only a cultural phenomenon, but the president of the United States? Maggie Haberman, the New York Times reporter who won a Pulitzer Prize for her coverage of the 45th president, offers insight into his background, his motivations, and the true nature of his personality, not to mention the means by which he gained a seat in the Oval Office.
Maggie Haberman, a senior political correspondent for the New York Times and a political analyst for CNN, is the author of Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America. David M. Rubenstein (moderator), co-founder and co-chairman of the Carlyle Group, is the author of How to Invest: Masters on the Craft and the host of History with David Rubenstein on PBS.
DEADLINE | WHITE HOUSE
March 28, 2024
Liz Cheney urges the Supreme Court to
stop aiding Donald Trumpâs delay tactics
Anthony Scaramucci, former Trump White House Communications Director, Charlie Sykes MSNBC Columnist, and Basil Smikle join Nicolle Wallace on Deadline White House with reaction to Liz Cheneyâs most recent comments calling out the conservative Supreme Court for aiding and abetting Donald Trump and his legal teamâs delay tactics by taking up the issue of Presidential Immunity.
March 28, 2024
The Mass Psychology of Trumpism
What explains Donald Trumpâs enduring appeal among his supporters? What drives the intense emotional connection that his most passionate followers feel with the former â and possibly next â president? This question has flummoxed and bedeviled pundits, political scientists, journalists, historians and other observers for the last decade, leading many to the realization that the normal categories of political analysis fall short when it comes to this phenomenon.
In this video essay, the psychologist Dan McAdams ventures a theory: In the minds of Trumpâs most ardent supporters, he is both more and less than a person. âIn the eyes of his supporters, Trump possesses extraordinary powers that are wielded for good and against evil,â McAdams observes. âWho cares if he is flawed? So what if he lacks certain distinctively human qualities? What does it matter that he is rude, authoritarian or even a criminal?â
To explain this apparent paradox, McAdams draws on the research for his book The Strange Case of Donald J. Trump: A Psychological Reckoning (2020). McAdams, the Henry Wade Rogers professor of psychology and professor of human development and social policy at Northwestern University, is a pioneering scholar in the field of ânarrative identityâ theory, or the life-story model of human identity. His other books include The Redemptive Self: Stories Americans Live By (2006).
This video essay is drawn from McAdamsâ New Lines Magazine article âThe Mass Psychology of Trumpism,â which can be found at newlinesmag.com/argument…
Written & narrated by Dan P. McAdams
Produced by Danny Postel
Edited by Mikey Andreasson
Assistant editor Mindi Roscoe
Sound engineered by Stephen J. Lewis
April 5, 2024
The Antisocial Network: Memes to Mayhem
How did a niche meme-sharing message board become a hotbed for conspiracy theories and dangerous disinformation? This documentary investigates.
April 2024
Jacobâs Dream
MAGA meets the Age of Aquarius
By Frederick Kaufman
Jacob Angeli-Chansley, the man the media has dubbed the QAnon Shaman, had been released from federal custody six weeks before when we met for lunch at a place called Picazzoâs, winner of the Phoenix New Times Best Gluten-Free Restaurant award in 2015. Despite a protracted hunger strike and 317 days isolated in a cell, Jacobâs prison sentence of forty-one months for obstruction of an official proceeding on January 6, 2021, had been shortened owing to good behavior, and he was let out about a year early on supervised release.
It took some doing to get him to sit for an interview, as Jacob is wary of what he calls Operation Mockingbird, an alleged CIA-sponsored effort begun in the Fifties to use mass media to influence public opinion. Jacob believes that people like me are the tools of the Mockingbird operation, of the deep state, international bankers, pharmaceutical cartels, and corporate monarchies that control the world. People like me believe in medicines that are addictive drugs, in food that is poison, in environmentalism that is ecocide, in education that is ignorance, in money that is debt, in objective science that is not objective. âPeople are brainwashed by the elites and their propaganda networks,â he said. âMass hypnosis, bro.â
April 9, 2024
Lying Is What Dictators Do
Straight from the authoritarian playbook, Trump has turned the RNC into a hereditary dictatorship in his quest to swap out the entire GOPâand reality itselfâwith a murderous Christofascist fantasy.
By Brynn Tannehill
One of Donald Trumpâs first acts as president in 2017 was to force Sean Spicer onto the podium to lie about how his inauguration was the best attended and watched ever. It was such an audacious and easily dispelled lieâthere was footage to prove otherwise. But Trumpâs narcissistic ego prevented him from admitting defeat. More so, everything had to be superlativeâthe most popular, the biggest, the best. It was Spicerâs job as his flack to make us understand and accept this. (Spicer paid for this by ritually being humiliated and emasculated in a way that recalls the infamous âMy name is Reekâ scene in Game of Thrones.)
However, Spicer was one man. And now it is a command from above to define reality as whatever Donald Trump says it is, regardless of facts, evidence, or logic. Now Trump, in his bid to run for the White House for a third time, wants the Republican National Committee, which he effectively has taken over, to replace the entire GOP. He swapped the organizationâs chair Ronna McDaniel with his daughter-in-law, Ericâs wife Lara Trump, and longtime Trump loyalist Michael Whatley, and then immediately instituted mass layoffs and began restaffing it with his own people. The goal was clear: Establish the Trump family as a hereditary dictatorship.
This past week, the Washington Post revealed that interviewees for positions at the RNC were asked whether they believed the 2020 Election was stolen. This was the litmus test, so that they would only hire those who would vocally support lies meant to undermine the legitimacy of the United Statesâ government.
If Trump takes power again in 2025 (according to polls, if the election were held today, he would likely easily win the electoral college based on six key swing states), he will spread this command to all of government via Schedule F. This will also allow him to fill all of the top 50,000 spots in government with cronies, ideologues, and sycophants who can be hired and fired at his will.
April 11, 2024
Column: Trump 1.0 made some world
leaders laugh. Trump 2.0 terrifies them
By Jackie Calmes
Not a joke, as Joe Biden might say.
Iâm talking about our country: America is no joke, no matter how many times Donald Trump claims it is.
One of his most obnoxious lies at every rally and in most interviews is his contention that, with Biden as president, a disrespectful world is laughing at us. Trump was at it again last week, at his most recent rally in Green Bay, Wis., claiming the United States is a global laughingstock.
âJoe Biden is not respected and Joe Biden is not fearedâ among the worldâs nations, he told his fawning crowd. But once he, Trump, is reelected, âAmerica will soon be respected again, very quickly respected, like never before.â
Like virtually all Trumpisms, this one is demonstrably false.
âThroughout Donald Trumpâs presidency, publics around the world held the United States in low regard,â the Pew Research Center reported soon after he left office. Its 2020 survey found that among 13 allied nations, the share of people who had a favorable view of America was the lowest it had been in the two decades since Pew began asking the question. Good feelings toward the United States rebounded after Biden took office and remained favorable by a 2-to-1 ratio last year.
Itâs almost laughable, Trumpâs projection of his own unpopularity onto Biden. Except that too many Americans believe him.
As for foreign leaders, theyâre not laughing at the United States or Trump. Theyâre openly fretting that the pro-authoritarian neo-isolationist whose crude credo is âAmerica Firstâ could return to power. Their agita is pretty astounding, really.
They donât respect Trump at all, though they do fear him â the way youâd fear a madman at the nuclear button. President Nixon sought leverage by making foreign counterparts think he was unstable; Trump actually is unstable. Foreign diplomats and some leaders donât even mask their anxiety. They mostly speak anonymously, in case he actually regains power, but they speak nonetheless, ignoring norms against opining about another countryâs election.
Trumpâs former national security advisor John Bolton has said repeatedly that even the autocrats Trump admires â Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, Kim Jong Un, among others â âthink heâs a laughing fool.â
April 19, 2024
What Did President Trump Do
for 187 Minutes on Jan. 6?
DEMOCRACY ON TRIAL
PART 12 of 13
April 30, 2024
How Far Trump
Would Go
By Eric Cortellessa / Palm Beach, Florida
Donald Trump thinks heâs identified a crucial mistake of his first term: He was too nice.
Weâve been talking for more than an hour on April 12 at his fever-dream palace in Palm Beach. Aides lurk around the perimeter of a gilded dining room overlooking the manicured lawn. When one nudges me to wrap up the interview, I bring up the many former Cabinet officials who refuse to endorse Trump this time. Some have publicly warned that he poses a danger to the Republic. Why should voters trust you, I ask, when some of the people who observed you most closely do not?
As always, Trump punches back, denigrating his former top advisers. But beneath the typical torrent of invective, there is a larger lesson he has taken away. âI let them quit because I have a heart. I donât want to embarrass anybody,â Trump says. âI donât think Iâll do that again. From now on, Iâll fire.â
Six months from the 2024 presidential election, Trump is better positioned to win the White House than at any point in either of his previous campaigns. He leads Joe Biden by slim margins in most polls, including in several of the seven swing states likely to determine the outcome. But I had not come to ask about the election, the disgrace that followed the last one, or how he has become the first formerâand perhaps futureâAmerican President to face a criminal trial. I wanted to know what Trump would do if he wins a second term, to hear his vision for the nation, in his own words.
Trump and Macho Masculinity
in American Politics
By Ray Williams | May 2, 2024
âHegemonic masculinity was a major factor in Trumpâs political success.â â Theresa Vescio and Nathaniel Schemerhorn, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The current trial of Donald Trump over a âhush money coverupâ with an adult porn star and accompanying two campaign finance charges feature daily outbursts by Trump in the media, often displaying him in an aggressive, angry âmasculineâ way. This male aggressiveness has been a hallmark of Trumpâs behavior throughout his life, and it has spread in politics.
There is a rise in support for authoritarianism which has clear connections to toxic masculinity in American politics, particularly in the Republican Party as I describe in my book, Macho Men: How Toxic Masculinity Harms Us All and What To Do About It.
According to Kristin Kobes Du Mez, author of Jesus and John Wayne, a book about white evangelicals and masculinity, aggressive macho politics can contribute to political dysfunction. âTrumpâs identity is rooted in militancy, and militancy needs adversaries. Therefore, his foes are both internal and foreign,â she said.
Trump chose conflicts with other political, business, and international leaders both during his election campaigns and after he was elected. Of course, the mainstream media is his preferred target. Trump, according to Du Mez, proved that âcompromise is a sign of weakness.â
In addition to picking confrontations with adversaries (real or imagined), Trump often used degrading, if not abusive, rhetoric, such as âCrazy Nancy Pelosiâ or âCryinâ Chuck Schumer,â or âSleepy Joe Biden.â
Trump is infamous for calling people âlittleâ or âliddleâ before their names, as he did with California congressman Adam Schiff, Senator Marco Rubio, former Tennessee Senator Bob Corker, and other figures (for example, former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg).
There is a trend to Trumpâs insults though: He frequently disparages womenâs appearances or refers to them as hysterical, but likes to denigrate male opponents as weak by calling them âcryinâ,â âlittle,â or âlow-energy.â In addition, he has a history of criticizing black women, including Vice President Kamala Harris.
