Trump's Campaign of Lies: Gaslighting America

Falsehoods fuel strategy

On the surface, the three issues currently driving Donald Trump’s presidential campaign seem entirely unrelated. One involves a foiled assassination attempt against him. The second is his claim that Haitian immigrants are eating household pets in Springfield, Ohio. The third is his assertion that the recent presidential debate, which he lost convincingly, was rigged by ABC News.

But if you listen closely to Trump’s comments on these issues — the assassination attempt, the alleged pet-eating, and the supposedly rigged debate — you’ll notice a common theme. In all three cases, Trump and his allies have spread repeated lies, attempting to convince the public that what we know to be true isn’t. In simpler terms, he’s gaslighting us.

Take the assassination attempt, for instance. The Secret Service saw the would-be assassin’s gun barrel emerge from bushes at the golf course where Trump was playing. Agents fired their weapons, and the man, Ryan Routh, fled. He was later apprehended and charged with various crimes.

While most people praised the agents and breathed a sigh of relief, Trump had a different take. In a social media post, he wrote, “The Rhetoric, Lies, as exemplified by the false statements made by Comrade Kamala Harris during the rigged and highly partisan ABC Debate, and all of the ridiculous lawsuits specifically designed to inflict damage on Joe’s, then Kamala’s, Political Opponent, ME, has taken politics in our Country to a whole new level of Hatred, Abuse, and Distrust. Because of this Communist Left Rhetoric, the bullets are flying, and it will only get worse!”

Let’s be clear: Trump’s opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris (who is not a communist, by the way), has never uttered anything remotely close to violent or extreme rhetoric. Trump, on the other hand, has built much of his political persona on inflammatory speech.

Trump’s use of violent language goes back decades, but for our purposes, we can focus on his 2016 campaign, where he repeatedly and gleefully spoke about protesters being roughed up. He also hinted at a Second Amendment (read: gun-related) solution to political disputes. As president, he praised a Montana politician for assaulting a reporter, suggested border agents shoot migrants crossing the southern border, and defended law enforcement’s killing of an unarmed suspect as justified. “That’s the way it has to be,” he said.

Trump’s rhetoric reached a peak on January 6, 2021, when he told an angry rally crowd, “We fight like hell, and if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.” Trump was referring to his false claim that the 2020 election had been rigged against him. Thousands of his supporters then marched to the Capitol, where more than 1,000 clashed with police and breached the building. In the ensuing violence, 174 officers were injured. More recently, Trump has vowed to “root out” supposed enemies, suggested that Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley is a traitor, and declared, “I am your warrior. I am your justice. For those who have been wronged and betrayed… I am your retribution.”

Trump has provided no evidence of Harris or Walz using similar inflammatory language, further proving that he is gaslighting the public. He is the one inciting extremes.

The same pattern holds true for Trump’s claim that Haitian immigrants are eating cats and dogs in Springfield, Ohio. While his running mate, J.D. Vance, has admitted the story is false, Trump continues to promote it. Meanwhile, over 30 bomb threats have been made against schools, local officials, and government buildings. Once again, Trump and Vance are gaslighting the public.

Finally, let’s address Trump’s absurd claim that ABC News rigged the recent debate. “From the standpoint of ABC, they’re the most dishonest, in my opinion, the most dishonest news organization — and that’s saying a lot because they’re all essentially really dishonest,” Trump said.

This echoes Trump’s frequent portrayal of the press as the “enemy of the people.” His inflammatory rhetoric has reached his followers, one of whom was recently arrested after trying to breach a barrier to attack journalists covering a Trump rally. In this instance, the gaslighting led a man to take extreme action.

Sadly, more than a decade of Trump’s lies, repeatedly spread by media outlets favored by his followers, has conditioned many of them to believe him, fueling their resentment and anger. In other words, he’s been gaslighting them. No political figure on the other side has engaged in similarly destructive behavior.

Trump is responsible for the extreme polarization in the electorate. He is using lies to motivate his base to turn out on Election Day. Don’t expect this to change — gaslighters never tell the truth.