Here we are, the year of Donald Trump. Of course, we have had Trump for quite a few years now. But as he would say, this is the big one. Will she choose him?
It is a fairly basic electoral proposition: an all-consuming Trump against an ever-receding Joe Biden. Does Trump exclaim every day, many times a day, insulting, attacking, talking endlessly, filling all spaces with strangeness and nonsense, loudly standing up to everyone in the many battles of his life, to disgust or resignation (that is, beyond the hardcore that he inspires it)? Does Biden’s fundamental lack of effect, almost physical transparency, obvious frustration or aversion to the demand for theater, and, overall, shuffling back-office behavior, create feelings of hopelessness or relief?
Trump’s strategy, despite all attempts to parse the larger meaning or “dog whistles” of his messages, amounts to pure media dominance. The more news cycles he checks, the happier he is and the better he gauges his political fate. For Trump, political logic always takes a back seat to showmanship. Since the start of the primary campaign season about a year ago, Trump’s unique approach and natural demeanor has simply been to deprive all competitors of airtime. If he got attention, then he didn’t. It was not, as in any traditional political formulation, about who had more money; Ron DeSantis, his main challenger, had a lot of it. And it wasn’t about knocking on doors and retail politics – something Trump has little patience for. The point was that there was one exaggerated story, and it was a constant story: Trump. Only Trump.
The election calendar with its march to the nomination and its countless trials means that every day is Trump Day
Strangely, or naively, this remains something of a shock to the political system. After his defeat in 2020, and January 6, and his exile to Mar-a-Lago, the belief was that this was, at best, a severely diminished Trump. But here again there was a misunderstanding between the political game and the techniques of reality television. In the first case you try to regulate conflicts, in the second you invite as many of them as possible. Virtually every political insider, Democrat and Republican, viewed his insistence and continued rehashing of the “stolen” election as foolish, if not psychotic. And yet the effect of his obsessive harping has not just been to present him with a simple, conflict-ridden issue – full of martyrdom, victimhood and us-versus-them – but an issue that is all about him. The issue isn’t about politics, or policy, or anything like that: it just is. Moreover, it allowed him, again as on reality TV, to maintain the dramatic pretense – however ridiculous – that he was still president. He wasn’t a challenger, he was an incumbent (well, he would be, if…). The sheer strength or ridiculousness of his character – never call him the “former” president – kept him and Mar-a-Lago as America’s alternative power center. This had the added benefit of allowing him to avoid the hard work of campaigning to get attention. As an alternative president, his statements and resistance drew attention directly to him, barely interrupting his golf game.
His many persecutions, which seek nothing less than his political and personal destruction, have not so much called into question his unique status as helped to sustain and burnish it. The more headlines – the reason and meaning don’t really matter – the more important it is. And for many, all the more inevitable.
And realistically, we haven’t seen anything yet.
Next week, his lawyers will go to Federal Court in Washington to argue his case for absolute presidential immunity, an idiotic defense that defies all constitutional logic and is now suddenly, for no reason other than the sheer crazy drama of it, being taken seriously. Trump himself is threatening to appear in court personally to hear his lawyers argue this case. Why? No legal reason. Just to create more drama and media attention for it.
Two days later is the last day of his trial in New York on civil fraud charges. He will lose this lawsuit – based on the rulings that have already been made, he has lost it. But he has consistently appeared at the New York courthouse, creating new headlines in the courthouse hallways with every bathroom break. What are the chances that he won’t show up on the last day?
Four days later are the Iowa caucuses – the first primaries. And the first of Trump’s expected string of victories.
A day later, E Jean Carroll, who previously won her lawsuit against him for a sexual assault, goes back to court and sues him for defamation (he continues to smear her). Trump has privately expressed anger at his lawyers for discouraging him from appearing at the first trial. He has promised not to miss the second one.
A week later are the New Hampshire primaries. And we’re not even done with January yet.
Biden can only hope that the contrast, as extreme as it has ever been in American political life, will ultimately be with him.
The election calendar with its march to the nomination, its myriad trials – its criminal trials, its civil trials, the multi-state attempts to kick it off the ballot, its varied issues now before the Supreme Court – with their daily odds on fire and anger, and his natural state where the air he needs to survive is television broadcasts, simply means that every day is Trump Day.
Where is Joe Biden?
It’s clear that he can’t fight this fight and he sees it as futile to even try. He can only hope that the contrast, as extreme as perhaps ever seen in American political life, will ultimately be with him: perceptual assault and domination, an inescapable cacophony of images and sounds, versus the barely visible, a tranquility that many hope will be taken as a sign of competence and dedication (rather than being out of it).
American political pundits have defined this as a choice between the despotic and the democratic. But that can complicate a more deeply held collective judgment.
Does Trump win because of his pursuit of ratings? Or will he lose by jumping the shark? After all, no show goes on forever. And this one is already putting pressure on the outermost number of plausible seasons.
Michael Wolff is the author of Fire and Fury and The Fall: The End of the Murdoch Empire