According to Du Mez, race is inextricably linked to this manly posture. According to her, âThese heroes [Confederate Generals, for instance] that are praised tend to be white male military heroes that promote this narrative of white masculine strength as actually being the center of American history, the center of the American tale.â
Reshaping Republican Politics
Kirk Swearingen, writing in Salon about toxic masculinity in the Republican Party comments: âThis hyper-focus on anything and everything sexual extends to the rightâs self-proclaimed tough guys, the seeming adults who so much enjoy playing dress-up. Tucker Carlsonâs bluster about masculinity (including his risible special âThe End of Menâ whose promo included a fair amount of plausibly-homoerotic imagery.â
As historian Ruth Ben-Ghiat noted in an article for the Atlantic: âIlliberal political solutions tend to take hold when increased gender equity and emancipation spark anxieties about male authority and status. Conquest-without-consequences masculinity, posing as a âreturn to traditional values,â tracks with authoritarianismâs rise and parallels the discarding of the rule of law and accountability in politics.â
Jennifer Rubin also wrote a blunt editorial in the Washington Post which argued amongst other things:
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âIn their head-spinning transition from apologists for Russian President Vladimir Putin to proponents of World War III, Republicans reveal not only their utter lack of principle but also their obsession with toxic masculinity. Winston Churchillâs favored saying âThe Hun is always either at your throat or your feetâ neatly sums up the Republicansâ abrupt shift . . . âBoth expressions of wish fulfillment â admiring Russian ruthlessness and going to war â are features of a party in constant need of masculine affirmation.â
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âThis is not a new phenomenon. As the saying went during Trumpâs administration, cruelty â or the raw assertion of power over the powerless â was the point. It still is. Whether they are separating children from parents, spying on and infringing on women who do not want to be compelled to complete their pregnancy, or threatening to take away transgender children whose parents seek appropriate medical care, manliness manifesting as bullying has been the Republicansâ defining feature of late.â
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âAnd theyâre using the full force of the state to impose their will. All to enforce the frantic assertion â as Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) laid out in a ludicrous 11-point platform â that âmen are men, women are women.â Does anyone remember a national party running on such a naked appeal to masculine insecurity?â
Rubin noted that following the Capitol insurrection, Senator Josh Hawley (R-Missouri) went on to âsell a mug depicting his fist pump to the Jan. 6 mob,â and âhis speech decrying that âtraditional masculine virtuesâ are under attack illustrated precisely how masculine insecurity masquerades as manliness.â She added âDeclaring that the left has been systematically destroying masculinity and Republicans will stage a ârevival of strong and healthy manhood in Americaâ might sound comical. But in todayâs GOP, this is red meat for the MAGA crowd.â
As an indication of the Republican Partyâs focus on masculinity, The Public Religion Research Instituteâs 2020 values survey found, âMajorities of Republicans agree with both the statement that society punishes men just for acting like men (60% agree) and that society has become too soft and feminine (63% agree).ââ
Other politicians in the Republican Party have picked up Trumpâs macho attitude. For instance, former Georgia senator Kelly Loeffler tweeted a video of Trump physically wrestling the coronavirus to the ground and beating up on it; Texas senator Ted Cruz tweeted that âmany leftist guys never grow balls.â
A news anchor on the conservative One America News outlet commented that the thousands of people who stole the 2020 election from Trump were âtraitorsâ and that execution might be an appropriate penalty. American citizens âhave an obligation to useâ the Second Amendment, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) of Congress said, âto continue an armed rebellion against the government if that becomes necessary.â
In pressuring Vice President Mike Pence to help him overturn the results of the election, Trump reportedly questioned Penceâs masculinity by saying, âYou can either go down in history as a patriot, or you can go down in history as a pussy,â according to the New York Times.
Trump has demonstrated to Republican supporters the viability of using violence to gain control. The danger of violence and its actuality are closer than we realize, and they are directly out of the script for authoritarian and autocratic leaders, as we know from the history of authoritarianism.
According to a PRRI poll, Republicans employ aggressive rhetoric more frequently than Democrats, (42 percent to 23 percent respectively).
âI think Trumpâs exaggerated hypermasculinity, if you could call it that, has, if itâs done anything, it’s driven women away from the party,â said Christine Matthews, a Republican pollster who has been critical of Trump.
Matthews added: âWhen I was sort of looking at some of the Republican women running for government in the 2020 election, one thing I saw was how many of them seemed to be portraying themselves as not only Second Amendment supporters, but photographs of themselves with firearms â enormous guns.â This includes Congresswomen Lauren Boebert and Marjorie Taylor Green as well as South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem.
Hegemonic Masculinity and Donald Trump
âNew research shows that people who embrace âhegemonic masculinityâ are more likely to support President Trump than people who do not.
âThis analysis demonstrates that masculinity is more than just an ideal that men aspire to. Itâs something our culture values, âsaid the studyâs principal author, Theresa Vescio, a psychology professor at Pennsylvania State University who also specializes in womenâs gender and sexuality studies.
âThe appeal of masculinity as a cultural concept is that, despite subordinating women, we can persuade them to participate in and support it. Despite its underlying subordination, we can persuade men of color, guys from low socioeconomic level, and men who identify as LGBT to support it,â added Vescio.
Over and above whatever sexist, racist, or homophobic sentiments a voter could have, around half of seven research studies published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences revealed acceptance of a strong male hierarchy predicted a positive appraisal of Trump.
Professor of political science and psychology at the University of Minnesota Christopher Federico said, âThe underlying notion is that masculinity is more brittle than femininity and must continuously be earned and upheld in front of others. Trump seems to receive more support among guys who feel (or have been made to believe) that their standing as males is insufficient.â
âOne explanation is that Trump emits an excessive domineering masculinity, at least in the persona he presents in public. Therefore, backing him could be a method to adopt that ethos or to show that one is a man by backing a âmasculine proxy,â he argues.
It Spreads Like a Virus
A no-fly zone in Ukraine, enforced by the U.S., was urged by several elected Republicans who were seeking to portray themselves as tougher than President Biden, which would increase the likelihood of a direct confrontation between the United States and Russia.
During Trumpâs presidency, expressions of the use of power over the weak and helpless were common. It is still. Republicansâ actions have been characterized by tough masculinity that takes the form of bullying, whether they are separating children from their parents, spying on and violating the privacy of women who do not want to be forced to finish their pregnancies, or threatening to take away transgender children whose parents seek appropriate medical care.
The MAGA followers found their perfect example of toxic masculinity in Trump. Trump gave the MAGA mob the vicariously thrilling experience of being tough guys at a distance by supporting war crimes, encouraging police to hurt suspects, defending white vigilantes, and standing behind individuals accused of abuse. On January 6, 2021, mostly angry white men attacked the Capitol and put politiciansâ and his own Vice Presidentâs life in danger. Trump has said numerous times that he âlovedâ these kinds of men, who he regards as patriots.
Trump enthusiastic supporter Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) markets a mug with a picture of him pumping his fist. Hawleyâs remarks criticizing the attack on âtraditional masculine characteristicsâ can be seen as an example of how masculine insecurity can pass for manliness.
The MAGA movement believes with a passion that Trump and the Republicans would lead a ârevival of strong and healthy manhood in Americaâ.
Bo Hines, a congressional candidate from North Carolina, produced a campaign video showcasing his physique. The image depicted him ferociously lifting weights and performing pullups at a gym decorated with a large Back the Blue banner. An intimidating voice over rock music declares that Hines will bring âNorth Carolina gridiron valuesâ to Congress.
More and more GOP politicians, who are highly reliant on the support of men, present an unbridled, aggressive masculinity as the solution to defeating the liberal left, often depicted as weak and not very masculine.
Trump, who was exempt from military duty due to âbone spurs,â was able to develop a reputation for toughness by association by associating with autocrats like Putin. His admiration for autocrats like the Saudi monarchs, Viktor OrbĂĄn, Tayyip Erdogan, and Kim Jong Un, reveals Trumpâs admiration for aggressive masculinity.
Republicans overwhelmingly agree with the claims that society punishes males for being men (60 percent agree) and that it has grown too soft and feminine (63 percent agree), according to the Public Religion Research Instituteâs 2020 values survey.
Misogyny often is a fundamental element of toxic masculinity. Misogyny is pervasive in the GOP. Abrasive and belligerent populist North Carolina lieutenant governor Mark Robinson held rape victims accountable for the harm they suffered as part of his comments supporting an abortion ban. He said, âThat is Darwin.â
Toxic masculinity appears to be spreading in the Republican party. The less educated white male working class makes up the majority of the GOP coalition. Many conservative males have reacted in a sexist rage rather than changing their behavior and value systems to accommodate the rising power of women. Why? The growing knowledge economy has been more kind to educated women than to less educated men.
According to a new report from New American Leaders, of the current 7, 383 state legislators in the US more than 81% are White and over 71% are male. The GOP is a remarkably white, male-dominated organization particularly at the state level. For example, 86 percent of the Republican majority in the North Carolina General Assembly is made up of men.
Republicans have made masculinity a defining issue, led by politicians like Missouri senator Josh Hawley. He asserted in his recent book, Manhood: The Masculine Virtues America Needs, cast liberals and progressives as the enemy of masculinity and that the Democratic progressive movement is attempting to âdeconstructâ the American man.
The Era of Lawless Masculinity Has Begun
A video that Republican Representative Paul Gosar of Arizona released exemplifies GOP toxic masculinity. The video weaves a masculine dream of being praised for killing a female rival. In it, an idealized Gosar defeats President Biden with swords and assassinates Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to rescue the country. Gosar was censured by the House and stripped of committee assignments, but he has never apologized.
In an advertisement for his campaign, Eric Greitens, the controversial former governor of Missouri who ran for the Senate on the GOP ticket, but was defeated, can be seen going after âRINOsâ (Republicans in name only).
A shotgun-wielding Greiten said, âWeâre going RINO hunting.â Before entering a residence with the guys in tactical gear and one of them throwing what seems to be a flash-bang grenade, Greitens, who is carrying a revolver at his side, makes a statement. âObtain a RINO hunting license. It doesnât expire until we save our country,â he says at the conclusion of the film, which asks viewers to donate $25 in exchange for a âRINO huntingâ sticker.
Greitens, who resigned as governor in 2018 after a sexual misconduct investigation and a felony charge related to campaign finance that was ultimately dismissed, is seen saying earlier in the tape, âThe RINO feeds on corruption and is marked by the stripes of cowardice.â
Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Georgia-based Republican congresswoman and well-known conspiracy theorist, told white supremacist podcaster Steve Bannon in November that âthe only way you win freedom back after youâve lost it is with the price of blood.â The next month, Republican Congressman Madison Cawthorn told a reporter that the country was moving toward âSecond Amendment remedies.â Steve Lynch of Pennsylvania, a far-right contender for Northampton County executive, pledged to assemble âtwenty strong guysâ to pressure school board members into leaving.
The New York Times noted that âthreats against members of Congress had surged by 107 percent compared with the same period in 2020,â according to the Capitol Policeâ surveying the rise of violent threats in public life.
