Mainstream media detailed Trump’s multiple false and misleading claims but ignored how that was a deliberate strategy for demolishing our democratic republican institutions.
About 36.6 million people watched President Donald Trump’s Address to the Joint Congress on 15 different networks. That is the lowest viewership Trump received from his prior four State of the Union speeches. Nevertheless, it was higher than three of President Biden's four addresses. Trump knows how to attract a TV audience.
Unfortunately, his address differed from all previous presidential speeches in that he lied more than any other president.
Thomas B. Edsall is the Pulitzer Moore Professor of Public Affairs Journalism at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. He wrote: "Donald Trump can lay claim to the title of most prodigious liar in the history of the presidency."
George C. Edwards III is the Jordan Chair in Presidential Studies Emeritus at Texas A&M University. He wrote: "Donald Trump tells more untruths than any previous president. There is no one that is a close second."
The following nine networks summarized the takeaways each found in Trump’s address: CBS, CNN, NPR, Al Jazeera, AP News, Fox News, the New York Times, Time Magazine, and the Washington Post. The consensus was that Trump promoted blatantly false claims and used them to attack Democrats and their policies.
A wealth of data shows how Trump’s flood of executive orders and appointments has created immediate confusion and chaos in delivering services. But detailing that process demands a separate effort.
First, it is necessary to understand that Trump’s strategy was to repeatedly accuse established successful liberal programs and institutions of corruption without the slightest evidence. Second, his strategy succeeded in gaining many viewers who approved his Address.
Trump’s narcissistic boasting of fantastic accomplishments sets him apart from other presidents.
Trump’s personality is shiny, like fool’s gold. CBS News and YouGov survey results showed that most viewers of his congressional address described the president as "presidential,” "inspiring," and more "unifying" than "divisive." A significant majority also called it "entertaining."
That last attribute explains why many citizens do not take his draconian measures seriously. Trump is entertaining to many, and the media reports his half-joking comments without challenging their impact on citizens. Time Magazine’s lead apprehends it soundly: Trump Uses Big Speech to Spin Alternate Reality of ‘Astronomical Achievements.’
Time described his behavior this way: Facts were not the point of the speech; if it felt ‘overwhelming, that is because it is, and by design. NPR did an in-depth annotated fact check of more than 20 things that Trump said, which can be found here. Below are three that capture the Trumpian reality that his followers dwell in.
“It has been stated by many … our presidency is the most successful in the history of our nation. Do you know No. 2 is? George Washington.” The White House presented no list to substantiate this comparison.
“For the first time in modern history, more Americans believe that our country is headed in the right direction than the wrong direction.” A CNN Poll conducted by SSRS was released the week Trump spoke. CNN found that just 39% of Americans said the country was moving in the right direction, compared with 45% who said it was in the wrong direction.
“I terminated the ridiculous green new scam. I withdrew from the unfair Paris Climate Accord, which was costing us trillions of dollars.” Biden’s State Department announced it had allocated $5.8 billion by 2022 to finance international climate issues. US finance contributions to climate change have never reached trillions of dollars.
While the network reviews saw Trump making multiple false claims, most viewers were unfazed, if not supportive of his speech.
Over 15 different news organizations ran fact-checks on Trump's address. There has been more fact-checking of Trump’s speeches than any other president’s. That’s probably because Trump throws out so many outrageous, unheard-of declarations that are easy targets to rebut.
Lying is typical of Trump, according to academics and observers. Carole McGranahan, for the American Ethnologist, wrote that Trump is the most "accomplished and effective liar" to have ever participated in American politics. Donnel Stern, writing in Psychoanalytic Dialogues in 2019, declared: "We expect politicians to stretch the truth. But Trump "lies as a policy" and "will say anything" to satisfy his supporters or himself.
The TV audience of Trump’s congressional speech felt good about what they heard, regardless of whether major media networks factually repudiated its claims. Seventy-six percent of people approved of the president’s remarks, while only 23 percent disapproved, as reported in the CBS News and YouGov survey results. Sixty-eight percent said the speech made them feel hopeful, and 54 percent said it made them proud.
CNN’s instant polling captured a similar response, with 44 percent of speech watchers viewing Trump’s remarks as very positive. However, that’s lower than the 57% of viewers who rated Trump’s initial address to Congress to begin his first term in office as very positive and lower than the 51% who saw President Joe Biden’s initial address in 2021 as very positive.
The response was shaped by the viewers' party identification, which consisted of 51% Republicans, 27% Independents, and only 20% Democrats. Multiple media commentators described Trump’s speech as more of a partisan campaign speech than a report to the nation.
Republican viewers and conservative-leaning independents could be expected to be fine with Trump giving a campaign pitch they are used to hearing.
Chaos invites citizens to seek a safe reality; repeating a phony solution provides it.
Remember, Trump was a TV actor. He knows how TV audiences respond to presentations. This is particularly true when he delivers and repeats a simple, strong message, like “You’re Fired.” That’s how advertising works. Trump has applied this method to politics by convincing Americans he is telling the truth.
According to his former White House press secretary, Stephanie Grisham, Trump told her, "As long as you keep repeating something, it doesn't matter what you say.” Grisham defended never having held a White House briefing, saying, "It's because, unlike my boss, I never wanted to stand at that podium and lie."
Scientists call this pattern of carelessly lying as creating a truth effect through manipulating repetition to build people's confidence in the truth of what they hear. When statements on data are unfamiliar, mental processing makes distinguishing between true and false statements more difficult.
