Benjamin Herrera
Professor Graves
ENG 2150
4/3/2019
The Trump Phenomenon’s Impact on American Political Discourse
According to a June 2018 poll done by Rasmussen Reports, 31% of Americans think a second U.S Civil War is likely to occur in the next five years, with 11% of those saying it’s very likely. Furthermore, according to a October 2018 NBC News poll, 80% of Americans believe the country is “mainly” or “totally” divided. When voters were asked why they thought the country is so divided, the two most popular answers (by a significant margin) were first Donald Trump and then the Democratic Party/Liberals. As one can deduce from this information, the United States is experiencing a period of deep civil unrest and political polarization. This level of unrest has only occurred in the last couple of years starting with the 2016 U.S Presidential Election and has had a profound impact on the way Americans organize around and discuss politics. Donald Trump’s arrival on the political scene has resulted in a significant widening of the overton window, the realm of political discourse which contains political ideas and policies which society deems acceptable. Trump’s abrupt acceptance of extreme conservative political ideas in addition to his extreme antics has resulted in the left doubling down in adopting extreme ideas on the other side of the political spectrum. In this paper, I will be exploring how Donald Trump’s election has changed our political discourse by making Americans more polarized to right and left “echo chambers”, to have a more intense discourse surrounding racism, sexism, immigration, to focus more on politicians’ character, and have a decreased amount of faith in the media.
Soon after announcing his presidential campaign, Trump made the now infamous statement, “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best; they’re not sending you. They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.” He went on to further say that in order to solve this problem of illegal immigration, he was going to build a massive wall along the U.S/Mexico Border, and have Mexico pay for all of it. Shocking though it may sound (I joke), these comments, or anything resembling the extremity of these comments, have never been said by any politician or person running for president in modern American history regarding the topic of immigration. He completely shifted the overton window. Then, to the surprise of many Americans, he received massive support. One month after making those comments, his popularity in the national Republican primary polls went from 3.6% to 16.8%. Despite his popularity, he was not taken seriously by conservative network Fox News and during this time in his campaign, he was having public feuds with Fox News personality Megyn Kelly. He complained that the network treated him unfairly and even refused to participate in a Republican debate hosted by Fox News. Although not embraced by Fox News or other mainstream conservative networks yet, Trump’s extreme comments had sparked something in a large number of the electorate to warrant their support. On the other hand, his immigration comments sparked massive backlash from democrats. In response, then presidential candidate Hillary Clinton said in reference to Trump, “Recently a Republican candidate for president described immigrants as drug dealers, rapists and criminals. Maybe he’s never met them. Maybe he’s never stopped to ask the millions of people who love this country, work hard, and want nothing more than a chance to build a better life for themselves and their children what their lives are like.” Trump created this political divide by using fearmongering of the other to gain support. According to an article written in Psychology today by Ph.D. psychologist Bobby Azarian, Terror Management Theory helps explain support for Trump’s immigration comments. Terror Management Theory, as Azarian describes it, is “Terror Management Theory predicts that when people are reminded of their own mortality, which happens with fear mongering, they will more strongly defend those who share their worldviews and national or ethnic identity, and act out more aggressively towards those who do not.” It is this inclination towards this that Trump supporters have that is contributing to this political and civil unrest.
Furthermore, there is considerable evidence that Trump has profoundly impacted the way in which Americans talk about their politicians. According to a pew research poll done in October 2017, 69% of news coverage about Donald Trump is about the merits of his leadership and character, not his policy substance. This is considerably higher than other modern presidents with President Obama being closest behind at 50% and President Bush being only at 35%. From this data, it is hard to tell whether it is an active bias of the media to only focus on Trump’s character. It is very likely however that Trump’s extreme antics are so out of the ordinary that they garner the media attention over any policy substance. It also could be that Trump simply does not have much policy substance and that his main selling point to his supporters is his character and broad rhetoric. His brash persona is why they vote for him. Whether the answer is only one of these things or a mix of them, it is clear that Trump is certainly changing the degree to which we focus on the character of a politcian instead of their policies. In fact, it could be argued that the reason why Trump was able to defeat his Republican competition was because of his character. One Washington Post study done in June 2016 had participants watch forty minutes of clips from different presidential candidates, and through monitoring the brain activity of the participants, it found out that Donald Trump has a unique ability to keep people engaged. This trait of Trump’s is one of the reasons that Azarian attributes to Trump’s popularity. Eventually, the Republican party broadly combined to support Trump. It can be deduced that since the Trump “formula” worked so well for them last time, they will stick to it in future elections and push candidates based more on character rather than policy substance.
Another very important way in which Trump has changed our political discourse has to do with how Americans talk about Islam, muslims, and terrorism. Early on in his campaign, Trump called for a “total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States.” Like with his statement regarding illegal immigrants from Mexico, this is a statement that is out of the overton window and has never been stated by a politician in modern American history. One of the reasons why this statement was so extreme is because it breaks with one of America’s fundamental traditions: freedom of religion. This is written into our constitution and our national history that there is no religious test for citizenship. The fact that this statement which is such at odds with American tradition was made by a person who went on to become president shows how much the political discourse has changed. I am not suggesting that Trump invented Islamophobia in America, as there are many examples in U.S history (unfortunately especially post 9/11). However Trump has introduced the idea of banning all Muslims into the everyday political discourse and has taken advantage of the fear many feel in America.
In response to all of the extreme ways in which President Trump is opening up the political discourse, Democrats and those who oppose him have gone further to the left. The anti-Trump sentiment among those on the left has been a unifying cause for them to gather around. The prominent national best selling book What Do We Do Now: Standing up for your Rights in Trump’s America, a book containing a collection of writings from leading progressives (such as Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Ilhan Omar, Gloria Steinem, etc.) about what those who oppose Trump should do and what ideas they should push. This book is organized into chapters specifically dealing with the different relevant topics of this era of civil unrest such as racial justice, immigration, women’s rights, religious freedom, climate change, etc. This is indicative of the positioning of the left farther to the left. Bernie Sanders’ ideas of universal healthcare, universal higher education, more progressive tax rates, etc. have been gaining traction in the polls among Democrats. In addition to this, multiple Democratic candidates for the 2020 Presidential Election such as Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris, and Corey Booker have openly supported the idea of reparations to African-Americans for slavery and historical injustices. Similar to the ideas that Trump introduced into the political discourse, reparations was not an idea floating around in the mainstream political discourse.
In conclusion, President Donald Trump has set off a chain reaction in which American political discourse on issues such as race, immigration, islamophobia, and discussions around politicians have all changed significantly. Both sides of the political spectrum have opened the overton window and begun to indulge in ideas previously not common in mainstream political discourse.