Add to the above, Multiple GOP 2022 candidates who ran for Congress in 2022 have domestic violence allegations in their background.
Rising Authoritarianism
In the last century, authoritarianism has changed. Today’s electoral autocracies coexist with traditional dictatorships. Toxic masculinity, disguised as a âreturn to traditional values,â coincides with the development of authoritarianism and the rejection of the rule of law and political responsibility. The removal of guardrails for activities which have been considered unethical in democratic situations (lying, stealing, even rape and murder) has become more pronounced.
In that way itâs not shocking to see the GOP, which embraced an authoritarian political culture under the Trump administration, cultivating a culture of lawless masculinity. As evidence of their rejection of democratic norms, the Republicans supported the January 6 coup attempt and perpetuated the lie that Donald Trump, not Joe Biden, won the 2020 election. They have also normalized and deliberately spread disinformation and lies about election tampering, advocating violence as a remedy if they are not victorious.
Hyper-masculinity has frequently been associated with authoritarian policies, which are motivated by the desire to control and exploit peopleâs bodies and minds. People may make fun of Mussolini and Vladimir Putinâs pectoral-baring displays and the rape jokes made by former leaders Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil and Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines, but their strongman style of leadership defends patriarchal privilege and menâs rights to indulge in their ânaturalâ male desires in response to perceived threats to male authority.
Early on, Trump declared masculine invulnerability. He claimed, âI could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and kill someone and I wouldnât lose voters.â Killing his political rivals has been a theme with Donald Trump for years, and now that heâs promising to be a âdictator on day oneâ and to engage in ârevengeâ and âretributionâ itâs past time to take him seriously. Trump violated judge imposed gag order by posting a video of President Joe Biden hog-tied with an apparent bullet hole in his forehead, laying dead or helpless in the back of a pickup truck. Just a few weeks later, his lawyers told the Supreme Court that he could assassinate his political rivals during a second term, because, they argued, the President has absolute immunity from prosecution.
Trump has shown no remorse over a Manhattan federal jury which found that Donald Trump sexually abused E. Jean Carroll in a luxury department store dressing room in the spring of 1996 and awarded her $5 million for battery and defamation. Subsequently, a jury awarded $83.3 million in damages to Carroll, who sued the former president for defamation for calling her claim that he had sexually assaulted her a lie.
Given that he only held office in a free society for four years, Trumpâs skill in producing âmini-Trumpsâ is striking. While Florida Governor Ron DeSantisâs 2018 campaign persona as a âpitbull Trump defenderâ has become so entrenched three years later that he frequently imitated the former presidentâs hand gestures. Mike Pompeo, who violated ethics standards as secretary of state and yelled obscenities at a female journalist, boasted about leading through âswagger.â
Trump recruited supporters in the traditional authoritarian manner by easing restrictions on menâs freedom to pursue their masculine inclinations without fear of repercussions. In 2019, his administration limited the definition of domestic abuse to physical harm in order to partially decriminalize it (which effectively legalized sexual, emotional, economic, and psychological actions or threats of actions). In addition, Trump filled prominent government positions with individuals, such as Steve Bannon, who were accused of sexual harassment, domestic violence, or inappropriate workplace behavior. Trump also defended men accused of sexual harassment and assault, such as Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Sean Lawler, Trumpâs former chief of protocol, walked around the office with a horsewhip to frighten staff members, most of whom were women.
Whether or not Trump regains office in 2024, the GOP has absorbed his hyper-masculine style. After all, doesnât a real man not have to pay a price for taking what he wants when he wants it, whether in the bedroom, the office, or politics. Abuse, exploitative, and illegal behavior are being increasingly encouraged and condoned as the Republican effort to dismantle democracy grows. The dangerous marriage of toxic masculinity and authoritarianism is clearly creating havoc in America.
Many people donât take seriously Trumpâs threats of what heâll do if re-elected again infused with authoritarian toxic masculinity. People had the same reaction to Mussolini and Hitler too. How did that turn out?
Yes, That’s Right: American Fascism
Why waste time debating the extent of Trump’s
fascism when we ought to be fighting it instead?
/
âNo, no,â some admonish: âDonât get carried away. Sure, Donald Trump is dangerous, perhaps uniquely so. But ⊠fascist? The need to label him a fascist says more about the labeler than about Trump.â This argument has sprung from certain quarters of the right, which was to be expected, but it has also sprouted from the left, where a point of view has arisen that the âhystericalâ invocation of the f-word is as much a danger as Trump.
We have trouble seeing the hysteria. We chose the cover image, based on a well-known 1932 Hitler campaign poster, for a precise reason: that anyone transported back to 1932 Germany could very, very easily have explained away Herr Hitlerâs excesses and been persuaded that his critics were going overboard. After all, he spent 1932 campaigning, negotiating, doing interviewsâbeing a mostly normal politician. But he and his people vowed all along that they would use the tools of democracy to destroy it, and it was only after he was given power that Germany saw his movementâs full face.
Today, we at The New Republic think we can spend this election year in one of two ways. We can spend it debating whether Trump meets the nine or 17 points that define fascism. Or we can spend it saying, âHeâs damn close enough, and weâd better fight.â
We unreservedly choose the latter course. And so we have assembled herein some of our leading intellectual historians of fascism; a member of the fourth estate who learned firsthand what the Trump lash feels like; a leading expert on civil-military relations; a great Guatemalan American novelist with a deep understanding of immigrantsâ lives; one of our most incisive cultural critics; and a man with all-too-real experience in living under a notorious authoritarian regime. The scenarios they describe are certainly grim. We dare you to say, after reading these pieces, that they are impossible.
May 17, 2024
The Affairs and Scandals of Trump’s Pastor
Paula White | Documentary
In a world of faith and flashy lights, megachurches and their pastors sometimes come with mega-drama⊠In Pastor Paula White’s world, alleged marital affairs, bankrupting churches, and using church money to pay for plastic surgery arenât unheard of. As a young girl who lived in a trailer and became a young married mother, she grew up to become a preacher after an affair with the associate-pastor of her church (and not before they ran off together to start their own church).
She went on to lead a congregation of 22,000, became a multimillionaire, hosted a Christian TV show, owned a private jet and an 8,000 sq ft. beach-front home. But no matter how high she climbed, betrayal, greed, and multiple scandals have followed Paula her entire career and three marriages. This is the scandalous story and luxurious lifestyle of Pastor Paula White.
May 20, 2024
Jordan Klepper Fingers the Pulse: Moscow Tools
As Vladimir Putin continues his gritty reboot of the Soviet Union, he’s getting a surprising amount of help from the party once led by Reagan. In this new special, “Jordan Klepper Fingers the Pulse: Moscow Tools,” Klepper speaks to foreign affairs experts, possible Russian assets, and the Prime Minister of Russia’s neighbor, Estonia, to find out whether Republicans have become the Kremlin’s most useful idiots.
June 4, 2024
Vice President Kamala Harris on Protecting Reproductive
Rights, Trump’s Guilty Verdict & Health Care
June 7, 2024
Top Anti-Trump Celebrities: Why They Dislike Donald Trump
June 8, 2024
Trump’s final year as President: Part One
History, as it happened. A reminder of what happened in Donald Trump’s final year as president. In this documentary, we relive the first six months of 2020 under the Trump administration, through the 7NEWS team’s coverage of all key moments.
Part Two – June 9, 2024
“A Man of Conviction” by John Cuneo
June 19, 2024
Who Will Win America’s Second Civil War?
From April 12, 1861 to April 9, 1865, the U.S. Civil War drenched America in blood, claiming up to 750,000 soldiers’ lives and leaving the South in ruins. Today, 41% of Americans believe another civil war is likely within five years. What would this conflict look like?
July 12, 2024
The Problem With Elon Musk
The Billionaire Whoâs Not Like Other Billionaires
Is Elon Musk a net positive or negative for society? We spoke to people heâs worked with and researched his childhood, past business ventures like Tesla, SpaceX, Neuralink, and X (formerly known as Twitter), and what heâs currently working on to answer this question.
With an assassination attempt on Donald Trump at a rally in Pennsylvania on July 13, 2024, the U.S. experienced another violent episode in its increasingly polarized politics. Former President Trump, whoâs about to formally become the GOP nominee for president in the 2024 election, survived the attempted assassination when, initial reports said, a bullet grazed his ear. But one rally attendee was killed, more spectators were injured and the suspected gunman is also dead. The Conversationâs politics editor, Naomi Schalit, spoke with University of Massachusetts, Lowell, scholar Arie Perliger after the event. Perliger offered insight from his study of political violence and assassinations. Given the stark political polarization in the U.S., Perliger said, âitâs not a surprise that eventually people engage in violence.â
Schalit: When you heard the news, what was the first thing you thought?
Perliger: The first thing that I thought about is that we were basically one inch from a potential civil war. I think that if, indeed, Donald Trump would have suffered fatal injuries today, the level of violence that we witnessed so far will be nothing in comparison to what would have happened in the next couple of months. I think that would have unleashed a new level of anger, frustration, resentment, hostility that we havenât seen for many, many years in the U.S.
This assassination attempt, at least at this early stage, may validate a strong sense among many Trump supporters and many people on the far right that they are being delegitimized, that they are on the defensive and that there are efforts to basically prevent them from competing in the political process and prevent Trump from returning to the White House.
What weâve just seen, for many of the people on the far right, fits very well into a narrative that theyâve already been constructing and disseminating for the last few months.
Political assassination attempts donât aim only to kill someone. They have a larger goal, donât they?
In many ways, assassination attempts bypass the long process of trying to downgrade and defeat political opponents, when there is a sense that even a long political struggle will not be sufficient. Many perpetrators see assassinations as a tool that will allow them to achieve their political objectives in a very quick, very effective way that doesnât demand a lot of resources or a lot of organization. If we are trying to connect it to what weâve seen today, I think that many people see Trump as a unicorn, as a unique entity, who in many ways really consumed the entire conservative movement. So by removing him, thereâs a sense that that will or may solve the problem.
I think that the conservative movement changed dramatically since 2016, when Trump was first elected, and a lot of the characteristics of Trumpism are actually now fairly popular in different parts of the conservative movement. So even if Trump will decide to retire at some point, I donât think that Trumpism â as a set of populist ideas â will disappear from the GOP. But I can definitely understand why people who see that as a threat will feel that removing Trump can solve all the problems.
In a study of the causes and impacts of political assassination, you wrote that unless electoral processes can address âthe most intense political grievances ⊠electoral competition has the potential to instigate further violence, including the assassinations of political figures.â Is that what you saw in this attempted assassination?
July 13, 2024
Americaâs right-wing radicals – US veterans
against democracy
On 6 January 2021, hundreds of Donald Trump supporters stormed the Capitol in Washington. Five people were killed and many injured. Some 15 per cent of those involved were former members of the US military or police.
By storming the Capitol, hundreds of supporters of former US President Donald Trump aimed to prevent the Senate and House of Representatives from officially confirming Joe Bidenâs victory in the 2020 presidential elections. Some 15 per cent of those involved were former members of the US military or police. This shocking statistic prompts an important question: Why are the very people who have sworn an oath to protect the nationâs democracy attacking it?
