There are a number of recent news stories about the ways the incoming President-elect’s policies will likely hurt the Americans who voted for him. People who have undocumented family members somehow seem to believe that Trump’s plans for mass deportations will not affect their relatives.
People who depend on government benefits that Trump has promised to cut, somehow don’t seem to believe that they will be affected. Farmers who depend on migrant labor have somehow ignored Trump’s promised closing of the borders.
The common denominator is an ongoing refusal to take Trump’s own words at face value. Throughout the 2024 presidential campaign, it became clear that many of his supporters only believed what they wanted to believe and with a wave of their hand dismissed the most brutal or authoritarian of his promises.
In a post-election New York Times focus group, many of the 14 participants who voted for him were still praising Trump for policies he doesn’t support or beliefs he doesn’t hold. There likewise appears to be a broad assumption among many of his voters that if Trump’s policies produce negative results, then they, their businesses and their loved ones will somehow be part of the exception, not the rule.
– Hayes Brown
Create your own Donald
Trump voters have for years made light of Democrat’s “over reaction” to the outrageous, offensive, and dangerous things that Trump says. They claim he is just exaggerating for effect, and to “own the libs.”
I suppose, in some perverse way, it actually makes sense to ignore what he says. After all, he never says anything accurate or meaningful. He just randomly makes things up as he speaks. He is the absolute king of bullshitters.
The secret to Trump’s popularity is that he always tells every audience exactly what they want to hear. He has absolutely no moral or ethical center. He has no consistent religious belief, political philosophy, or value system. All that matters to him – ALL that matters to him – is his own personal popularity and wealth.
The danger of this is that his ingrained habit of only telling people what they want to hear allows his listeners to create, in their own minds, a Donald Trump that they like and who will make all their dreams come true. His fantasy image-making is, of course, made much easier because his base voters have self-limited their access to factual news outside the “hero image” propaganda bubble created for Trump by the right-wing media.
Trump voters are living in a complete Fantasyland. They have allowed themselves to be blinded by the unrelenting stream of phony outrage and deliberate lies spewing from right-wing propaganda factories and amplified by social media. They have abandoned their critical thinking abilities and surrendered their moral sense of right and wrong.
Ignore the facts
Here are the facts. This man is a convicted rapist, a convicted felon who falsifies business records, a chronically bankrupt and failing businessman, a fraudster, an insurrectionist, a traitor who gives away state secrets, a would-be dictator, a pathological liar, a demagogue, an illiterate bully, a malignant narcissist, and demonstrably incompetent.
It is absolutely astonishing (and frightening) that such a man would ever attain a party’s nomination for president – let alone be elected twice. Had he been convicted by the Senate in either of his TWO impeachments, he would not have been eligible to run again. His role in the January 6, 2020 assault on the Capitol actually disqualifies him for office according to the insurrection clause of the 14th Amendment, but neither the Republicans in the Senate, nor the stacked Supreme Court have been willing to speak up for this Constitutional requirement.
The bright, flashing warning signs were there throughout the campaign for anyone who wanted to see them. It seems impossible that anyone could be unaware of what a vote for him could mean, not after almost a decade of him dominating the country’s political attention. Agency rests squarely on the shoulders of Trump voters, who chose him despite the overwhelming evidence that his plans would be harmful.
– Hayes Brown
Enjoy the chaos
So here we go again. His announced plans for large tariffs and mass deportations will destroy the economy. His proposed appointments to administer government health care programs will lead to widespread outbreaks of disease and death. His cuts to entitlement programs will lead to increased suffering, homelessness, and starvation. His promise to dismantle the Department of Education will further limit opportunities for our children (of course he won’t care, uneducated people are more likely to support him).
These policy facts have Democrats, and other thinking people, extremely worried.
I can only see one hope for the future. Trump’s own incompetence may save us. His campaign promises are dark, and the plans of the fascists behind Project 2025 are even darker. But when has Donald J. Trump ever kept (or even remembered) a promise? And what does he actually know about implementing government policy?
The Republican voters who have been telling us to not believe everything Trump says may prove to be right after all.
For some reason the voters have chosen another four years of Trumpian chaos. There is no doubt it will be painful and destructive. But whether or not that chaos leads to the end of our Constitutional democratic republic is still to be decided.
Sources:
Hayes Brown, “Why it’s so hard to have schadenfreude for Trump voters,” MSNBC, December 30, 2024.
— “The Trump voters who don’t believe Trump,” MSN, (Original article in New York Times, October 14, 2024).
George Packer, “The End of Democratic Delusions,” The Atlantic, January 2025.
Hayes Brown, “Donald Trump should not be this close to the presidency again,” MSNBC, November 4, 2024.