Even by his haywire standards, Donald Trump’s latest rhetoric and behavior is erratic, autocratic and vulgar and hints at four years of unpredictable leadership that may lie ahead if he’s elected president in 15 days.
Vice President Kamala Harris and top Democrats are seizing on the Republican nominee’s bizarre antics to inject new urgency and a sharper focus into her campaign, arguing he “demeans” the presidency and is “deranged.” As Trump cancels one-on-one interviews and piles up odd public appearances, Democrats are suggesting that he is “unstable” and showing cognitive decline, using the same critique he once used against President Joe Biden. The Harris campaign, for example, immediately highlighted the 78-year-old Trump saying on Sunday that he’s “not that close to 80” when calling for cognitive tests.
The former president this weekend described Harris as a “sh*t” vice president, opened a rally with a rambling and explicit story about late golfing legend Arnold Palmer’s anatomy, and justified his previous threat to use the military on enemies “from within” even as House Speaker Mike Johnson insisted in an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union” that Trump meant nothing of the sort.
Trump seemed to validate Harris’ message that he is an “unserious man” who poses “extremely serious” consequences if he is returned to the White House as both campaigns chase the last undecided voters in an agonizingly close race that could be decided by tens of thousands of votes in a few swing states.
Yet Trump’s years of trashing expectations of presidential behavior have seemed to offer him a kind of immunity from the ramifications of what would be career-ending actions for most other politicians. The twice-impeached, once-convicted ex-president’s outlandish displays only underscore his anti-establishment authenticity for millions of Americans who adore him.
His alarming behavior may look to some like a candidacy melting down when the pressure is at its most extreme. But the election may be decided by other factors.
With polls deadlocked, Trump’s behavior hasn’t yet disqualified him. And he consistently leads surveys when voters are asked who they most trust to manage high prices for housing and groceries and to handle immigration.
The White House failed to neutralize both those issues politically, paving the way for their potency in the 2024 campaign. Officials repeatedly insisted that rising inflation early in the Biden term was “transitory” and that the economy was healthy even when millions of Americans were hurting. Similarly, administration spokespeople were long reluctant to consider rising numbers of border crossings as a “crisis” even though the asylum system was overwhelmed. Migrant crossings and inflation have both fallen considerably from their peaks, but the political damage may have been done. And Trump’s voters still regard him as a vessel for their frustration with a political and economic system they believe has poorly served them.
Trump’s behavior underscores stakes of deadlocked election
It will be up to voters to decide how to process Trump’s recent conduct.
The Harris campaign, which began as an attempt to spread joy, is now fully exploiting Trump’s rhetorical rampages.
The vice president told the Rev. Al Sharpton on MSNBC on Sunday that “the president of the United States must set a standard” for this country and the world. “What you see in my opponent, a former president of the United States … demeans the office,” she said. Harris’ running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, on Saturday claimed in Nebraska that Trump lacked “stamina” to be president and was “far more unfit than he was in 2016. He’s more deranged.”
In Nevada the same day, former President Barack Obama slammed Republicans who make excuses for Trump when he “repeatedly lies or cheats or shows utter disregard for our Constitution, or just insults people, when he calls service members who died in battle ‘losers’ or fellow citizens ‘vermin’ or ‘the enemy within.’”
The most troubling of recent Trump comments are his suggestions that he could use the US military or National Guard against the “enemy from within,” a classic trope of authoritarian leaders. When asked who he meant, Trump has several times cited California Democratic Reps. Nancy Pelosi, the former speaker, and Adam Schiff, who was a key figure in Trump’s first impeachment.
But Johnson insisted on “State of the Union” that Trump was referring specifically to “marauding gangs of dangerous, violent people who are destroying public property and threatening other American citizens,” even when CNN’s Jake Tapper played tape specifically referring to Schiff and Pelosi. And in an interview that aired on Fox’s “MediaBuzz” later Sunday, the ex-president yet again made clear exactly what he meant when he said that “of course” Schiff is an enemy.