The US-American filmmaker Charlie Sadoff and his co-writer and producer Kenneth Harbaugh both used to be in the military, something that allowed them to delve deep into the veteransâ world. Through them, they gained access to violent rightwing extremist circles in America, including anti-government militias such as the Proud Boys, the Three Percenters and the Oath Keepers.
These groups – organized and led by well-educated, highly motivated military veterans – represent the greatest threat to democracy in the United States today. The documentary examines the complexity of this development, tracing it back to its historical roots. The smoke over the Capitol may have cleared, but the problem remains: US society remains deeply divided. The groups are still active and the next elections are imminent.
July 15, 2024
RETRIBUTION
PART ONE: THE BATTLE FOR DEMOCRACY
Investigating Trump, Project 2025 and the future
of the United States | Four Corners
There has never been a US president like Donald Trump â and now heâs back, this time with a detailed plan for his second coming.
Nearly four years after he was cast out by voters and accused of encouraging the American people to assault their own democracy with the attack on the US Capitol, the now convicted criminal wants to rebuild the country in his own image.
Ahead of the US election in November, Four Corners reporter Mark Willacy travels to Washington for the first of a special two-part series.
He sits down with White House insiders who witnessed the chaos of Trumpâs first term â some who continue to support his vision, and others Trump now considers âtraitorsâ.
Trump wants to reshape the pillars of American democracy and give himself more power. Willacy goes inside âProject 2025â, the blueprint for a second Trump term and the army of recruits ready to carry out his orders.
Meanwhile strategy, security and defence experts warn of the impact another Trump presidency could have on Americaâs institutions, its democracy, and the rest of the world.
~~~~~~~~~~~~
July 15, 2024
‘Noxious’: See Maddow expose JD Vance’s past
statements about Trump, Jan. 6 and more
Rachel Maddow looks back at the blistering insults JD Vance directed at his now running mate Donald Trump, as well as his newfound MAGA perspective on the January 6 insurrection.
The Late Show with Stephen Colbert
July 15, 2024
Rep. Adam Kinzinger On Trump’s Cult-Level Control
Over The Republican Party
Former congressman Adam Kinzinger recalls the events of January 6, 2021 and admits he was surprised to see Donald Trump take total control over the GOP in the runup to the 2024 presidential race. Stick around for two more segments with Rep. Kinzinger.
Segment 2: “They Are Celebrating In Moscow Tonight” – Rep. Kinzinger On Trump Selecting J.D. Vance As VP
Segment 3: “Jan 6 Was Trump’s Last Desperate Move” – Rep. Kinzinger On Trump’s Attempt To Stay In Power After Losing…
July 19, 2024
Preacher, prophet, messiah: Trump cult
takes on religious overtones at RNC
As Christian nationalism grows in strength and influence within the Republican Party, Donald Trump’s cult of personality is shifting toward increasing religiosity with Trump as the central deity. George Conway, president of the Anti-Psychopath PAC, Susan Glasser, staff writer at the New Yorker, and Tressie McMillan Cottom, columnist for the New York Times, discuss with Alex Wagner.
“The Face of Justice” by Anita Kunz
July 23, 2024
Trump: Guilty on all Counts | Full Documentary
Donald Trump faces four criminal cases, with the sentencing for the Hush money scandal taking place on the 11th of July 2024. Just days before the start of the Republican National Convention on the 15th of July where Trump is expected to be formally nominated for president. Although the ex-president continues to claim he is ahead in the polls, the prospect of a jail sentence could really rock his campaign and has warned that the public would reach a breaking point. However, at a time of such high intensity, the prospect of civil unrest and violence could very much rear its ugly head…once again.
Cast
Andrew Wroe
Guy Walters
Matthew Goodwin
Natasha Lindstaedt
Filmmakers
Sarah Findley, Brian Aabech, Jordan Hill
July 26, 2024
Trump Backers Are Talking Up Possible
Civil War
These commentators and GOP state official sound willing to take drastic measures if Trump loses in November.
By Arianna Coghill
Last week, at J.D. Vanceâs first rally as the GOPâs vice presidential nominee, Ohio state Sen. George Lang said that civil war would be necessary if former President Donald Trump does not win the 2024 presidential election.
âI believe wholeheartedly Donald Trump and Butler Countyâs J.D. Vance are the last chance to save our country politically. Iâm afraid if we lose this one, itâs going to take a civil war to save the country, and it will be saved,â Lang said, as the crowd erupted in raucous applause.
Three days later, Lang apologized on X, claiming that the statement âdidnât accurately represent his views.â But while the Ohio legislatorâs statement may not represent his views, it certainly seems to represent those of other Trump supporters.
Since campaigning for the 2024 race began, several MAGA loyalists have openly advocated for political violence in the event the real estate mogul loses the race.
July 29, 2024
A half-million records and one app: The group
behind a massive effort to âcleanâ voter rolls
Police officers in Texas, senior citizens at a nursing home in Pennsylvania, and people who had registered to vote at a Marine base in California are among the thousands of voters whose right to cast a ballot has been needlessly challenged ahead of this Novemberâs election by activists â many of whom have been inspired by conspiracy theories â seeking to prevent voter fraud.
âMy simple right as a voter is being attacked,â said Daniel Moss, a university administrator from Denton County, Texas, whose registration was challenged by one of the activists even though he has lived in the county and voted there for about two decades. âItâs kind of un-American to do that.â
Election officials across the country have been inundated with dubious complaints about inaccurate voter rolls, which have wasted government resources and sapped taxpayer money spent reviewing lists of registered voters that officials say are already carefully maintained, a CNN investigation has found.
One of the main drivers of the fruitless challenges is a conservative Texas-based nonprofit group called True the Vote, an election-monitoring organization that has long peddled debunked voter-fraud theories. The groupâs founder, Catherine Engelbrecht, has called on followers to help clean voter rolls by using an app called IV3 that enables users to research voter data and submit voter-eligibility challenges to local election offices.
August 5, 2024
Even FOX can’t save Trump! Anchors struggle
to stop Trump disaster | Will’s Take
While Donald Trump brags about his own intelligence, he doesn’t have the intelligence to answer questions Fox News anchors directly coach to him. Will Saletan explains.
August 6, 2024
Kamala Harris Picks Minn. Governor & Midwestern
Dad Tim Walz as Running Mate
Michael Kosta gets to know Tim Walz, the Minn. governor Kamala Harris chose as her running mate. While the Trump campaign claims the vice presidential candidate will âunleash hell on earth,â Democrats love his political record and “Midwestern dad af” vibes. Plus, Josh Johnson weighs in on why Walz is the âright type of white guyâ for this race.
August 15, 2024
Trump DUMPED By Evangelicals After Ruthless New Ad
Evangelicals are finally turning on Trump as his hypocrisy and moral failures push them to rally behind Kamala Harris in a desperate bid to save the GOP from its own self-destruction. Richard Ojeda breaks it down on Rebel HQ.
August 16, 2024
Project 2025 Co-Author Lays Out “Radical Agenda”
for Next Trump Term in Undercover Video
As Donald Trump tries to distance his campaign from Project 2025, those behind the right-wing policy blueprint to remake the U.S. government continue to brag in private about their close ties to the Republican presidential nominee and how they intend to push a radical right-wing agenda in a second Trump administration.
In July, Project 2025 co-author Russell Vought met with two people he believed to be relatives of a wealthy conservative donor interested in funding the effort.
In fact, he was meeting with two reporters with the U.K.-based Centre for Climate Reporting as part of an undercover sting captured on video. Over the course of two hours, Vought described Trump’s disavowal of Project 2025 as mere theater and laid out plans for mass deportations, restricting abortion, gutting independent government bureaucracies, using the military against racial justice protesters and more.
The secret plans are “designed to ensure that this kind of radical agenda that the conservative movement has in the U.S. can be implemented from day one,” says Lawrence Carter, founder and director of the Centre for Climate Reporting and one of the reporters who spoke with Vought. “They want to make sure that the mistakes from the first Trump administration, as they see them, where not much got done, are avoided this time around.”
Trumpâs Latest Scheme to Steal the Election:
Let Congress Do It
The ex-president has demanded that Congress insert âvoter fraudâ measures into a must-pass spending bill. Speaker Mike Johnson says he agrees.
Get ready. Donald Trump has made good use of the propaganda technique known as the Big Lie 1.0, famously claiming that the 2020 âelection was stolenâ from him. And now heâs preparing to use Big Lie 2.0 to shut down our government this fall, believing itâll hurt the Biden administration and thus the Harris-Walz campaign.
That second weaponâthis Big Lie 2.0âis the false allegation of widespread âvoter fraudâ in America. He intends to use it to try to bring the Biden administration to its knees in the next few weeks. And, as a bonus, if it works, he gets to prevent millions of people, particularly minorities and women, from voting.
Republicans have been using this lie to attack the heart of our democracy right out in the open ever since the Civil Rights Act was passed in 1964, the year they responded by rolling out âOperation Eagle Eye,â yelling about nonexistent âvoter fraudâ and using it as an excuse to intimidate minority voters in the Goldwater/Johnson race.
September 6, 2024
Fred Trump III Denounces His Uncle Donald Trump
for Saying Disabled People “Should Just Die”
Democracy Now! is joined by the nephew of Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, who has endorsed Trump’s Democratic opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris. Fred Trump III’s new memoir, All In The Family: The Trumps and How We Got This Way, shares fresh insights into the Trump family and acts as a platform to advocate for individuals with developmental disabilities.
Fred Trump’s own son William has a rare genetic disorder that causes severe developmental and intellectual disabilities. He says Donald Trump once told him to abandon William, saying, “He doesn’t recognize you. Let him die, and move down to Florida.” After a meeting in the Oval Office about dedicating more resources to people with disabilities, Fred Trump says his uncle said, “Those people, the costs. They should just die.”
“How could one human being say that about any other human being, least of all your grandnephew?” says Fred Trump, who calls on the next president to support disabled Americans.
September 9, 2024
‘This is not an idle threat’: Schiff sounds
alarm on Trump’s threat to jail opponents
Congressman Adam Schiff discusses Trump’s threat to jail opponents if he wins reelection as well as Trump’s delayed sentencing in his New York “hush money” case.
September 9, 2024
Funny Donald Trump Stories | Marathon
We’ve had a fair few stories about President Donald Trump over the years, what better time to go through some of them than the night before his big debate?
September 11, 2024
In debate, Trump embraced false claims
from the deep corners of the far-right internet
The former president disappointed some allies with how often he ventured into obscure conspiracy theories Tuesday.
By
Former President Donald Trump repeated a broad range of false claims, internet rumors and outlandish conspiracy theories during Tuesday nightâs presidential debate, many of which might have seemed unintelligible without a deep understanding of obscure corners of far-right social media.