Experiments show that if a message is simple and quick to understand, it is easy to process new and unfamiliar statements as incoming valid information. And researchers have found that hearing an opinion repeatedly, even if only from one person, makes the opinion seem like a popular one.
This process of understanding reality becomes necessary in a chaotic environment. Trump created this by signing nearly 100 executive orders and taking over 400 executive actions within two months of becoming president.
In the first statement of his Address to Congress, he boasted that in six weeks, “it has been nothing but swift and unrelenting action.” Trump’s promotion of action as the solution to a problem has been used before.
Taking some action is a medicine that relieves anxiety about facing a terrible future. Revolutionary students formed “action factions” in the sixties to attack the police. Mussolini came to power promoting a solution of taking “action” to make Italy a better place to live. When asked what Fascism is, he replied, “It’s Action.” It’s the kind of action that led thousands to march on the U.S. Capitol to stop what they saw as an illegal election.
Trump’s swift actions include deporting as many immigrants as possible, abolishing laws trying to mitigate climate change, promoting oil exploration on environmentally protected public lands, and halting medical research that doesn’t provide a sure profit. Trump’s MAGA movement is to reverse liberal policies that have shaped our society and economy.
To carry out this effort, Trump is eliminating federal departments. He directed Education Secretary Linda McMahon to facilitate closing the Education Department, which disburses billions of dollars in federal funding to colleges and schools, manages federal student loan programs, and enforces civil rights laws in schools.
His appointee Elon Musk, as the head of DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency), is eliminating or phasing out departments and firing thousands of employees providing necessary services to Americans.
For instance, he plans to cut more than $1tn from the Medicaid and food stamps programs. Musk also laid off 7,000 IRS employees recovering unpaid complex taxes from large businesses, allowing more time to investigate the easiest-to-conduct audits on middle and lower-income taxpayers.
Trump’s directives create fear, confusion, and anxiety about one’s future economic security for those not in the top 10% of the wealthiest, having assets of $1.9 million or more. And yet, Trump carried the plurality of the 90% who will pay for Trump’s actions. This begs the question: How did Democrats respond while listening to Trump’s accomplishments in the Capitol Building?
Trump trashed the Democrats, and their response was muddled.
Al Jazeera summarized their response as “Democrats struggle to muster a response,” as they heard Trump denigrated Democrats, their policies, and the government departments that delivered them.
Trump’s address mentioned Biden 13 times, saying “Joe Biden, “the worst president in American history,” to the rousing applause of the Republicans present. In comparison, Biden only referred to Trump only as "my predecessor" 13 times in his first speech before Congress. His strongest accusation was his predecessor of "bowing down" to Russia.
Trump referred to Democrats as "these people" and "radical left lunatics” when he said, “In recent years, our justice system has been turned upside down by radical-left lunatics.” And adding that they were “weaponizing law enforcement against political opponents like me.”
Multiple media sources described Trump’s speech before Congress as "relentlessly partisan" in criticizing Democrats. However, they are not his voter base; a February Gallup poll found that only 4% of Democrats approved of Trump’s job performance overall, while it was 93% of Republicans. The 89-percentage-point partisan gap in Trump’s overall job approval rating is among the highest Gallup has measured for any president.
Given that level of support, Trump could enjoy tormenting the Democrats seated in front of him without fear of any voter reprisal. AP News reported that Democrats registered their dissent with stone faces, with some holding placards calling out “lies” and walking out during his speech. And they did not grant him even a perfunctory applause. This collection of individual actions are the signs of flailing in Trump’s swift current of actions.
The formal Democratic response, like the mainstream media, missed an opportunity to strike a chord with the public.
As is customary, an opposition party member responds to the other party president’s congressional address. Just-electedSen. Elissa Slotkin delivered a ten-minute Democratic response to President Trump's 100-minute speech. She had won her Michigan race in a state that Trump carried, so she is an ideal candidate to rebuke Trump.
The New York Times described her as delivering a simple, centrist message, devoid of partisan animus, aimed at voters across the political spectrum. She took a rational approach, saying, "America wants change, but there's a responsible way to make change and a reckless way,"
She said voters must hold elected officials accountable by going to town halls, organizing, and taking action. That was a jab at Republican legislators whose national party urged them to stop holding town hall meetings because critics showed up complaining about Trump’s policies.
Slotkin’s arguments probably made some folks think about how Trump’s actions will impact their lives. Nevertheless, like the major media outlets, she failed to hammer home the message that Trump is purposefully trying to demolish institutions that have served Americans for generations.
Slotkin needed to identify who would benefit from that effort: Trump’s cronies. They have poured hundreds of millions into campaigns to elect him and his supporters.
The Democratic Party can expose this effort by delivering a straightforward message. Trump and his appointees create chaos based on the lie of massive government corruption in every institution they wish to eliminate. Meanwhile, Musk is attempting to control protected government data as the head of DOGE, so their effort will go unchecked.
Going forward, Democrats must openly oppose Trump’s dismantling of the institutions that inhibit the concentration of wealth onto fewer families.
Nick Licata, a five-term Seattle City Council member, is the author of Becoming a Citizen Activist and Student Power: Democracy and Revolution in the Sixties.
He is also the founding board chair of Local Progress, a network of 1,300 progressive municipal officials.
If you like reading Citizenship Politics, become a Patreon patron or directly contribute to help me reach others. – thank you, Nick