It is hard to contemplate circumstances in which a US president would turn US forces on domestic opponents and harder to imagine that American service personnel and their superiors would participate. But the fact that a candidate for president, who appears to have a 50-50 chance of winning, is talking in such terms represents another taboo shattered by Trump. And it shows fears about his second term are not exaggerated. Trump’s remarks do not come in isolation. He has vowed to dedicate a second term to “retribution” and to use the Justice Department to investigate his foes. And a Supreme Court ruling that presidents have significant immunity for official acts has bolstered Trump’s false view that presidents have almost absolute power.
In another sign of his strongman instincts, Trump said Harris should be investigated over a CBS “60 Minutes” interview because he differed with the network’s editorial presentation. “We’re going to subpoena their records because we want to see how much else did she do,” he said on “MediaBuzz.” The ex-president – who backed out of his own “60 Minutes” appearance – has earlier suggested CBS should lose its broadcast license over the interview, fueling fears about his possible policies as president.
In the Fox News interview, the ex-president also repeated his false claims about Haitian immigrants in Ohio eating cats and dogs and said January 6, 2021 – when his supporters tried to subvert the certification of Biden’s election victory – was a day of “beauty and love.”
Questions about Trump’s stamina and cognition
Some of the ex-president’s comments and behavior have also offered an opening for his opponents to question his capacity to serve and to sharpen the contrast with Harris, who turned 60 on Sunday.
After an interview at the Economic Club of Chicago last week, for example, the former president’s grasp of facts and economic logic was in question as he struggled to focus. Trump justified his rambling as a “weave” in which simultaneously speaking about multiple ideas at once showed what he said were rare cognitive abilities. But the spectacle casts doubt on Trump’s capacity to handle complex issues in the Oval Office and during a national security crisis.
Also last week, after several members of his crowd at a town hall meeting needed medical treatment, the ex-president suspended the event and swayed along to his soundtrack for more than half an hour.
And on Saturday, he started a rally in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, by speaking at length about Palmer, who was brought up in the town and died in 2016. He ended his peroration with a lewd description about the late golfer’s genitalia. Palmer is remembered by his fans as the epitome of class and sportsmanship, and Trump’s decision to invoke the legacy of the seven-time majors champion in such a manner was in poor taste. The episode showed that almost nothing is immune from being deployed for his personal or political ends.
In an election in which Trump is trying to lessen his deficit among female voters and moderates in swing states, his decision to resort to explicit locker-room talk seemed especially questionable. It also represented political malpractice since he drowned out his closing argument that Harris represents a continuation of a failed Biden presidency haunted by high prices, mass undocumented migration and a descent toward World War III as chaos reigns abroad.
But the idea that Trump’s lewdness will turn away many voters is belied by the experience of 2016 and the release of an “Access Hollywood” tape on which he boasted that as a celebrity he could grab women by their genitalia and get away with it. And if attempting to steal an election does not disqualify Trump from being a viable Republican nominee, it’s unlikely an off-color remark about a golfer will damage him.
How a spell at a McDonald’s frier encapsulated polarized views of Trump
The ex-president has so polarized the country that he’s created a unique political environment. Liberals and media elites might, for example, view his appearance making fries at a McDonald’s in Pennsylvania on Sunday as a stunt. Walz slammed it as an insult by a tycoon who spent decades “stiffing workers’ pay.” But to Trump supporters, the photo-op could convey authenticity and kinship.
That hold on the GOP base explains why Republicans repeatedly accommodate his crude and anti-democratic conduct. It’s why Johnson’s defended the party nominee on “State of the Union,” which sent particular alarm bells since the speaker may be called upon to play a role in defending constitutional governance in the event of a disputed election.
In a country where majorities believe things are heading in the wrong direction, and where Harris this month said she couldn’t point to one thing she’d have done differently from Biden, Trump’s recent unhinged behavior may not be decisive.
“We’re winning, and going to win, not because of what Donald Trump is saying, but because of what they’ve done for four years,” Sen. Lindsey Graham said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday in reference to the Biden-Harris administration. “The American people are not going to tolerate four more years of affordability crisis, a world on fire, a broken border, energy dependence.” The South Carolina Republican added: “It’s all about Trump; they have got no other game to play.”
Whatever voters decide, Trump’s wild closing arguments suggest that if he wins, great political turbulence is in store.