It included a variety of baseless claims about abortion, campaign rallies, the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol and bribes to government officials â not to mention a sensational rumor about immigrants in Ohio stealing and eating pets. And he denied any shift in his perspective on the 2020 election, falsely claiming there was âso much proofâ that he won it.
While some of the claims may have been familiar dog whistles to people who spend time on fringe message boards, itâs not clear how the outlandish rumors may have landed with everyone else. The debate drew more than 57.5 million viewers, according to ABC, which hosted it.
Late in the debate right before the second break, Trump released a torrent of vague claims alleging corruption in the Biden administration.
September 12, 2024
The Secret Trump Investigation
Nobody is Talking About
Did Egyptâs President el-Sisi try to buy Trumpâs loyalty by sending Trump $10 million? We looked into it and hereâs what we found.
Read the excellent report that inspired this video, by Aaron C. Davis and Carol D. Leonnig for The Washington Post here.
September 17, 2024
75 Worst Things about the Trump Presidency
Donald Trump left office with the lowest approval rating of any president ever. But some people now seem to be suffering from amnesia.
September 18, 2024
Maddow on her new documentary on
Trump-Ukraine scandal,
âFrom Russia with Levâ
Rachel Maddow is the executive producer of a new documentary on the Trump-Ukraine plot, âFrom Russia with Lev,â airing this Friday at 9 pm ET on MSNBC. Maddow joins Joy Reid with more.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
From Russia with Lev | Official Trailer
September 19, 2024
NC Candidate Mark Robinson Gets Exposed
and Trump Reunites with Rudy Giuliani
Ronny Chieng on the North Carolina Republican busted for posting weird comments on a porn site, Rudy Giulianiâs frightening performance at Trumpâs Long Island rally, and the shocking truth behind JD Vance’s cat eating stories. Plus, Troy Iwata joins with the inside scoop on one missing feline.
September 19, 2024
Was Trump’s Presidency Part of Putin’s Plan?
NATO troops amass along Russia’s borders as U.S. officials grapple with Putin’s election meddling. How will a battle that started in cyberspace play out on the ground?
This episode of Cyberwar originally aired in 2017.
September 19, 2024
FULL INTERVIEW: President Trump on Gutfeld
September 24, 2024
One-on-one with Heather Cox Richardson
Cap Times Idea Fest 2024
Heather Cox Richardson is a Boston College history professor whose daily digital essays (âLetters from an Americanâ) that place current political events into historical context have gained a massive national following.
In this keynote Idea Fest session, she talks with fellow historian David Maraniss about the precedents for what we are seeing now in Americaâs political landscape and where we might be headed.
Sept. 24, 2024
Mary Trump: âCruelty Was a Currencyâ in Trump Family
In a busy week for diplomacy, world leaders are weighing up what a second Trump term could mean for the U.S. and the world. To the former president’s niece, Mary Trump, it would spell nothing but bad news for American democracy. Mary Trump joined Michel Martin to discuss her views on the upcoming election and her latest book, Who Could Ever Love You: A Family Memoir.
THE
CHOICE
2024
HARRIS vs.TRUMP
Premiered Sep 24, 2024 | FRONTLINE investigates the lives and characters of Kamala Harris and Donald Trump as they seek the presidency.
October 1, 2024
Psychiatrists expose Trump’s mental
deterioration at major conference. Part 2
Anthony Davis reports on The World Mental Health Coalition’s major conference ‘THE MORE DANGEROUS STATE OF THE WORLD AND THE NEED FOR FIT LEADERSHIP’ with Dr Bandy Lee and 18 experts.
October 2, 2024
Unmasking the Illusion of Donald Trump
Russ Buettner and Susanne Craig are investigative reporters at the New York Times. Get a copy of their bestselling book, Lucky Loser: How Donald Trump Sqaundered His Father’s Fortune and Created the Illusion of Success.
with Glenn Kirschner
October 2, 2024
Jack Smith Lays Out The Sharply Incriminating
Evidence of Trumpâs Democracy-Busting
January 6 Crimes
In anticipation of conducting the litigation the Supreme Court directed her to conduct on the issue of presidential immunity, Judge Tanya Chutkan placed on the public docket Jack Smithâs 165-page motion setting out the crimes of Donald Trump and why he is not immune from prosecution.
Smithâs motion reads like a 165-page opening statement, showing why Trump should never again be allowed to get within a thousand miles of the Oval Office.
Vice President Kamala Harris on
October 9, 2024
October 11, 2024
Fears grow that ‘clown-like’ Trump
could achieve fascist goals despite
gross incompetence
For as long as Donald Trump has been on the political scene, analysts have struggled with how much of his performance to take seriously. But as Election Day races closer and polls remain tight even as Trump rhetoric becomes more extreme and his supporters become more radicalized, more people are realizing that no matter how big a buffoon Trump may be, the risks of him taking power and abusing that power are significant and worrisome.
Charlie Sykes, a former conservative radio host who has now endorsed Kamala Harris, is joined by Susan Glasser, staff writer at the New Yorker, and McKay Coppins, staff writer for the Atlantic and author of Romney: A Reckoning, discuss with Alex Wagner.
October 11, 2024
“The Apprentice”: New Film Opens Despite
Trump’s Attempts to Block Anyone from Seeing It
We speak with the director of “The Apprentice,” which opens today in theaters despite legal threats from the former president. The film looks at how Trump was mentored by Roy Cohn, former chief counsel to Senator Joseph McCarthy during the Red Scare. He went on to represent Trump as he built his New York real estate empire, and “was the person who sort of built Trump, as a person, as a brand, as an identity,” says Abbasi.
October 12, 2024
Trump’s 40-Year Entanglement
with the FBI and Organized Crime
Never has a president so repeatedly and openly demonstrated his disrespect for the law, the Constitution and the democratic institutions of the United States. From Russian interference in the 2016 elections to secret deals with the mafia, Donald Trump has faced many accusations – while he claims to be the victim of an FBI conspiracy.
Despite being implicated in well-documented suspect deals, he was never charged. In fact, Trump and the FBI have been covertly enmeshed for 40 years. But exactly how far did he go to get his way, and to keep agents from investigating?
Using privileged access to FBI officials, this film examines the complex relationship between the United States Intelligence Community and its businessman-turned-President, who plays a double game with the Mafia and the bureau. In the run-up of the next presidential election, this investigation proposes to lay out the inside story of Trumpâs potentially compromised presidency, examined by those who know him best.
Documentary: An American Affair : Trump & the FBI (2020)
Directed by: Fabrizio Calvi & David Carr-Brown
Production: Pumpernickel Films and Allumage
October 15, 2024
Operation Trump: Russian Spies Conquer America
As the 2024 elections approach, Russiaâs interference in American politicsâthrough spies or agents of influenceâremains a troubling reality. Vladimir Putin is counting on Donald Trumpâs victory to weaken Ukraine.
Why does Trump almost always support Russia? Is he compromised? Did he betray during his presidency? And why has the Republican Party shifted its stance toward Russia?
Answering these questions means shedding light on a labyrinthine operation of espionage and manipulation. Still ongoing, it began in the final years of the Cold War. While it remains shrouded in mystery, some hold pieces of the puzzle. A former KGB leader, infiltrated âillegals,â a former Trump advisor, former CIA and FBI officials, and a former prosecutor provide testimony.
This gripping investigative documentary, filmed like a spy thriller, takes us deep into Soviet and later Russian infiltrations in the United States.
October 16, 2024
PolitiFact Founder Explains the âEpidemic of Lyingâ
in American Politics
As Americans gear up for the election, Bill Adair warns of an “epidemic of lying” in U.S. politics — particularly within the Republican Party. Adair joins the show to discuss his new book, Beyond the Big Lie: The Epidemic of Political Lying, Why Republicans Do It More, and How It Could Burn Down Our Democracy.
As founder of the fact-checking website PolitiFact, Adair is well placed to account for where disinformation comes from, how it spreads and the danger it poses to democracy.
LYING
Look at the phenomenon of lying in its relationship to fools.
Fools lie to explain or conceal their foolishness. It is not a remedy, but they use it.
Liars, again, are fools because a lie may be found out, and gambling fools are not different from the ordinary kind.
The liar fools himself that he will not be found out, and the fool fools himself that his lie will cover his folly.
It is not easy to avoid being a fool. It is possible to realize that one has been one. The remedy is not lying.
Again, it is possible to realize that one has lied, and to avoid it. Foolishness and lying being so much of a continuum, being truthful can help towards being less foolish.
It is for this reason, because it is constructively useful, that traditional teachings have stressed the need to tell the truth and be as truthful as possible. Truthfulness means being efficient, effective. Lying is an attempt to make inefficiency into its opposite.
This is why all forms of self-deception are âlyingâ; and the person who foolishly cannot see the truth can approach it by practice in avoiding at least, for a start, some forms of lying.
Many durable âmoralisticâ teachings are specific and effective exercises gone wrong.
Idries Shah, Reflections
October 18, 2024
America’s Last Election – Part 1: The Big Lie
Donald Trump did not win the 2020 presidential election. But if you watched his speech on election night, you wouldnât come away with that understanding. âFrankly,â he said âWe did win this election.â
In the months that followed, the story backing up that claim warped and changed, but at its core was a big lie about a supercomputer called âThe Hammerâ, an imaginary software called âScorecardâ, and a man with a long history of scamming the US government.
And now Donald Trump is on the ballot again. Over five episodes, If Youâre Listening looks at the transition period after the 2020 election, and what it tells us about the plan in 2024.
Part 2: The fake elector plot
Part 3: Trump’s plan to reject results
Part 4: What they did on January 6th
October 18, 2024
Putin & Trump : Russian Influence in U.S. Politics
and the 2024 Election
With the 2024 US presidential elections fast approaching, the Russian grip on the American political right – through spies, semi-spies and agents of influence – in the service of Russia is a pervasive, yet little-known and never really studied reality until now.
The Kremlin sees President Biden as weak, and Russian influence on the United States as strong. This context enabled Putin – among other considerations – to dare to invade Ukraine in February 2022. However, he is counting on Trump’s victory in 2024, which would mean the definitive end of American support for Ukraine, and pave the way for a Russian victory. As proof of this connivance, only 48% of Republican voters now support Ukraine, and more of them prefer Putin to Biden!
How did we reach this level of influence? What is really at stake in the United States? What are the origins of Trump’s positions? How is a part of American political life now under Russia’s sway?
This investigative documentary, shot like a political thriller, narrated and structured like an espionage film, immerses us in the story of Russian infiltration of the United States, and recounts the mafia-like logic of Russia, the evolution of Putinism, the ambitions of the Russian President and his thirst for revenge.
Documentary: Red Shadow Over the White House (2024)
Directed by: Antoine Vitkine
Production: Nilaya Productions
Oct. 18, 2024
“That man needs to go to jail”: Former Trump voters
explain why they could never support him again
Speaking to Salon, Republicans and independents who previously backed Trump explain why they’re now voting blue.
By Charles R. Davis
News Editor
October 20, 2024
Ex-Trump supporters on why they DUMPED TRUMP
— Former Donald Trump supporters, Robert Nix, Damian Salmon and Kyle Sweetser, join David to discuss why they have abandoned Donald Trump, who they are voting for in the 2024 election, whether they are still Republicans and/or conservative, and more.
October 21, 2024
Rachel Maddow interviews Yulia Navalnaya
Watch the full, extended version of Rachel Maddow’s interview with pro-democracy, anti-Putin, anti-corruption activist Yulia Navalnaya, widow of Russian opposition leader and political prisoner Alexei Navalny.
October 21, 2024
TRUMP: FILTHY, FOUL, FELONâTHIS IS WHO HE IS
Donald Trump’s lounge act hasnât changed in 40 yearsâheâs still spewing the same vile, predatory, disgusting rhetoric. And now, Howard Stern and The View have turned on him. Trump is left ranting at his rallies to dwindling crowds, desperate for attention.
Filthy, foul, and a felonâthis is who heâs always been.
Thought Reform in Trump’s MAGA: Introduction
What eight themes of Chinese communist brainwashing
can tell us about today’s politics
October 22, 2024
Navigation within this article series:
Thought Reform in Trumpâs MAGA – Intro (you are here)
Milieu Control in Trump’s MAGA, Part 2
Mystical Manipulation in Trump’s MAGA, Part 3
The Demand for Purity in Trump’s MAGA, Part 4
The Cult of Confession in Trumpâs MAGA, Part 5
Sacred Science in Trumpâs MAGA, Part 6
Loading the Language in Trumpâs MAGA, Part 7
Doctrine over Person in Trumpâs MAGA, Part 8
The Dispensing of Existence in Trumpâs MAGA, Part 9
Conclusion: Thought Reform in Trumpâs MAGA, Part 10
References
Lifton, Robert Jay (2019). Losing Reality: On Cults, Cultism, and the Mindset of Political and Religious Zealotry, The New Press.
DEADLINE | WHITE HOUSE
October 22, 2024
Donald Trump: âI need the kind
of generals that Hitler hadâ
Rep. Jim Himes, Democratic Congressman from Connecticut and Miles Taylor, Former Chief of Staff at the Department of Homeland Security, join Nicolle Wallace on Deadline White House with reaction to the stunning reporting from Jeffrey Goldberg of the Atlantic in the waning days of the Trump Presidency — where Trump claims the family of a fallen U.S. soldier tried to ârip him offâ and admired the generals that Adolf Hitler was able to surround himself with. NBC News has not independently verified The Atlanticâs reporting.
ALL IN with Chris Hayes
October 22, 2024
‘Hitler did some good things’: Trump praised
Hitler multiple times, Kelly confirms
In an interview with the New York Times, Trumpâs former chief of staff John Kelly says his former boss told him more than once that ââHitler did some good things, too.ââ Kelly also called Trump a fascist.
October 25, 2024
President TRUMP – Has he Made
America Great Again? | First Term
The World According to Trump | Documentary
Donald Trump has imposed his own pace, provocative style, and agenda, and the world experienced his four years in office at full throttle. Every day a new controversy crowded out the previous one, to the extent that it was hard to grasp what was really at stake. What if the time had come to watch the film once again at a normal speed?
October 25, 2024
Why Trump Is So Dangerous
In this Changing Climate video essay, I examine the disaster of another Trump presidency and the implementation of Project 2025. In short, Trump will build a fossil fascist regime that would not only be catastrophic for oppressed people everywhere, but also lock-in climate chaos for decades to come.
October 26, 2024
Trump: The Art of the Insult
Donald Trump used The Art of the Insult to brand political opponents and bash the media all the way to the White House. Trump dominated the news with a master plan of political incorrectness, hurling insults like Lyin’ Ted and Crooked Hillary.
In this film, Trump emerges as a marketing genius and performance artist who, despite being a Manhattan billionaire, captured the hearts of middle America.
October 28, 2024
“Whoever Wins this Presidential Race,
Weâre Going To See a Lot of Violence” | Shawn Ryan
Shawn Ryan, former Navy SEAL and CIA contractor, joins John to discuss politics, war, and the psychological toll of military service. Shawn reflects on his experiences in conflict zones like Iraq and Afghanistan, the rise of his podcast “The Shawn Ryan Show,” and how it resonated with listeners craving authenticity amidst a media landscape they no longer trust. He shares his personal struggles, including battling alcoholism, and how transparency and vulnerability became central themes on his platform, especially for veterans reintegrating into civilian life.
Shawn and John explore the state of the world today, touching on societal unrest in the US, the dangerous rise of extremism, and the challenges posed by foreign adversaries like China. Shawn also highlights the importance of critical thinking, the influence of money in politics, and the vital need for America to “get its house in order” before it can effectively handle global threats.
October 29, 2024
American Voices 2024
Returning to voters filmed in 2020, this 90-minute documentary explores how their hopes and fears have changed amid another polarizing election season.
âAmerican Voices 2024â begins in 2020, following ordinary Americans with different viewpoints as they dealt with COVID-19 in their communities that spring, responded to George Floydâs murder that summer, and then participated in the election and its aftermath that fall. Then, the documentary revisits those same Americans from a mix of urban, rural and suburban areas as they reflect on the past four tumultuous years, navigate health and economic challenges, and share their perspectives on politics today.
Filmed everywhere from Texas to California; from Virginia to Minnesota; and from Iowa to Oregon, âAmerican Voices 2024â is a journey across geography, race and politics that sheds light on where our country has been â and where it is headed.
October 30, 2024
The Accidental President
In 2016 it was Hillary Clinton versus Donald Trump… The mainstream media pollsters, the political establishment failed to recognize the Trump challenge for what it was — serious. And spent much of the campaign dismissing him and his antics. Pollsters gave Clinton an 83% chance of winning. And then on a night in November 2016, there was a political explosion. And this is how it happened.
October 30, 2024
Nationalism is not patriotism: 3 insights
from Orwell about Trump and the 2024 election
Shortly after Donald Trump was inaugurated as president of the United States in January 2017, George Orwellâs 1949 novel Nineteen Eighty-Four shot to the top of Amazonâs bestseller list. Apparently, lots of people thought Orwell had something relevant to say in that political moment.
Nearly eight years later, the United States once again faces the prospect of a Trump presidency.
In 2016, many Americans were caught off guard by Trumpâs win, leading them to grapple with the potential consequences of a Trump presidency only after he was elected. But this time, more people seem to be thinking about the ramifications of such an outcome in advance.
Oct. 30, 2024
Why Narcissistic Leaders Always Fail (In The End)
Michael Moore’s epic Trump-era film in 2018
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
2007 documentary on America’s healthcare system
January 30, 2024
Stories behind the rich and powerful
named in the Jeffrey Epstein court files
Synopsis | The Epstein Files (2024)
The Epstein files – the latest on who knew what in the biggest sex trafficking ring in history. His elite circle of the wealthy and powerful on notice as thousands of damning new court documents are unsealed.
Michael Wolff’s FIRE and FURY – The Podcast
What happens when one of the best-sourced reporters in the game catches up with an old friend to share his latest scoop? Every week, we listen in as journalist Michael Wolff (FIRE and FURY: Inside The Trump White House; SEIGE: Trump Under Fire; LANDSLIDE: The Final Days Of The Trump Presidency) speaks with James Truman, former editorial director of Condé Nast. They dish from inside the Trump campaign and share election intel before the world gets to hear it. Fire and Fury: The Podcast is essential listening for anyone looking to stay one step ahead of the headlines.
October 31, 2024
EPISODE 22: JEFFREY EPSTEIN AND DONALD TRUMP
In this episode, Michael reveals a key source for his reporting on Donald Trump: Jeffrey Epstein. Through behind-the-scenes stories and never-before-heard recordings, Michael recounts Epstein’s candid insights into Trumpâs rise, revealing a world of power plays, unsettling competitions, and twisted allegiances. The conversation unearths Epsteinâs perspective on Trumpâs character, ambition, and his relentless pursuit of power.
October 24, 2024
Former Sports Illustrated swimsuit model says
Trump groped her to show off for Jeffrey Epstein
In her first on-camera interview about the allegation, with CNN Thursday, Stacey Williams offered her most detailed public account of the alleged encounter, which she said occurred outside Trumpâs office in Trump Tower in the early 1990s when she was in her 20s andâŻwas briefly dating Epstein. CNN has spoken to three friends of Williams,âŻwho each said that she told them about the incident with Trump and Epstein, in 2006, in 2015 and in 2018, respectively.
October 31, 2024
Trump’s brain is QUICKLY getting worse, says psychologist
— Doctor Harry Segal, clinical psychologist and Senior Lecturer in the Psychology Department at Cornell University, as well as the Department of Psychiatry at Cornell Weill Medical School, joins David for a final discussion of the cognitive stakes of the Donald Trump vs Kamala Harris election.
November 1, 2024
Interview with Dr. Greenwood on Trump’s Brain
Top psychologists and doctors, including Dr. Greenwood, sound the alarm on Donald Trump’s dangerous mental diagnosis, which could prove terrifying consequences if elected again.
Nov. 1, 2024
Trump Loves Pretending God Likes Him,
But His Cult Is Far From Christian
Will Saletan breaks down how Donald Trump and his supporters have used the failed assassination attempt on the former president to argue he’s been chosen by God to save America.
Nov. 2, 2024
Donald Trump against the FBI | Full Doc
Nov. 2, 2024
US faces ‘chaos’ if Trump wins 2nd term
A second Donald Trump presidency would paralyse the US government and embolden its global adversaries, says former George W. Bush speechwriter David Frum.
The Atlantic writer says the former president would immediately try to shut down the various legal investigations against him if re-elected, triggering widespread resistance.
Nov. 4, 2024
Fascist tendencies in Trump: A comparison to Hitler’s rise
An unsettling question has been dominating the US presidential race: Is Donald Trump a fascist? Some have even compared him to Nazi Adolf Hitler. DWâs Washington Bureau Chief Ines Pohl sat down with Timothy Ryback, historian and author of Take Over: Hitler’s Final Rise to Power.
Nov. 8, 2024
Jon Stewart on Trumpâs Win and
Whatâs Next w/ Heather Cox Richardson
In the aftermath of 2024 election results, Americans are rightfully worried about what a second Trump administration may bring. This week, Jon Stewart is joined by Heather Cox Richardson, author of Democracy Awakening: Notes on the State of America to explore what our past can teach us about the resiliency of our democratic institutions as we navigate an uncertain future.
“Tightrope” by Barry Blitt
November 11, 2024
Did Donald Trump Actually Win?
2.7 Million Provisional Ballots Were Rejected
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Oct. 18, 2024
VIGILANTES INC.
AMERICA’S NEW VOTE SUPPRESSION HITMEN
Greg Palast’s award-winning documentary, introduced by Martin Sheen and narrated by Rosario Dawson.
Nov. 12, 2024
Is Every Civilization Doomed to Fail?
Gregory S. Aldrete is Professor Emeritus of History at the University of WisconsinâGreen Bay. He earned his PhD in Ancient History from the University of Michigan. He has been honored with numerous awards for his research and teaching and has received five fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities. He is also a prolific scholar whose books include Gestures And Acclamations In Ancient Rome, Daily Life In The Roman City, and The Long Shadow Of Antiquity: What Have The Greeks And Romans Done For Us?
Brace Yourself
Trump 2.0: Here Comes the Night
Well, reality must be faced now. But many courageous Americans are ready to fight.
Nina Burleigh / November 14, 2024
In the summer of 2015, Steve Bannon watched Donald Trump descend the Trump Tower escalator. He exclaimed: âThatâs Hitler!â He meant it, of course, as a compliment.
Bannon would go on to become campaign CEO and a White House staffer, and Trump went on to win his first presidency. He didnât get to do full Hitler. He did spend four years smashing norms, insulting women, finding âfine people on both sidesâ of a Nazi march, committing treason (or at least trying to), operating an open-air kleptocracy, mishandling and lying about a pandemic, inciting a coup, surviving two impeachments, and then grabbing dozens of classified documents on his way out the door.
Now, a majority of the American electorateâover 70 million votersâhas handed supreme power back to this supremely unqualified, disrespectful, convicted fraudster and sexual abuser who likely avoided prison time for conviction in the Stormy Daniels hush money case. And now, his power to fulfill Bannonâs prophecy is even greater than it was during his first term, thanks to a timorous Republican Party and a Supreme Court that has granted him nearly monarchical immunity.
We are headed into uncharted territory as a people and a nation. Trump and his allies have promised to initiate their radical right-wing agenda the minute after he takes his hand off the Bible on Inauguration Day. We are about to experience an unprecedented assault on the Constitution and our civil liberties related to speech and assembly, and an abandonment of norms related to the military, the Justice Department, and government contracting that will make the first term look, well, normal.
The worst-case scenarios are disturbing, to put it mildly. Whose side will the military take, Trumpâs or the peopleâs? Will America come to resemble Argentina in the 1970s and 1980s, the âenemy withinâ rounded up and held without charges? Will women be stopped at state borders and hormone tested for pregnancies? Will Americans watch behind closed curtains as men in military garb, maybe without identification, hustle their neighbors away? Will we hear ofâbut never seeâthe concentration camps, deep in the barren Western deserts, surrounded by razor wire?
For this article, I spoke with former government officials; experts in American law, politics, and national security; and civil society NGOs and activists to get consensus on what to expect, and when and how, and what a resistance movement might look like. The consensus was bleak, but many saw a silver liningâa new coalition of Americans from many points on the political spectrum fighting back against autocracy, newly engaged and energized to create a stronger, more vigorous democracy.
Nov. 14, 2024
‘Worst of the worst’: Go inside El Salvadorâs
fortress prison for gang members
We get rare, exclusive access inside El Salvadorâs Cecot prison, where some of the countryâs most notorious gang members are held, isolated from the rest of society. Join us as David Culver tours the controversial high-security facility with El Salvadorâs prison officials, capturing the tight security, packed cells, and firsthand accounts from inmates.
With Cecot likely to receive more criminal migrants from the U.S. under President-elect Trumpâs immigration plan, the prison has become a focal point in El Salvadorâs crackdown on gangs. While critics say the prisonâs strict control and isolation of inmates is a violation of human rights, many locals see it as essential in keeping brutal violence from seeping back into society.
November 15, 2024
America’s Last Election Part 5:
The one thing Trump demands of his new cabinet
Donald Trump is bringing together his cabinet, from RFK to Matt Gaetz to Elon Musk to Vivek Ramaswamy. The one thing he is prioritising above all else is loyalty.
The President has learnt from his last term in the White House where senior leaders in his administration refused to follow through on his orders.
The story of his interactions with the likes of James Comey, Mark Milley and Mark Esper are a warning for Trump.
This time around, he is determined to Make America Great Again and he is setting up his administration to make that happen.
November 16, 2024
Top Harvard Intelligence Expert: “This is the
Golden Age of Disinformation” | Open Book
Calder Walton is a world-leading expert on intelligence, national security, and geopolitics â a scholar at Harvard Universityâs Kennedy School of Government. Read his wonderful book Spies: The Epic Intelligence War Between East and West.
November 16, 2024
“Donald is absolutely crazy,” says his biographer
David Cay Johnston is a professor at the Rochester Institute of Technology and author of The Making of Donald Trump.
November 21, 2024
Heather Cox Richardson
Today, former Florida representative Matt Gaetz withdrew his name from consideration for the office of attorney general. He did so shortly after CNN told him that they were going to report that the House Ethics Committee had been told there were witnesses to yet another sexual encounter between Gaetz and a minor in 2017. There was already evidence that he had sent more than $10,000 to two women who later testified in sexual misconduct investigations. The notes explaining the payments said things like: âLove you,â âBeing my friend,â âBeing awesome,â and âflight + extra 4 u.â
Trump transition spokesperson Alex Pfeiffer told Will Steakin of ABC News that discussions of Gaetzâs payments âare meant to undermine the mandate from the people to reform the Justice Department.â
Gaetzâs withdrawal turns attention to Trumpâs pick for secretary of defense, Pete Hegseth. As host of the weekend edition of Fox & Friends, Hegseth has no relevant experience to run a crucial United States government department, let alone one that oversees close to 3 million personnel and a budget of more than $800 billion.
According to Heath Druzin of the Idaho Capital Sun, Hegseth has close ties to an Idaho Christian nationalist church that wants to turn the United States into a theocracy.
Jonathan Chait of The Atlantic did a deep dive into Hegsethâs recent books and concluded that Hegseth âconsiders himself to be at war with basically everybody to Trumpâs left, and it is by no means clear that he means war metaphorically.â Hegsethâs books suggest he thinks that everything that does not support the MAGA worldview is âMarxist,â including voters choosing Democrats at the voting booth. He calls for the âcategorical defeat of the Leftâ and says that without its âutter annihilation,â âAmerica cannot, and will not, survive.â
November 22, 2024
PROJECT 2025: Trump’s REAL Plan All Along
We Should Have Known
Mary Trump exposes the terrifying reality of Project 2025 – the extremist blueprint Trump denied but is already implementing. Watch as his administration executes the playbook’s core principles: mass deportations, military purges, and the dismantling of public education. From targeting reproductive rights to eliminating a million federal jobs, the plan reveals exactly how to prepare for what’s coming.
November 23, 2024
Ex-Republican predicts “Fascism” and “Chaos”
in Trump 2nd term
— Steve Schmidt, renowned American political strategist, commentator, and founder of The Warning, joins David to discuss the aftermath and consequences of the 2024 election.
November – December 2024 Issue
The Bureaucrat Who Could Make
Trump’s Authoritarian Dreams
Real
Russ Vought has a plan to take presidential power to new heights.
By Isabela Dias
Our November+December issue investigates the Christian nationalist movement that aspires to take over government at all levels, from school boards and state legislatures to Congress and the Supreme Court. Read the series of stories here.
In the waning days of the Trump presidency, Russell Vought, the outgoing director of the Office of Management and Budget, had a request.
After years in Washington, DC, soaking in the minutiae of policy, Vought had come to both know and loathe the bureaucracy. A rare voice in an administration committed to âdraining the swampâ who had actual Beltway experience, he found in the Trump era he could put his expertise to use.
On November 20, 2020, Vought wrote to the head of the Office of Personnel Management for approval to reclassify dozens of career civil servant jobs within his agency. A few weeks before the 2020 election, President Donald Trump signed an executive order creating a new category of at-will employeesâso-called Schedule F positionsâwhich would be exempt from the rules designed to protect civil servants from partisan hatchetmen.
Despite Trumpâs loss, Vought pushed to recategorize scores of OMB roles. To an outsider, this might have seemed like a technical adjustment. But in practice, reassignment would have stripped 415 employeesâ68 percent of the agencyâs personnelâof work protections, effectively making it easier for political appointees to fire them. Vought called it âanother step to make Washington accountable to the American people.â
In the end, Vought couldnât get it done by inauguration. But this combination of lofty public rhetoric and ruthless behind-the-scenes gamesmanship has become his trademark. By the tail end of Trumpâs turbulent four years in the White House, the OMB director had turned into one of the presidentâs most trusted and obsequious officialsâan acolyte with a knack for making the half-formed schemes from his boss achievable.
As Trump runs for a second term, Voughtâs years of faithful service havenât gone unnoticed; his name has been widely floated for chief of staff, and he is a key policy adviser. One of the masterminds behind Project 2025âthe Heritage Foundationâs presidential transition blueprint to overhaul the executive branch and usher in an ultraconservative agendaâVought, an avowed Christian nationalist, is the man best positioned to realize Trumpâs visions.
Nov. 26, 2024
China, the U.S. & the Rise of Xi Jinping
The complex, contentious U.S.-China relationship is a high-profile issue President-elect Donald Trump will face in his second term. FRONTLINEâs timely investigation traces Chinaâs emergence as one of the worldâs wealthiest and most repressive countries, and the role of its longtime president, Xi Jinping.
Nov. 27, 2024
Chris Hayes: Remember the last time a country
fooled around and found out?
âJust like the Tories and Liz Truss in London two years ago, Donald Trump told us what he plans to do. And just like then, the critics have said what the devastating results will be. Now we are about to enter the âfinding outâ phase of the story,â says Chris Hayes on Trumpâs economic plans.
Nov. 29, 2024
INFURIATING Clip Shows Just How Little
the Truth Matters to Trump | Will’s Take
Will Saletan breaks down how Donald Trump pathologically lies, using a story Trump tells about CNN’s Van Jones as a prime example.
December 2, 2024
“Instrument of Vengeance”: Mehdi Hasan on
How Trump & Kash Patel Could Weaponize
FBI Against Critics
We speak with journalist Mehdi Hasan, founder and editor-in-chief of Zeteo, about the incoming U.S. administration and President-elect Donald Trump’s picks for key roles, including lawyer Kash Patel to lead the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Trump reportedly considered Patel for FBI deputy director during his first term but dropped the idea after pushback from within his own administration. Hasan describes Patel as a “toady” whose threats against political opponents and journalists should be disqualifying, but that he aligns with Trump’s goals of further politicizing the FBI. “He wants to use it as an instrument of vengeance.”
December 4, 2024
America’s Lonely Future: David Frum on
Trump’s “Predatory” Foreign Policy
With Trump’s inauguration on the horizon, conversations continue about the impact of the President-elect’s policies both at home and abroad. David Frum is a political commentator and former speechwriter for President George W. Bush. In his latest piece for The Atlantic, âAmerica’s Lonely Future,” Frum warns that the U.S. could become a global bully. He joins Walter Isaacson to discuss.
December 13, 2024
Enduring the Trauma of Genocide (w/ Gabor Maté)
Dec. 18, 2024
Five Times Klepper Took on Trumpers in 2024
From finding out if America is headed to a second Civil War, to Trump’s criminal trial and conviction, to the president-elect’s assassination attempt, Jordan Klepper had quite a busy year. Here’s the best of Jordan Klepper Fingers the Pulse in 2024.
Dec. 20, 2024
Why Democrats can’t get over the grief
of losing to Donald Trump
A party without a leader is hopeless
By Chauncey DeVega
Senior Writer
Following their trouncing by Donald Trump and the MAGA movement in the 2024 election, Democrats continue to plod through the stages of grief, vacillating between denial, anger and bargaining. This behavior is increasingly taking the form of self-soothing talk among its leadership, consultant and media class that their defeat in the 2024 election was not as extreme and dire as it first appeared (Trump won the popular vote and the Electoral College; the Republicans now control both chambers of Congress) and that a big rebuild and reassessment of the party and its strategy, messaging and leadership are not necessary.
MSNBC Highlights
December 23, 2024
Americans Are FLEEING to These 10 Countries Because of Trump.
Escape Plan: Discover the top 10 countries Americans are fleeing to in 2024! From Costa Rica’s “Pura Vida” lifestyle to Japan’s strict social rules, we’re exploring the most popular destinations for Americans looking to start fresh abroad.
Ready to trade your American zip code for an international address? We break down the real deal on living in these countries — from Portugal’s golden visa program to Canada’s point-based system. Plus, get the inside scoop on visa requirements, cost of living, and what daily life is really like in each destination.
Dec. 24, 2024
‘Pay-to-pray’: Trump reportedly charging supporters
$100,000 to attend church service with him
By Carl Gibson
The day before his inauguration, President-elect Donald Trump will reportedly be attending an interfaith prayer service in Washington D.C. His wealthiest supporters can also attend â if they write or solicit a big enough check.
That’s according to a recent report in Religion News Service (RNS), which published promotional material from Trump’s inaugural committee showing a list of different tiers of “benefits” depending on how much a donor gives. On Saturday, January 18, donors can get tickets to a “Make America Great Again Victory Rally,” a Cabinet reception and a dinner with Vice President-elect JD Vance. And on Sunday, January 19, donors who give $100,000 or raise $200,000 can get two tickets to the “One America, One Light Sunday Service.” RNS reporter Jack Jenkins described it as a “pay-to-pray” event.
THE WEIRD NEW
NORMAL OF DONALD
TRUMP IN 2024
Radical revisionism is a strong contender for the theme
of this disruptive year, in which some unique property
of political alchemy managed to transform a defeated
and disgraced ex-President into a perfectly electable
Republican candidate.
By Susan B. Glasser
December 26, 2024
December 27, 2024
WASHINGTON WEEK with The Atlantic
George Packer is known far and wide for his penetrating analysis of American history and American politics. Across his distinguished career, Packer has reported from war zones and countries in turmoil around the world. This week, Jeffrey Goldberg and Packer focus on turmoil at home to make sense of this year and Americaâs future.
Dec. 28, 2024
How Empires Fall and Why the US is Next
Every empire falls, no matter how long they reigned and how far their rule stretched. So is the empire weâre living under today – the US Empire – also crumbling?
There are three symptoms of its impending demise that we can see from looking to the past.
Jan. 6, 2025
Rep. Jamie Raskin – Jan. 6 & Reevaluating
Democratsâ Priorities
âWeâre going to be standing up every single day for the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the freedom of the people.â Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland joins Jon Stewart from Washington D.C. to discuss the countryâs future following the certification of Donald Trumpâs 2024 election win.
As the newly-elected ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, he weighs in on Democratic priorities moving forward, engaging young voters through the Democracy Summer project, his friendship with Rep. Lauren Boebert, and positive memories from the day after the 2021 insurrection.
Jan. 7, 2025
Chris Hayes: Zuckerberg and tech execs cozying
up to Trump is chillingâbut ‘very clarifying’
January 8, 2025
Donald Trump holds a bizarre and disturbing
press conference at Mar-a-Lago
Jan. 8, 2025
“We did not discuss that”: Trump spoke to Alito
before asking SCOTUS to intervene in hush money case
Justice Alito admits he spoke to Trump before the filing,
but denies they discussed Supreme Court business
Nights and Weekends Editor
Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito spoke with Donald Trump mere hours before he filed a request for the court to intervene in his New York hush-money case.
The president-elect’s legal team filed an emergency application to the highest court on Wednesday, asking the justices to intervene ahead of Trump’s upcoming sentencing hearing. The filing asked the court to act to “prevent grave injustice and harm to the institution of the Presidency.” Though Alito admitted to speaking with the president-elect on Tuesday, he said they did not discuss his case.
“William Levi, one of my former law clerks, asked me to take a call from President-elect Trump regarding his qualifications to serve in a government position,” Alito told ABC News. “We did not discuss the emergency application he filed today, and indeed, I was not even aware at the time of our conversation that such an application would be filed… We also did not discuss any other matter that is pending or might in the future come before the Supreme Court or any past Supreme Court decisions involving the president-elect.”
Trump was found guilty of 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in May of last year. After several months of delays, Trump was ordered to a sentencing hearing by New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan. Barring intervention from other courts, Trump will be sentenced on Jan. 10.
Merchan has telegraphed that he has no intention of sentencing Trump to jail time or fines. In his order, he shared that the court would not “impose any sentence of incarceration” and floated the idea of an “unconditional discharge,” a sentence that comes with no consequences. That did not stop Trump from raging against Merchan and calling for him to be disbarred.
“There has never been a President who was so evilly and illegally treated as I. Corrupt Democrat judges and prosecutors have gone against a political opponent of a President, ME, at levels of injustice never seen before,” he wrote on Truth Social earlier this month. “Corrupt judges or judges so blinded by their hatred of me … are making a mockery of the United States Judicial System, and the World is watching in disgust.”
Jan. 10, 2025
Rachel Maddow on Pam Bondi: Five things to know
about Trump’s (second) pick for attorney general
How much will Americans get to know about the people Donald Trump is choosing to run the U.S. government? In the absence of any real vetting the way it’s usually done, Rachel Maddow presents a Rachel Maddow Show Public Servant Announcement to hopefully help fill that gap.
In this episode, Rachel takes a closer look at Trump’s choice for attorney general, Pam Bondi, who has been working closely with Trump, despite not being given a role in his first administration, showing commitment to his causes, including the prosecution of his political opponents. While Bondi is not highly regarded for her abilities, she does benefit from comparison to Trump’s first choice for attorney general, former Rep. Matt Gaetz.
Jan. 12, 2025
Interview with FBI Director
FBI Director Christopher Wray, who’s stepping down before President-elect Donald Trump takes office, sits down with Scott Pelley to discuss the Bureau’s future, and the threats America faces.
January 12, 2025
How global autocrats will OWN Trump
— Anne Applebaum, Pulitzer prize winning historian and writer for The Atlantic, joins David to discuss her book Autocracy, Inc.: The Dictators Who Want to Run the World.
Jan. 14, 2025
Mary Trump: My uncle is out for revenge
The BEAT
Jan. 14, 2025
Jack Smith breaks silence on Trump smears:
DOJâs final evidence to âconvictâ 47
Special Counsel Jack Smithâs report stated it had enough evidence to convict Donald Trump, stating âthe admissible evidence was sufficient to obtain and sustain a conviction at trial.â MSNBC’s Ari Melber reports on the newly released Jan. 6 report.
January 14, 2025
White Nationalism, Sexual Assault & Corruption:
Pete Hegseth Faces Senate Confirmation
The confirmation hearing for President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for defense secretary, former Fox News host and military veteran Pete Hegseth, begins today amid backlash over his history of sexual assault, misusing funds in his previous positions, and various violations committed while under the influence of alcohol.
Hegseth was also one of 12 National Guard members removed as guards for President Biden’s 2021 inauguration over possible extremist ties. He has tattoos associated with the white supremacist and neo-Nazi movements, including what’s known as a Jerusalem cross, a symbol used by Christian nationalists. If Hegseth is confirmed, “the Trump administration would stand to gain a loyalist,” says reporter Alice Herman, who is covering Hegseth in The Guardian.
January 15, 2025
Pam Bondi and Adam Schiff clash
At today’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Sen. Adam Schiff (D-CA) questioned former Florida AG Pam Bondi, President-elect Trump’s nominee for Attorney General.
January 16, 2025
Trump’s Return Echoes Rome’s Fall: Is America Next?
Will Trump make America fall like Ancient Rome? Thom Hartmann reveals how Ancient Romeâs democratic collapse set the stage for Americaâs current crisis⊠Trump’s second inauguration.
Jan. 17, 2025
What’s with Trump’s obsession
with Greenland? | About That
U.S. president-elect Donald Trump has long been fascinated with owning and controlling Greenland, spanning from his interest in buying the country in 2019, to his recent refusal to rule out taking it by military force.
Andrew Chang explores four potential reasons why Trump calls ownership of Greenland ‘an absolute necessity.’
January 17, 2025
PBS News Weekly: Trumpâs incoming
cabinet under the spotlight
In his final days in office, President Joe Biden reflected back on his presidency in a speech to the nation, while his successorâs administration began to take shape through confirmation hearings. This week, we take a close look at the hearings, the upcoming presidential transition and the legacy Biden will leave behind after 50 years in public service.
Jan. 17, 2025
‘Alarming’: RFK Jr. sought to stop vaccinations
In May 2021, just six months after the rollout of the Covid vaccine, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. tried to stop all coronavirus vaccinations in the U.S., the New York Times reports. Sen. Ed Markey joins Chris Hayes to discuss that and more.
January 17, 2025
Heather Cox Richardson
In his final address to the nation last night, President Joe Biden issued a warning that âan oligarchy is taking shape in America of extreme wealth, power, and influence that literally threatens our entire democracy, our basic rights and freedoms, and a fair shot for everyone to get ahead.â
It is not exactly news that there is dramatic economic inequality in the United States. Economists call the period from 1933 to 1981 the âGreat Compression,â for it marked a time when business regulation, progressive taxation, strong unions, and a basic social safety net compressed both wealth and income levels in the United States. Every income group in the U.S. improved its economic standing.
That period ended in 1981, when the U.S. entered a period economists have dubbed the âGreat Divergence.â Between 1981 and 2021, deregulation, tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations, the offshoring of manufacturing, and the weakening of unions moved $50 trillion from the bottom 90% of Americans to the top 1%.
Biden tried to address this growing inequality by bringing back manufacturing, fostering competition, increasing oversight of business, and shoring up the safety net by getting Congress to pass a lawâthe Inflation Reduction Actâthat enabled Medicare to negotiate drug prices for seniors with the pharmaceutical industry, capping insulin at $35 for seniors, for example. His policies worked, primarily by creating full employment which enabled those at the bottom of the economy to move to higher-paying jobs. During Bidenâs term, the gap between the 90th income percentile and the 10th income percentile fell by 25%.
But Donald Trump convinced voters hurt by the inflation that stalked the country after the coronavirus pandemic shutdown that he would bring prices down and protect ordinary Americans from the Democratic âeliteâ that he said didnât care about them. Then, as soon as he was elected, he turned for advice and support to one of the richest men in the world, Elon Musk, who had invested more than $250 million in Trumpâs campaign.
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